Algarve - place on Earth

When I saw the surroundings of one of Portimao for the first time I was about to cry... Where were all the charming hotels with the ocean view, pedestrians with lovely restaurants and lively people enjoying their holidays. Instead of that I've found huge block-buildings facing each other, pedestrians with empty restaurants and staff not very encouraging to enter.
Luckily my disappointment didn't last long. As soon as the morning sun appeared I've discovered that Portimao's beach - Praia da Rocha is worth its fame. Long, wide, sandy, surrounded by amazing rock cliffs beach is much more than I expected from it.

After exploring the coast my flatmate Paulina and I took a break in one of the Pastelaria's and continued discovering Portimao afterwards. The center of Portimao reminded me of Cuba. It gave me a feeling of the forgotten city, full of very old buildings that lost their glory a long time ago. After seeing all the melancholic images I couldn't believe my eyes, or actually ears, when I've heard on one of the streets an old man playing Beethoven's "Ode to joy" - the anthem of Europe.

For thos who follow my blog regularly, as you see the black Smart is always with me!
On that day, we've discovered the train station which gave us an opportunity of going to the great beaches of Lagos for just 1,35 Euro one way! We were very excited about taking one of the silver trains woohoooo! They not only have double sits inside, but also triple sits - perfect for long legs of polish girls.

Before arriving to Lagos I had no idea what to expect from it. The story of it is quite complicated. An ancient town founded by Carthaginians, colonized by Romans, occupied by Visigoths and Byzantines, fortified by Moors and finally completely captured by the king Afonso III in 1249. The king gave himself the title "King of Portugal and the Algarve" because it was considered as a foreign country after the Moorish times. Lagos became very significant through centuries as an important port on trade routes. Many historical buildings still remained, such as Forte do Pau da Bandeira from XVI century, which personally for me looks like the fortress El Morro in Havana de Cuba. The historical area is full of places that are very attractive for tourists - wide variety of restaurants, self made products shops, modern statues, carousel for children.

Nevertheless, the best reason for coming to Lagos are definetly its beaches. Incredible rock formations make those places very unique. I've visited few of them...

10:00 am - Praia dos Estudantes - great place to lay down in the ocean waves on the hot summer day avoiding the crowds, it's nicely hidden from the wind.


1:00 pm - Praia do Pinhão - great place for amateurs of water jumps! Can you see the rock behind me? If look carefully you may see crazy Brits climbing and jumping into the ocean.
This beach is also a very cool place for lunch, turned out not to be as expensive as I expected- Tosta Mista costs 1,75 Euro.


3:00pm - Praia do Camilo - i'm speechless about this one! Its rocks absolutely rock!

After speding time among such a natural surrounding it's hard to believe that Algarve is a place on Earth - full of concrete buildings and hard working people.