Faro; Friday, 17 February, 2012

I had a late breakfast and then headed out into town for the day, walking the 2KM in rather than catching the bus. I started by heading over to have a look around a couple of churches recommended by the guidebook – the church of São Pedro and the Igreja de Nossa Senhora do Carmo. The latter having a very interesting, if slightly gruesome chapel made out of human bones.

Next stop was the museum of the Algarve and after zipping round that a short break from the walking by taking in the land train tour of the town centre. After the train I polished off the rest of Faro’s attractions by visiting the Municipal museum located in a former convent building behind the Cathedral.

Having exhausted Faro, and still only early in the afternoon I decided to head over to the train station and head east. I caught the train along the coast to the small town of Vila Real de Santo Antonio.

I walked the short distance down from the station to the harbour to pick up the ferry across the river and into the future. Santo Antonio is a border town and down the middle of the Rio Guadiana not only runs the Portuguese/Spanish border, but also the diving line between WEST and CET. So whilst it was 16:30 on Santo Antonio, just 400 yards away across the river it was already 17:30.

I caught the ferry across to Spain to the small town of Ayamonte and had a brief look around the town. I didn’t want to linger too long as I wasn’t certain if the times of the return boats posted at the ticket office in Santo Antonio were local times to Portugal or to Spain. Depending on the answer I either had 10 minutes to look around before the last boat of the night, or the choice of one in 10 or one in 70 minutes. As I was boarding the boat I noticed there was a different set of times correct for CET so I could have had longer, but it wasn’t worth the risk.

So, 50 minutes before I left Ayamonte I arrived back on the other side of the river in Vila Real de Santo Antonio. I had a bit of a wander around the town before heading back over to the station to catch the train back to Faro.

By the time the train left Santo Antonio it was already dark, and by the time I got back to Faro I was quite hungry (realising only then that I hadn’t actually bothered to stop for lunch). I headed into town for a large dinner. Sated, I wandered back to the station and caught a cab back (having already decided that whilst the walk in was very nice in the sun, it would have been horrible in the dark)