The Algarve by Sea

 

What an incredible day! It began with a 7am start as I headed towards Benagil for my morning kayaking tour of the Benagil Cave. It was a 40 minute drive and went pretty smoothly...not much traffic on the road at this time of day in Portugal.

I arrived at the tour company to meet the other 22 people on my tour and we all got our safety orientation. I was the only one there by myself, so everyone else was in a double kayak and they decided to put me in a single kayak instead of going with the guide. I wasn’t sure what I thought of that, but I went with it and figured they knew what they were doing.  

The weather was spectacular...low wind, sun was out but not too hot and no thunderstorms in the forecast. One at a time we were given a kayak and helped into the water.  The views of this area are truly stunning...all of the coast in the Algarve is the same way with cliffs jutting out of the water with their unique clay, sandstone and limestone colour combination.

Within about 10 minutes we were all on the water and on our way. Kayaking on the ocean can be tricky, especially if there is wind, but we had a perfect day so the waves were pretty calm...at least on our way out. After 10 minutes of kayaking, we arrived at the Benagil Cave...a famous landmark in Portugal and I can see why.

To enter we each had to wait our turn and kayak in one at a time. This allowed our guide to help pull us up on to the beach as we arrived. Inside this cave is a good size beach, two archways you can enter from and a hole out the top. The water was turquoise in colour, the sun shinning in caused a gold colour hue on the rocks. It really was a spectacular place to experience..only those in kayaks of SUP are allowed to come in the cave and go on the beach - no boats allowed. Being the first group to arrive that day was really special and felt so calm and relaxing. 

The cliffs and caves are somewhat unstable from erosion and while we were inside the cave, you could see clay falling from above...in fact there are signs posted all over about falling rocks...for the briefest moment I thought, what am I doing in here, but that quickly passed. 

After about 15 minutes we were back on our way, just as another tour was heading in. I purposely booked this tour because I heard this area gets very busy as the day goes along and I am so glad I did. 

For the next 30 minutes we took turns entering other smaller caves…always in single file…some were quite dark, others had little room to navigate and one we couldn’t get through on the other side because the tide was too high, so we had to turn and paddle back out instead.  

As we moved from cave to cave we came out to see more massive arches, cliffs and beaches. We passed along Lovers Beach and ended at Marinha Beach...one of the top 100 beaches in the world.

By this point we had gone about 2km down the coastline and it was time to turn around and head back. The wind had started to pick up slightly so kayaking back was a bit tougher. What made it even more difficult were all the tour boats that were all around creating wakes...apparently no wake zone is not a thing in Portugal. Sorry no pictures since navigating tte kayak on my own was a full time job at this point and I had no co-pilot to capture the scenery.  

It was a great couple hours, but I was loosing steam...doing all the work, taking pictures, navigating waves and constantly trying to keep from banging into others while we waited our turn to enter caves had done me in during the last 10 minutes. But slow and stead was the name of the game and I made it back exhausted, but exhilarating…even though I’m sure one of a tour boats was trying to run me over at one point!

I was in need of a good gulp of water and some fuel to get my energy back, so I went up to my car, grabbed my lunch and some water and sat outside for a bit to relax. At this point I decided to leave my car parked and hike to Marinha Beach instead…it was about 2km away. 

At this point it was noon and the place was packed with people, so I figured leaving the car was the best option. The hike to Marinha Beach is part of the Seven Hanging Valleys Trail...a 6 km linear trail that I was planning to do today…and what a journey I was about to have.

Stay tuned for part 2 of my day in the Algarve.

Until then...share in the experience.

Lisa