One of the promises that I made to myself when I began to travel a lot more heavily 2-3 years ago was that I wouldn’t revisit a destination more than once. Except as you can probably tell, I’ve already broken that promise a few times. I went to Paris twice last year, and I’ve been to NYC 3 times within the past year alone (an updated travel guide will come for that very soon!), and I’ve now revisited Portugal as well. Although it’s been almost 2 years since I was last there, but it still very much counts as a second trip—but with good reason!

If you recall, about 2 years ago when I traveled to Portugal for the first time ever, I fell absolutely in love with the country. Peter and I visited Lisbon, Sintra, and Porto and loved every moment of it. I loved the country so much that I even put together individual travel guides for each city since there’s so much to see and do. If you haven’t had the chance to read them yet, I highly recommend that you do before planning your itinerary so that you’ll get the low down on all of the sights!

And because we loved it so much, we instantly knew that we wanted to go back when we found out that Mel would be visiting Portugal for her first time ever this year! This time around, we decided to make Lisbon our home base (Alfama is hands down my favourite neighbourhood and would live there forever if I could!), while also spending some time along The Algarve coast line. Portugal is well known for its beautiful beaches, rock formations, and coastlines—except we mostly stayed in the cities last time—so we decided to get in some sun and sand this trip around.

If you’ve got Portugal on your mind, or already have tickets booked, make sure to put some of these 10 things to do/places to see on your itinerary to get the best experience out of The Algarve region of this beautiful country!

Take a stroll around the city centre of Lagos

While visiting The Algarve, we made Lagos our home base. Although we drove back and forth between there and Faro, we chose to book our Airbnb in Lagos due to the size of the city compared to Faro. Although it is just as beautiful of a city, we were told by many close friends who had already visited Faro, that it would be a small place with limited activities to do in the evenings. For a stay of about 3-4 nights, Lagos would be the better alternative with more options to choose from. The drive between the two cities isn’t much more than 2 hours, so spending the day in one, before traveling to the other wasn’t too much of an issue for us.

We did find that restaurants and shops closed up significantly earlier in Lagos than the bigger cities of Lisbon and Porto, but we were always able to find a place to eat for dinner nonetheless. If you have an early evening, I would highly recommend taking a stroll through the city centre of Lagos to truly take it in. It’s a quieter seaside city compared to the mainland ones, but with just as many bustling locals and tourists to keep the atmosphere alive.

Praia da Batata

Along the shorelines of Lagos is a beautiful little beach known as Praia da Batata. It didn’t seem to be one of the better known beaches as it was literally unoccupied when we visited at around 6PM for a sunset walk. We had almost the entire place to ourselves except for a few other people wandering around here and there. This beach is a little secluded from the main city area without a marketplace situated behind it, so be prepared for a bit of a hike/walk to get to it since it is situated a little bit off of the cliff side.

Unbeknownst to us, there was an adorable little archway situated between 2 rocks that we actually had on our bucket list to visit, but had no idea was located there. Luckily enough, the whole place was completely empty when we arrived so we all managed to snag our shots very quickly before the sun set.

Lagos Roman Bridge

This bridge that we happened upon is known as the Lagos Roman Bridge and was completely unoccupied when we visited. Pop by the beach closer towards sunset to get completely undisturbed moments here. The tide also happened to be quite low so we were able to get extremely close up to the bridge without having to wade too far into the water.

Ponta da Piedade

Also located in Lagos is the beautiful rock formation lookout of Ponta da Piedade. I would highly recommend checking this spot out during the day as the walk up is quite rocky and might not be the best idea when there is low light. The view itself is absolutely gorgeous and includes a beautiful panorama of the Atlantic Ocean with boats zipping in and out of the dock directly below. Pop down the stairwell for a closer look at the water, or climb up the side steps for a dizzying view of the ocean. Either way, the views are great and definitely worth the short hike—make sure to bring sneakers so that you don’t stub you toes!

Praia do Carvoeiro

As we moved further out East from Lagos, we found ourselves in the beautiful city of Carvoerio. Don’t ever ask me to try and pronounce the name of this city properly because I can’t for the life of me. It’s a tongue twister that I can never fully pronounce. We happened upon this beach while looking for a place that wasn’t too overcrowded or full of seaweed and couldn’t be happier with our find. Although this beach is quite big, there weren’t many people laying on it and we had a significant amount of space to ourselves.

If you walk up along the left side of the beach, there’s a stairway that leads up to a beautiful lookout over the beach and the waters from which we spent quite a bit of time taking in the view. Word of the wise to any drone operators out there: do not attempt to fly your drone near the ocean as the seagulls will most definitely attack it and you. The don’t seem to enjoy drones there and we had many a narrow miss with the birds while we were operating ours. After several attempts, we sadly gave up and had to make do with the footage that we captured.

