Our last full day in Vilamoura, Portugal

It's our last day in Vilamoura, and we've totally ran out of things to do, places to walk, areas to explore... anything really.

Before we came I googled: 'Things to do in Vilamoura' and came up with loads!! Lots of boat trips, sunset cruises, dolphin watching, cave exploration. There was the 'Kings & Queens' show at the casino, the casino itself was also an option, as was a trip to another town/village/city. 

The area boasted loads of shopping and a huge array of restaurants. Bike hire was another possibility along with sea-faring equipment such as jet skis. If all else failed, the apartment complex had a pool, we could swim our days away and burn some calories off in the meantime.

The reality was, no boat trips were occurring due to the sea being a bit rough, and the fact there were not enough tourists about to fill a boat.

The casino show was cancelled.... due to lack of ticket sales, and when we went in to enquire about a ticket we very quickly realised that 3/4 length trousers & flip/flops were not the appropriate attire for a casino of that calibre. We were probably more suited to a Blackpool amusement arcade.

A good 70-80% of the shops & restaurants were shut for a yearly holiday that they all seem to take around the beginning of the year.  

The bike hire was difficult to set up with no internet & cost 20€ each - a bit pricey we thought, we'd probably be only on them a couple of hours.

The beach was freezing, not that we are beach people anyway, but even walking along it brought chilly tears to your eyes.

So, we had breakfast and just headed down to the marina.... again.  There's not anywhere else to go really. Turn left out of the apartment and it takes you to the marina, turn right and it takes you to the marina. Head straight on and you end up at the beach, which leads round to the marina. (You can't head the other way in the beach as its all closed off for an upgrade.)

We did read about some Roman ruins behind the marina, so we thought we'd head for those. 

We didn't bother going in as we learnt everything from the information board outside.

So we just peered through the railings for a while. 

We headed back to the marina.

We spent a while looking in a yacht shop window, looking longingly at the classifieds, wondering how we might be able to raise quarter of a million to buy a nice yacht. Actually, I'd even have been happy with a tour of one right then, they do look magnificent.

I took a panoramic shot of the marina you might like to see. Can you see just how few people are about?  If you look at how many waterside seating areas there are, each one belongs to an establishment on the opposite side of the road, you can now imagine just how many people are here in peak time, and why everywhere decides to shut down for this time of year. 

Here's another of a little bar area just off the marina. Deserted again.

There was a distinct feel of 'ghost town' as we walked around this morning. And, to top it off, it was blooming cold!

We spent the next two hours in Pizza Hut, alone, overlooking the beautiful, expensive yachts.

The pizza was gorgeous. Although it felt like a bit of a cheat using a chain restaurant when there are so many independents about, but we really fancied a cheesy bite pizza. And there was free wifi too.

Here's a birds-eye view of where we were. 

The little face is Hubster, in Pizza Hut, the little arrow is our hotel.

Of course it hasn't all been doom and gloom, we did the long walk to Quarteira, and the trip to Cliff's vineyard. And there was the sunset watching (although that was well chilly), it would have just been nice to have a little more going on, a few more shops open, just a couple more people about. We don't like it too busy, but a little more atmosphere would have been nice.

We sat for a good long while in Pizza Hut, before deciding we really needed to walk all that pizza off before our last evening meal.  Not that we needed any more food, but we were on holiday!

Hubster had been Googling something on his phone and he mentioned something about a Spa... "Let's walk to that", he said.

Now that would be a nice treat I thought to myself, a nice afternoon in a Spa.  how wrong I was....

Yep, really, it was a Spar supermarket!  I mentioned about him liking foreign supermarkets didn't I?  Of course we bought nothing as it was our last day and we had no way of bringing anything back, we just wandered about it for a while.

So after our lovely Spa/Spar visit, we trundled ourselves back to the Marina for the very last time.   We were hoping to catch another sunset, but the cloud coverage was quite dense, so we didn't get too see many beautiful colours at all.

