Corinne CrawfordI finally was going to get out on the water and see the coast from the sea. My previous attempts to both kayak and go out on a boat tour all ended with failure for one reason or another, but all looked good for today. I was leaving out of Albufeira which was about 30-40 minutes by train and although the train station in Faro was under a 10 minute walk for me, the train station in Albufeira was located well outside the town and not within walking distance to either the town or the harbor where I needed to go to embark with the tour company. I knew I was either going to have to take an Uber or a taxi but it wasn’t going to cost more than 10€. I dressed in many layers as even though there was some sun, it was cool and bound to be cooler on the water. The total time of the tour was 3 hours leaving at noon but due to the train schedule to Albufeira, I would have to arrive about 1 hour and 45 minutes in advance. I figured it would give me time to scope out where I was supposed to go at the harbor and get a coffee in a leisurely manner. Once I arrived at the train station in Albufeira, I got an Uber and went directly to the harbor. I easily found the tour company desk and they indeed had a café for coffee and snacks, but I still had almost 2 hours to spare. I decided to walk to the main old town area which was along the coast about a 20-25 minute walk. I had wanted to check out Albufeira and I was originally planning on going after the boat tour but if I could do it now, then I could either go back if I found it interesting or just go back to Faro for dinner. I made my way according to my Google directions and arrived at the seaside old town area. It was a sleepy morning with not a lot of activity and I wandered around the streets for a while before noticing it was time to get back to the Harbor and I hadn’t even had a coffee yet. I did not see any place that looked interesting for coffee in the old town so I decided I actually would get an Uber back to the harbor area and have time for a coffee there. I waited for a while enjoying my coffee and a book as more and more passengers arrived and checked in. I soon realized that they were taking two boats out, one larger than the other. I would have preferred the smaller boat, but I didn’t notice I had a choice when booking and ended up on the larger one. We took off out of the harbor and then hugged the shoreline to view some of the caves right near Albufeira. Apparently there is only one that is reachable by land, the rest you have to kayak or boat in.
I am determined to come back and kayak this coast line when the weather is nice and the seas are calm. After getting up close and personal with the rock formations, we picked up speed to get to the most famous cave on the route, Benagil Cave. The seas were getting a bit more choppy but we slowed down as we neared the cave and even with the rolling waves, the captain did a great job of navigating right into the entrance of the cave so we could see the “skylight” that is in so many pictures of the Algarve area of Portugal.
After backing out of that cave, we headed still further along the coast and the boat started heading to what appeared to me to be too small of an entry to actually go into the cave, perhaps when the tide was low but surely the captain couldn’t fit this boat into that entrance. But sure enough, even with rocking and rolling, the boat went into the opening and back out again after a few moments.
We were told that when the boat was going slow, we could stand up and move around but when the boat went fast, we had to sit. Before the boat picked up full speed, I got up from my bench seat that I shared with an older couple and stood near the back just beside and a bit behind the captain. I started chatting with the young super cute “skipper” and gave mad props to the captain. And even when we picked up speed and headed out to open water, they let me stay standing in my spot and I enjoyed that much more than sitting on a bench. This particular tour also is a dolphin watching tour and even though the captain took us to spots out in the open water that has good luck in other circumstances, we did not see any dolphins. This didn’t affect my enjoyment of the tour and I was smiling into the wind as we made our way back to the harbor. We disembarked and I called an Uber to take me back to the train station after I ordered some fries and a beer from the café right at the docks because I had a bit to wait before the next train to Faro was coming. I got back just after sunset and went straight to my apartment to change clothes to go find some dinner. I had two days left before having to get on a plane in Faro and fly back to the states.