Algar de Benagil

Further east is a little beach called Praia de Benagil, which is home to the infamous Benagil Caves. This is definitely a destination not to be missed, and not for the faint of heart. Nestled deep inside of the rock formations is a little cave with an opening (similar to a cenote in Mexico) also known as the eye. To gain access to this cave, you will have to either swim, kayak, or boat into it. It is never accessible via land, even in low tide.

The tricky part is that the entrance to this cave actually opens up into fairly deep waters, which makes it difficult for inexperienced swimmers to access it. Coupled together with extremely strong currents crashing into the sharp cliff side walls, you can see why accessing this cave by swimming there is probably not recommended—though many people do attempt this every year. Do not attempt to swim to the cave unless you are an experienced swimmer, and keep in mind that the swim can take anywhere from 5-10 minutes depending on the current and tide.

You can also access the cave via boat, but many of the boat tours also lump this particular cave together with other nearby ones so you don’t necessarily get a lot of time inside of this cave—if you’re lucky. Most boat tours don’t even allow you to leave the boat to go inside of the cave, instead they’ll hover around the outside for you to get a quick glimpse of it.

We decided to go ahead with the kayaks (being confident in our kayak skills) since it’s only a 5 minute trip—I’m not even exaggerating, the trip is so short you barely even realize it. Make sure to go online and to book ahead because if you show up the day off, it’s usually completely booked. I would also recommend that you book your kayak for as early as possible because as the day progresses, the caves become extremely busy and packed with others coming in by boat.

If you plan on bringing along any electrical gear (cameras, drones, etc.), make sure that you have a waterproof bag on you. We made the mistake of throwing our cameras into our backpacks and our vlogging camera unfortunately short-circuited due to being waterlogged by the waves that crashed onto us when we were entering the caves. I’m not joking when I say that the entry into the caves is treacherous.

Praia da Marinha

Right next to the Benagil caves is another beach called Praia da Marinha which is popular for its rock formations. The hike around the top of the rocks is mostly level and very easy to get around, but like the rest of Portugal, there are no fences around the edges so be careful how close to the cliffs you get.

If you’re able to locate it (Google Maps has the spot pinned as a photo-opp) there’s a cute little pocket of holes in the rocks that from above forms the shape of a heart. It’s quite easy to find if you take the time to walk around the rocks, but rather hard to photograph. Unless you’re 6 feet tall, you’ll probably have to raise your camera or phone quite far above your head in order to capture the shot without having to stand too close to the edge, so I’d definitely recommend being cautious here!

Marina de Albufeira

Further east of Carvoerio is the city of Albufeira. The city itself is gorgeous, but my favourite place definitely has to be its marina. This pastel dream is situated just slightly outside of the city and is significantly quieter than the beach side. The stunning pastel buildings are just gorgeous to sit back and stare at in awe, but other than that there isn’t much to do there. I would set aside maybe 10-15 minutes to walk around the marina and admire the buildings, but that’s about it. This would definitely count as a quick drive-by but worthwhile destination.

Pousada Palácio Estói

As you head further east towards Faro, there’s a small little town by the name of Estói situated just north of it. This quiet little town isn’t always a recommended stop for tourists, but I believe that the palace there is worth a visit. The Pousada Palácio Estói is nestled deep within the town and has actually been converted into a hotel, but its gardens and courtyard are frequently open to the public to peruse without having to book an overnight stay.

Unfortunately for us, there was a wedding taking place on the day that we visited, so we had to ask for permission from the wedding party in order to access the space, but otherwise it is typically open to the public.

I love this palace because of the dichotomous decor where the top portion of the courtyard is mostly styled in pink, and the gardens below are styled in blue. As you can see, I had a little bit too much fun colour-coordinating my outfits for the photos.

Capela dos Ossos – Igreja do Carmo

There are so many things to do in the small town of Faro, but by far my favourite is the bone chapel, Capela dos Ossos, nestled within the chapel called Igreja do Carmo. This little chapel is not for the faint of heart because the entirety of it is crafted out of bones, so if you go inside, you’ll see skulls upon skulls, upon skulls. I personally find this to be extremely fascinating, and I have a mild obsession with morbid curiosities, so I very much enjoyed it. But if you’re not fond of this sort of thing, you can definitely skip it and explore the rest of Faro. Old Town Faro would be a great runner up option to the bone chapel if old architecture made of stone is more your speed. Keep a couple of euros available because you’ll have to pay a small fee to access the chapel of bones.