The place was deserted.   We were actually searching for a restaurant tout for an Indian we had noted we should try.   If the touts catch you they try to urge you in with the promise of a free drink, so to get a free drink I made Hubster walk about for 40 minutes to try and bump into him.

We eventually found him and let him talk us into trying his Indian restaurant.  We made him put a bit of effort in, didn't want him to think we were too easy  ;)

The restaurant was Natraj, and we did save the best until last as it was the most delicious food ever.
I think this has got to be the nicest Paneer Tikka Massala I had ever had - they threw some chillis in for me which gave it a lovely kick.  They are just slightly off the Marina front, hence the tout, but it is well worth the extra few steps - if you are ever there, do try it.

And then it was back to the apartment for one final sleep before heading home.

Goodnight Vilamoura, it's been nice (but cold and damp) to visit you,  Maybe one day, in a warmer season, we will return.

Walking to the lighthouse

You may remember that on Sunday we tried to walk to the two lighthouses that mark the entrance of the Marina. Sadly, rain stopped play and we ended up watching the raindrops from the comfort of a cafe drinking wine (or Coke in his case).

With nothing much better to do we decided to try again today. We started off at the point that we'd abandoned our expedition last time and meandered towards the red & white striped cone.

Round the Marina....

.... past the giant Christmas tree...

Which, incidentally, looks like this in the dark..

..... and round the scruffy bit where no one seems to go.

Then we find this.

Restricted access.

Sigh!

Instead we though we would carry on up the road instead, just to see what we could see. And what did we see? A path, leading to the sea!

We followed it and it took us round behind the marina.

 To a point between the two lighthouse.

It gave us a gorgeous view, but just look at those clouds!! 

We found a little bridge that took us across to the other bit of land with the lighthouse on, but as with the previous one, we could only get so far due to the rocks underfoot.

But to the side was the most beautiful beach, the waves were quite choppy which were obviously good for the surf-boarders.

So, of course, now it's time for the obligatory blog photo 'feet in the sea ' moment.

This was my second photo as the first time I failed miserably as the force and the chill of the water caught me off guard and I squealed my way back up the beach. Luckily there was no one about to hear me, and Hubster was too busy taking photos to take any notice of me being silly. I did get my trousers well and truly soaked though, and the walk back was accompanied by the slapping sound of wet fabric against my calves. (or is it calfs?)

Lunch time called and back at the marina we chose this spot, as for the first time since we arrived in Portugal, it was nice enough to sit outside, for a change. 

The food was nothing special though, a toastie for me and a burger for him. 

However, the large glass of sangria made up for it.  The waiter asked 'red or white' of course I answered red, please. He didn't have a notebook and came back various times to ask about our order - plain hamburger, fries, cheese toastie. It wasn't looking promising.  The sangria ended up being white, when I mentioned it he said 'I did not understand your instruction'. Hubster said he had the personality of a goat.  Not sure when he's had the opportunity to get to know a goat, but that was his opinion.

The white sangria was blooming lovely though. I'd have it again ;)  Happy mistake.

But check out those clouds again, and yep, they opened. Everyone in the outdoor seating area picked up their plates and their glasses and scrambled to get into the covered sections. Us? We just pulled our hats on and sat it out. My sangria grew by half an inch ;) (food was gone by then!)

To celebrate the sun coming back out a while later, we shared a banana & kiwi crepe. Sod you rain clouds, you won't spoil our day.

Then to walk it off..... down to the beach we went, to take some photos. Due to luggage weight I left my 'proper' camera at home, so only had my iPhone to snap away with. Still, it didn't do too badly.

The beach was deserted, except for a strange collection of seagulls, all standing together as if waiting for a boat to come in.

As a feather and flappy thing hater, I was brave getting this close. Not so brave when I disturbed them and they took flight. I got a couple of shots before running away. Made a good photo though :)

We decided we would stay on the beach, in a deserted beach bar, to drink a cocktail & watch the sunset.

