Loulé
and Surrounding Area
Loulé
is situated only 20 minutes by Car from the Algarve's Capital City, Faro,
which has a busy International Airport. It is only twenty minutes away
from fine beaches and lively coastal resorts like Vilamoura with its renowned
Marina and the upmarket developments of Quinta de Lago and Val de Lobo. Loulé
is however not a brash place it is a bustling market town which has retained
a lot of its typical of charm with some fine old buildings together with
some really up to the minute modern architecture. There are plenty of
places to shop from the old covered market on the Avenida through exclusive
boutiques to several modern supermarkets.
There are still some workshops in the town where traditional crafts such as copper work, leather work and basket weaving are carried out. There are also many potteries selling hand made and hand painted tiles and pottery. Our favourite is Os Arcos where many of the pieces in the house come from.
One
word of warning: Loulé is a tourist hotspot on Saturdays. Saturday's
Market is by far the busiest day when all of the locals come from miles
around to set up stall and sell their wares. Tourists also come in their
droves and it can be extremely difficult to park so arrive early. It is
quite a wonderful sight to see cage birds, live chickens and ducks, fruit
and vegetables, fish and local produce such as olives, local cheeses and
the ubiquitous salt cod all for sale in one place at one time so I recommend
that you go once, go early (before 9am) and then retire to one of the
many open air bars on the Avenida for a coffee and a brandy if it all
gets too much! There is also a large gypsy/flea market in town opposite
the old convent (which is being turned into an art gallery) every Saturday
morning.
The remains of the old castle walls in the town house the local tourist information office and the town museum which is quite interesting with some roman and moorish pottery and a rather fine recreation of a typical local 18th Century kitchen. Parking in town can be difficult at busy times - along the main street there are pay and display metered spaces.
Casa Martin is a good base for all sorts of activities and excursions in the Algarve and beyond and we cover a few on these pages.
For
more information on the local area visit the Loulé
Councils own site which is in Portuguese (which I suppose is fair
enough!) and can be slow but it has lots of good pictures of the area.
Loulé's council (or Câmara) is incidentally one of the richest,
most highly thought of and progressive in Portugal.