A few weeks ago we found ourselves in that awkward in-between time during a move. We were in our new home with rental furniture, had unpacked the things that were air shipped over, were awaiting the arrival of our container and were exhausted from the last 3 months. We therefore decided to go on a quick vacation.

From the UK, you can go anywhere quickly. Surprisingly enough, Egypt and Dubai are only 4-5 hours away (That will be the spring destination). We landed on Portugal and the Algarve as it was close, hot and has beautiful beaches. We were not disappointed.

Thinking back on the trip, a few key things come to mind about Portugal:

• The beaches are beautiful and the scenery spectacular. There were towering cliffs, beautiful sunsets and long beaches with soft sand. We spent hours exploring every nook and cranny of the cliffs, rocks and trees. The boys loved it: washed up crabs, shells, unique rocks, really cool bugs and hermit crabs …. 

• The water is very, very cold. There is only one strategy – run in.
• I learned about the blue flag beaches (a quality standard for beaches in Europe) and that many of Portugal’s beaches are public. It was busy on our beach, but it provided interesting insight into the culture as the locals emerged with their families to hang out on the beach. It was refreshing to see so many families playing on the beach together …

• My sandcastle strategy failed due to the tides. In the Algarve the tides go out in the morning and come in dramatically through the day (changing the beach landscape by 40 or 50 feet) making it almost impossible to build a castle that would last the day .. so I got my exercise.

I will miss the gelato (which we had 2X a day) ….