It was so cold by now, I ordered a coffee first followed by a cocktail.   I expected a 'Costa' sized bucket, but got a thimble, so it was never really going to warm me up any.

And we waited for the sun to drop.

It was quite a sight, mixed with storm clouds from miles away, the sky looked like there were flames behind the grey.

Hubster took a cracking photo through one of his hand made marbles.

By the time the sun had totally gone to be we were FREEZING! So we headed to a Chinese restaurant for food to warm us up.

I had a veggie pancake roll which was really yummy. Never had one before, but it was the only veggie starter available. Delicious, I could have eaten three!!

For the main I ordered a vegetable chow mein, but asked for no onions or peppers, as I always do. I just ended up with noodles and bean sprouts, which was a bit weird - not a carrot or a Chinese vegetable in sight, but they tasted good topped with curry sauce.

 Hubster, the carnivore, had pan fried sweet and sour chicken Hong Kong style, number 64 (I just asked him and that's what he said - dweeb!!) which he said was 'good'.

We shared a banana fritter, which turned out to be slices of banana each separately battered. We didn't really want or need anything else, but we forced it down, as you do when on holiday.

.... as I did both of the complimentary glasses of Port. Hic!

Another day done, another day exhausted with aching feet. Seriously, never take a holiday with my Hubster if you need a rest!

9.00pm bed time.

A visit to Cliff Richard's Vineyard.

Now, listen up Portugal, this is what we call decent holiday weather - lovely sunshine & white fluffy clouds, like what we woke up to on Tuesday morning. Not the rain you've been generously dishing out over the last few days.

Both us us had headaches in the night, we blamed the wind chill blasting through our ears the previous day, we both have good 'walking kit' at home for hiking up chilly Lake District fells, but just didn't think we'd need to bring it to a sunny climate such as the Algarve! 

Anyway, we woke up to a lovely bright day so hopefully that miserable weather is behind us and we can look forward to a few days of sunshine before heading home to Blighty.

Today's plan, therefore, was to visit Cliff Richard's Vineyard. Now, this isn't a 'Cliff Richard' thing you understand, it's a 'wine' thing :) (although I did always quite like the song 'Devil Woman'.)

We were picked up at 11.00am, there was just us in the mini bus. Guess there's not many tourists about this time of year.

We drove towards Albufeira and it did tickle me to see pool liners propped up on the side of the road for sale. I suppose it's just like creating a fish pond, just on a bigger scale.

20 mins or so later and we were there. Just us again. Private tour for two then.

"Adega Do Cantor" means 'Cellar of the singer', apparently.

Now then, here's the story, Sir Cliff Richard (from here on in referred to as CR) has a villa and vineyard "down the road, way behind those trees over there.  You can't see it, it's private." 

In a nutshell CR and his business partner Nigel each have a vineyard. Nigel's was the one we visited, CR likes his to stay private. They share the business, they each grow grapes, they do whatever they do with the profits.

But it's CR's name on the fliers urging you to go visit 'his' vineyard. I guess Nigel's face (a non celebrity) would just not attract the punters. But it's Nigel's vineyard that you go to.

Apparently there are a lot of disappointed CR fans when the bus rolls up and they get told that they're not actually at his house, or even his hillside with grape vines all over it.

Still, as mentioned before we were there for the interesting tour of the vineyard. We certainly weren't expecting an impromptu rendition of 'Summer Holiday' with tea & cakes.

So, just the two of us there taken to a bandstand type area at the top of the hill, looking far & wide across a gorgeous view to the coast. 

'Must remember to take a photo of that once the lady has stopped talking', I think.

Then the rain starts. The bandstand has a perfectly good canopy, but the mere sound of the raindrops falling on it threw our tour lady into a mad panic. (We have come to understand that the Portuguese really do not like rain at all) 

She ushered us into the covered area where the crushers and vats were - big shiny, super clean machinery, ready for their next harvest later on in the year, but then the wind blew a few raindrops in and she decided we would do the rest of the tour indoors, beside the barrels full of Reserve red wines.

