The Lake Resort Hotel Faro

... I talk briefly with a receptionist in a Best Western hotel. She's actually quite interested to hear my story, and takes my email in case she knows anyone that needs a bit of work done in exchange for room and board. This is the only beacon of hope, in an otherwise very bleak situation. <br><br>I eventually find the Youth Hostel, and thoroughly abuse their complimentary internet service. We'll see what tomorrow holds.

... the kingdom of Dom Manuel I, the headland already had a beacon kept lit all night by the Capuchin friars. With a range of 95 kilometers, the present-day lighthouse is one of the most powerful in Europe. From the fortress of Sagres a panoramic view of the Atlantic Ocean is unforgettable.<br><br>Night show at Hotel Algarve Casino was spectacular. The dancers and the light show were truly unforgettable.<br><br><br>

... it was pretty tame until one of the toreadors almost got trampled by one of the bulls, the dude was lucky they dulled the tip of the bulls horns. <br><br><br>http://picasaweb.google.com /Jonny.D.Lawrence/20091016Albufeira?aut hkey=Gv1sRgCImA4oCXitDO5AE&amp;feat=dir ectlink<br>

The kiting in Alvor is supposedly one of the best spots in Portugal, because of a huge shallow lagoon, however the wind was in the opposite direction so we ended up kiting on the sea side in the waves. Exhausting, but very fun to launch off the waves. We met a wicked ...

The west and south coast of Portugal is pretty much a long stretch of beaches surrounded and separated by huge red cliffs and you can get from one beach to another by crawling through caves in the cliffs (I also think that's where the bums sleep at night...) We did some surfing at a small secluded beach that I had been to 4 years ago with my family. We&#8217;re ...

... about perfect and the most direct. QF9 Mel to Lon, then switching airports in London to catch BA2694 to Faro), and the timings meant we missed a lot of the crowds and traffic, particularly in London - so well done to Yvonne who pulled together our travel arrangements. <br><br>There were a few things we had to watch along the way - mainly in London, for instance, there is now a shuttle bus service that runs between London Heathrow and Gatwick airports (so no longer a ...

... a mix of research, bookings and preparation for the next leg of our trip.  Organizing your travels while traveling takes a large part of our day.  Tomorrow we head to Seville, Spain, another day another country.  For now, we have a delicous looking restaurant lined up for the evening (non-hostel cooking! crazy!) and a large bottle of Portuguese port which we may have underestimated and seems to be getting the better of us.   All our best from Portugal Dan and Gabes

... on the beach before making our way back to Faro. Once in Faro again, we took a siesta (of course!) and then went for a walk again downtown to see if we could maybe catch the ferry to one of the little islands off the coast. We missed the last ferry, but surprise! The seafood festival was still in town so we stuffed our faces again with octopus salad, oysters, etc. Mmmmm. Much better than lounging on the beach. The next day, Monday, we headed back to ...

... It was all a bit too much for us, not our idea of what we were looking for in Portugal. We will check out a few more places in the Algarve, hopefully another place will suite us better. The Algarve is the southern portion of Portugal. It is over 200kms long with 150 kms being beach. The western half of the beaches have large rock formations with most beaches set in coves, the eastern half has long stretches of sandy beach. In some areas the beaches are not along the coast but on ...

... at around 6 or 6:30pm in my bed and woke up at 9pm wondering if I should get up for a while, but then fell back asleep a minute later and woke up again the next morning just after 10am. I always feel really guilty about sleeping in and not going out and doing "something", but I really needed that. Usually I just get a few hours here and there to try and make up for not sleeping for a night, but then my energy never feels completely up for a while. So since I didn´t want ...