The Algarve, Portugal's southernmost province, stretches the width of the country. It is a simple, wholesome, fragrant and lively place. Despite pretensions of becoming a Riviera on the Atlantic, it is as homey as Appalachia. It remains a corner of old Europe, not yet standardized, plasticized and homogenized. Rampant tourist development threatens the region's peace, charm and authenticity, but has not yet destroyed them.
My wife, Jamie, and I, along with two friends, Jim and Dee Zazanis, spent a week in the Algarve late last winter. We picked this spot because we had heard that it was warm and cheap.
Cheap it certainly was, with our two-bedroom, two-bath apartment overlooking the Atlantic costing each couple $16 a night, including maid service.
Warm?
Well, in early March it was warm the way San Francisco is warm - fine for sightseeing, but too chilly and damp for sunbathing.
We spent our time roaming the region's small towns, enjoying the food, scenery and people and making little discoveries ranging from the bizarre (a chapel lined with human skulls, for example) to the delightful.
At noontime, the air in the small towns was fragrant with the odor of pork, goat, chicken and sardines sizzling on grills over glowing heaps of charcoal - not briquettes, but the real stuff, locally made.
The bread served everywhere was coarse and crusty with a whisper of ash clinging to the bottom, proof that bakers at the paderias had scooped a fire out of the clay ovens before shoveling in the yeasty round loaves.
In raucous open-air markets, Gypsy women shouted in English as well as Portuguese: "One thousand, madam-y, only one thousand. Very cheap price." The sweaters might have been of dubious quality, but 1,000 escudos was only $7.50. (At today's exchange rate, they would be even cheaper - slightly less than $7.) Tangerines cost about 30 cents a pound and fresh oranges less than 20 cents. A kilo (2.2 pounds) of dried figs was 500 escudos ($3.75).
