Albufeira – 6/12/2013

 

6/12 & 6/13 – Albufeira

Last stop in Portugal – the beach! It was lovely, sunny and warm when we arrived in Albufeira on Portugal’s southern coast in the region they call the Algarve. We took a very nice bus, only a couple of hours from Beja. I had really wanted to find a nice place in Albufeira to enjoy relaxing in the sun after our bike trip and I agonized for months trying to find the right hotel or resort (of which there are many – the whole coast in this region is essentially a big beach resort). I found a couple of very nice looking, but above budget places, so I decided to wait and see if the price would come down, which eventually it did, a little bit, but we were still looking at close to 200 Euro, which was alot more than I wanted to spend. Suddenly, it dawned on me that I was looking in the wrong spot. We had been staying in all of these wonderful guest houses or riads, which we greatly enjoyed, but I was looking at hotels. I switched my search in trip advisor and immediately came up with a lovely sounding bed and breakfast right close to the beach with a rooftop deck and fabulous reviews. I contacted the Dianamar, requesting a room, and they had one available for 60 Euro. When we arrived, the owner, Eva, greeted us along with the Swedish (her homeland) students that are working with her to learn the hospitality business. She was delightful, well-travelled, and had a fabulous sense of humor. She wanted to check the room since she had a brand new student cleaning for her (they get work credit for school and she teaches them and houses them). When we got to the room, she went in first and exclaimed, “well, I guess it is clean enough”, which made us giggle. It was a very clean room, nothing fancy, but with everything we needed. Two flights up was a roof deck from which you could see the entire beach and town…it was fantastic!! In the mornings she put out a lovely continental breakfast, in the evenings, coffee and cake. Both days we came back from the beach, had a delicious piece of homemade cake (she had trained as a chef) and took our beers from the grocery up to the roof deck where there was a refridgerator. We watched the boats go in and out of the bay (or party there, depending) and thoroughly enjoyed what felt like it must be the nicest private balcony in town. I was so pleased with the choice that I vowed to remember that I don’t really like resorts, I like a nice place with a great view and a little bit of privacy. Of course, the B&B was not completely full, as it was a bit early in the season….but I would go back to this lovely spot any time of the year. It was very close to the beach, but up above it, however there was a lovely elevator that would take you up and down the cliff if you didn’t feel like lugging your beach stuff up and down a bunch of stairs (I didn’t).

Anyway, the guide books sort of seem to poo poo the beaches in Albufeira, mostly because there is not really any history to be found there. I say, anybody who knows anything is aware that beaches take millenniums to be formed and when I go to the beach, I just want nice sand, crashing waves, and bearable water. The water was a bit borderline (they had a cool spring), but the sand and waves were wonderful and the vibe was perfect. Although the beach was somewhat crowded, I thought there was a very laid-back feel. People were going about their business of sunning, swimming or whatnot, mostly quietly and without a care for what others were doing. Vendors came through every once in awhile with cold water, sodas, beers and snacks, but they would simply walk past calling out what they were selling and leave you alone if you didn’t beckon them over. Nobody was doing the hard sell on painting us, prodding us, braiding us or selling us knick-knacks, so it was just perfect.

A walk around the town showed us that we could easily find almost any type of food, beach ware, sunscreen, post card, etc. that we could possibly need, but mostly we just needed some beach r&r. We did have a wonderful Indian dinner the first night and Portuguese with a beach view the second night, and when we left for Ireland after two nights, we were refreshed and ready to put our jeans and fleece jackets back on, feeling as if we had had a nice bout of sunshine!