That was the last we saw of outdoors, I did expect to wander around the grape vines, maybe marvel at the views, what we actually got was a (albeit very interesting) talk about grapes, soil, harvest and sea breezes fighting mildew.

Then it was tasting time. Now as Hubster is a non-drinker, if we'd have been in a large group he would have graciously accepted his sample and sneaked it to me to neck on his behalf, but as there was just us two, we couldn't pull that off, so I only had single measures (we paid the same though!!)

I have to say though, the wine was gorgeous, and I did buy a bottle. Sadly I can't take it home as we only have hand luggage, so no liquids over 100ml, I'll have to drink it before we leave. No hardship.

I also bought a drip stop gadget, I'll

show you that at a later date, as I can take that one home with me :)

I asked if we could go back outdoors to take photos as the rain has stopped, but was told "no, we can't go back, sorry, once the tour is finished you can't go back" .......ok then, thanks.  Weird as there wasn't another tour waiting to go in or anything.

And that was that, we were out in the courtyard waiting for our return mini bus back.

On the way back the driver turned away from the main road from which we'd come and drive down some bumpy village roads, then he stopped and in broken English (which was much better than my Portuguese) he informed us we were outside Cliff Richard's villa & vineyard. 

I wonder if he feels people are duped into going so gives them a freebie view on the way home :) 

Wonder if he is allowed to as he didn't stop long & we didn't get a chance to get out of the bus. 

So there you are, we actually got to go to the real vineyard of Sir Cliff Richard.

Not sure it was worth the money though. 25.00€ each (one without wine) for an hours talk, and very little to see.  Having said that, if you managed to get there yourself then it was only 7.50€ for the tour, so might be worth checking bus/taxi prices if you're ever thinking of visiting, as it seems, between us we paid 35.00€ for the lift!!

After getting dropped off back at the apartment we headed out for lunch. We were searching for a Creperie as Hubster had cravings for one. We found a cafe away from the Marina this time, a place you might expect locals to enjoy. Often these types of places do the best food.

The owner/server was proper grumpy though, didn't look as we walked in, not a smile, actually he only spoke once when Hubster asked for a Coke Zero - he barked back 'Pepsi'. Otherwise you just got a grump and a nod.

He got his crepe, which he enjoyed. I had egg & chips which took me right back to my school days :) 

When the folk on the next table all started smoking, we left. Most places in Portugal now seem to ban smoking in eateries, but there's one or two that still allow it. We are so not used to it anymore that it's quite difficult to sit in a cafe surrounded by it. 

So we went for a walk and saw a beautiful rainbow...

Which seemed to be the warning for the clouds parting to send yet another shower of the wet stuff down upon us. That brolly, bought yesterday, has been worth it's weight in gold!

We spent the next hour or so over coffee & cake, taking advantage of free wifi and catching up back home.  Mainly to see if the weather we had left behind was any better.

Giving up on the afternoon as a bad job, it was back to the apartment to dry out & crochet. One thing about sheltering from the rain, it gave me plenty of time to make a new baby blanket.

As dinner time approached, the weather was dry enough, although a chilly wind was bowing, for us to attempt to get back into the Marina area for dinner. We had been touted for the last three nights to try an Indian restaurant, as we'd promised the young chap (feeling proper sorry for himself as he stood out in the rain) we thought we'd better go. Such a hardship you know ;)

It was the Muglay Clay restaurant, the us usual chicken tikka for him and I had paneer tikka masala. The paneer wasn't 'tikka'd' but it was delicious anyway.

After a couple of complimentary Ports (when in Portugal.... ;) ) it was 9.00pm and past our bedtime.

It's strange, I would dream of going to bed before 11pm at home and even that's an effort, there's just too much to do. But when your faced with no TV, no internet and a chilly apartment with a broken heater, and your already full of food & wine, the only thing to do is to snuggle up in your (single) beds with three extra blankets & wait for the next day.