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ALGARVE NEWSLETTER
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The first weekend of October, and it still feels like September: 25 to 26 degrees, a mix of sun and cloud, a fresh breeze off the sea and only a small chance of a shower. Good walking weather, good sitting-outside weather. And the calendar is full in every corner of the Algarve, from the birds over Sagres to a free festival on the Ria in Olhão. Here is what we would do with it.
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🗺️ THIS WEEKEND AT A GLANCE
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FÉRTIL Festival · Parque Ribeirinho Poente, Olhão, Saturday and Sunday 2pm to 11pm, free · Talks, films, workshops, a creative market and food by the lagoon, then Sensible Soccers on Saturday night and Rossana on Sunday. Bring your own cup.
Sagres Birdwatching & Nature Festival · Sagres, today to Monday · The autumn migration at its peak over the Cabo de São Vicente, with boat trips, ringing sessions and beginner walks. Check what is still open on the festival site before you drive west.
Alvor Wine Tasting · Old fish market, Alvor, evenings from 6pm · Portimão's three wine estates pour side by side on the estuary, with live music and petiscos from Zé Morgadinho.
afpop expo · Portimão Arena, Saturday and Sunday, free · The yearly fair for everyone who lives here from somewhere else: residency, tax, health and property advice in one room, plus discounts. Worth an hour if you have paperwork pending.
InDireita Street Fest · Rua Direita, Portimão, Sunday from 10am, free · The old shopping street closes to cars for music and street entertainment, and the shops clear their summer stock at end-of-season prices.
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✨ PREMIUM PICK OF THE WEEK
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Portimão: Arade River and Silves History Tour on a Solar Boat
For centuries the Arade was the road to Silves, the Moorish capital of the Algarve, and boats sailed up it to a city of palaces. This trip takes that road again, on a silent electro-solar boat from Portimão marina: past Ferragudo, the salt marshes and the herons, and up through the orange groves to Silves, where you get about an hour and a half to climb to the red sandstone castle. A glass of wine on the way back.
👉 More Info
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Cerro de São Miguel: The Whole Eastern Algarve From One Hill
On Sunday morning, Moncarapacho holds its first-Sunday market. When you have finished there, drive four kilometres north-west, up a narrow road that keeps climbing. At 411 metres you reach the top of the Cerro de São Miguel, the highest point this close to the eastern coast, and the whole Sotavento is below you.
Look south and the Ria Formosa lies flat and silver, its islands drawn in white, with Faro, Olhão and Tavira along the shore. On a clear day the coast runs from Albufeira to Vila Real de Santo António and on into Spain. Turn around and the Serra do Caldeirão rolls away in green waves. Take a coat: it is always windy up there, which is why paragliders like it.
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The President Who Sailed Away
On Monday Portugal celebrates the Republic, and on 5 October 1923 a man from Portimão became its President. Manuel Teixeira Gomes was an unlikely politician: the son of a dried-fruit merchant, a writer of elegant and rather scandalous prose, and for twelve years the Republic's envoy in London. He took office in a country of strikes, bombs and failed coups, and found the job gave him almost no power to stop any of it.
On 11 December 1925 he resigned. Six days later he boarded a Greek steamer called Zeus and left, and he never came back. He wandered the Mediterranean and in 1931 settled in Bougie, in Algeria, where he spent ten years writing in a hotel room. He died there, in room 13, in October 1941. Only in 1950 did a navy destroyer bring him home to Portimão.
His town has not forgotten him. This Saturday at 6.30pm, a violin and piano recital opens the Manuel Teixeira Gomes Music Festival at the Casa Manuel Teixeira Gomes in Portimão.
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