Key Post: Portugal.

Thinking of summer holidays,any one got any suggestions on where to go in Portugal,resorts etc

Portugal

Lagos, is a beautiful town in the Algarve. It is not a purpose built golf/water sports/etc but a beautiful historical place full of atmosphere, entertainment, and real portugese people! Falcon I think is the only Irish Company to have aparatments there. we've holidayed there many times and have never been disappointed.

Portugal

I can highly recommend the Cegonha Country Club, near Villa Maura. It is not a country club at all, but an apartment complex with good facilities: excellent pool, poolside bar, two tennis courts, small shop. The apartments are clean and well equipped. Very popular with Irish people (about 30% of the residents were Irish). Booked it thru' Club Travel. The complex is about 10 mins drive from the town, but there is a free shuttle about twice a day to the town and beach, and taxis are cheap. Car rental is fairly cheap also.

Facilities for children on the complex are not great, apart from the pool, but there are several water parks nearby.

We found Portugese people to be warm, welcoming, and intelligent; nearly everyone speaks English so you don't even need a phrase book. Weather was great too, which helps.

The town is pretty small but well equipped with reasonably priced restaurants, and no lager louts. Excellent place for a quiet, relaxing holiday.

Portugal

I would agree with both Lagos and Villamoura - both lovely places. Albufeira's a good spot too, the older part is very nice - "the Strip" can be a bit gawdy though. My advice would be to stay away from Praia De Rocha - unless you're 18 and love lager. Alvor is close by and much quieter. Portimao is a nice fishing town although there is huge development going on more recently.

All said, you won't go wrong going to Portugal. Prices are great (if you going from Ireland!), weather superb and people very friendly.

MAC

Portugal

Big thank you for all the replys.Having gone through the Holiday Brouchors and taking on board the comments here we have deceided on Alvor and have booked a week there

Re: Portugal

i agree with lorraine.

lagos is the first place i've ever been that i could retire to.
what i liked about it was the fact that its a working town, not just a resort.

have been 3 times and loved it. if you want a resort albufeira or rocha.only word of warning though

its full of aussies. hundreds of them.

joeysoap

Re: Portugal

sorry

alvor is great too. quite near lagos and also near rocha and portimao.



if you are going to hire a car consider local companys and not just the holiday reps.
last year our rep wanted over €300 for 10 days hire ( multi drivers) and a local company in lagos (luz cars) rented us one for €214 for the same period. same insurance and multi drivers.

if you hire a car the monchique mountains are easy to drive in and silves is worth a visit as is loule and zoomarine.

lorraine

direct holidays also do lagos. no better no worse than falcon but its a choice.
cheers

joeysoap

Portugal

the pity of Direct holidays is that they only fly to Portugal from Dublin!

We're going to Alvor this year for a change, but the public bus service into Lagos in the evening is good!

The Jeep safari is a brilliant day out! we're not into the group holiday rep's tours really, but this one is worth every penny, book it locally rather than through the reps. much cheaper as is any tour you book yourself.

I too would love to retire to Lagos! heaven on earth!

Re: >>Portugal.

Hi, A few of you have mentioned Lagos as a lovely place to visit. If I get a direct flight, which airport do I fly in to? Also is it easy to get to Lagos from this airport?

Uisce

Re: >>Portugal.

I think you have to fly to Faro which is now much more accessible with the cheaper no-frills airlines. You can get a bus/train/ or taxi across to Lagos.

Re: >>Portugal.

theres now a motorway to lagos from Faro. Was first in lagos in 1995 and loved it. back in 1999 and loved it. stayed in luz in 2002 ( 6 kms away by good road) and loved it. only thing i did notice is that while lagos itself hasn't changed much in the centre the outskirts are getting very built up ( bit like galway in that respect) windy at night but still the place i would happily retire to. enjoy.

Hi,
Anyone been to northern Portugal? I will be going to Oporto in a few months time and would like some info on the place. Weather, accommodation, hotels, restaurants etc???

Hi Macnas,
I am also planning a trip to Porto in the near future,was wondering how it went for you over there and would you recommend it?

Hi again,have just realised that you possibly havent gone to Porto yet!!
Have you managed to find much out about the place as yet?

For ordinaryman and others asking about PORTO. I was there in December for 3 nights on cheap Ryanair fare. Lovely modern airport,direct new light rail line to city centre. Beautiful old city, parts a bit run down but nicely so. Did usual touristy things -open top bus tour to get our bearings, visited port warehouses and simply wandered around city on foot/public transport. Restaurants and coffee shops are good and way cheaper than Dublin.I think tourist office has website. We stayed at hotel das artes and got very good rate on hotel website though this may not always be available. I would recommend it for a relaxed city break and probably much more to see outside winter, river tours, wine etc

Thanks Dub,
Thats quite helpful, it does'nt seem to be a destination that Irish visitors are too familiar with at present so hence hard to get facts about.
Have been trawling the usual touristy sites for info but a lot of those would be biased anyway.
But overall reports seem pretty positive.
Thanks again,
Ordinaryman.

Hi Ordinaryman,
Been there. Good for a quiet weekend. Just like Dubwx, stayed at Eurostars das Artes. Excellent and 10 mins walk from center. Bus number #602 (very frequent) from the airport to Rua Miguel Lombarda (the stops are named on a screen in the bus) for €1.20. 100 m walk from there to hotel. Get ticket from driver. Food good and portions huge. Friendly people.
Much cheaper for everything. Get a busticket for 10 trips for €7.50 in tobacco shops. Get a bus to Matsoshinos? return bus #500 drives along the coast on the wayback. Look at the map of bus routes at each bus stop. They also have the Luas(metro) Sandemans port warehouse has a special offer for visitors just now. Look up Casa de Musica to see if there is anything of interest on while you are there. Very hilly but you can walk to most parts.

Central Portugal is very unspoilt and largely undiscovered by tourists. We live in a little town called Gois, a delight in itself, located on the River Ceira under the mountains of the Serra Estrela. There are some lovely little 'xisto' villages in the hills to visit, the rivers are crystal-clear for swimming and fishing, and there are endless tracks for walking or horseback riding. The local people are extremely helpful and friendly - though you wont find much English spoken in this region! We are only 45 mins. away from Coimbra, Portugal's 3rd city, between Porto and Lisbon, and there is some lovely accommodation in the area, including an excellent campsite.

What are the transport options from nearest airport?

The nearest airport is Porto. There is a really good metro system that takes you from the airport to the train station - Porto Campanha. The train takes just under an hour to get down to Coimbra, and then you can take a bus, taxi, or it's most convenient to connect with another train that takes you to Serpins, which is just a short taxi ride from Gois.