No Flamingoes in Faro

  Faro, Algarve, Portugal
Tuesday, October 14, 2008

We had a four hour train ride from Lisboa to Faro, taking the time to enjoy the Portuguese countryside rolling past in a blur of red-clay fields and olive trees. It also gave us a chance to finally use our iPods and read for a bit, which we remembered doing a lot of on our last trip but haven't really done yet this trip.

Mapless in Faro

Arriving in Faro, we loaded up with our bags and headed for the local info centre. It was a beautiful walk through the main seaside square to the info centre, but our luck turned sour when we found out the info centre was closed because it was Sunday. We ended up going all the way back to the train station because it had a giant stand with a map in it so we could plot our next move. With the combination of a map and guide book we became unstoppable, and Gabrielle waited with the bags while Dan scouted out a nearby pension.


Dan returned to Gabrielle triumphant a short time later and the peasants rejoiced (if only we had peasants, maybe they would carry our heavy heavy bags). The pension turned out to be quite hotel like, and we had an ensuite double room for a cheaper price than two dorm beds were in Lisboa.

Gate to the Old Town

Our bags safely stowed, we headed out to explore Faro. The town was extremely quiet, most of the stores were shut on Sunday with the only activity on the streets focussing around the cafes. We headed into the old town, a historic attraction in Faro, wandering past large churches that reached upwards with simple white wash walls but were topped with decorative bell towers and domes. On top of several of the domes and archways were giant collections of sticks that turned out to be the nests of huge white storks which spend their winters here, sometimes reusing and expanding on the nests over several decades.

Storks!!!

We wandered into an open door that turned out to be a centuries-old convent converted into a small museum of six exhibits. The courtyard was peaceful and serene, evoking the atmosphere of the convent's past, gargoyles standing guard on the rooftops. The wings of the convent contained the various exhibits, including some of the most poetic writings we've seen regarding the ancient Roman ruins that exist below the city of Faro. Leaving the museum, we spent the rest of our day wandering various parts of the city and finding a non-tourist oriented cafe for dinner, ending up at a tiny cafe watching over what appeared to be the opening celebration of a kids Dolce and Gabbana store (yuck).

Quiet at the Convent

On our second day in Faro we grabbed some warm, almond-filled croissants for breakfast and headed for a cathedral we had heard about in the centre of the town. We charged inside past some of the most aggressive Roma beggars we have yet encountered (if we spoke Portugese, we would probably be offended by whatever it was they were shouting at us for not giving them money, but we don't, so it's all good!) and headed inside to one of the most gilded churches we have ever seen. In a little courtyard outside we found the Capela Dos Ossos, a chapel decorated with the bones of 1245 monks who worked and lived at the church. One of the strangest aspects of the eerie place was that it backed onto a children's playground, and two little boys stood on tiptoes to peer through the grate into the bone-filled gloom, then shrieked and laughed when we waved at them, clearly unfazed by the hundreds of skulls and other bones within.

Inside the Bone Chapel

After the Bone Chapel, we took a short train trip to the nearby town of Olhao, where we intended to take a boat out to the nearby islands which apparently were the October habitat of one third of Europe's flamingo population.


Olhao is an interesting place full of interesting smells. Smells of fish, rubbish and cowpies all in variation. Being one of the countries major fishing ports, it still housed a major tourist strip with some very upscale shopping areas. In spite of this, we only stumbled upon the tiny ferry dock by chance but we had just missed a ferry out to the island. With dark and heavy looking clouds rolling in we decided to take a wander around the town instead before heading back to Faro, so we had to forget about the flamingoes.

Unimpressed in Olhao

The rest of our day was 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.

Perusing the Port

All our best from Portugal


Dan and Gabes