Travel guide and travel tips to visit Portugal

By walk or cycling, Faro has some routes close to the city that can and should be covered by those who visit us. Ria Formosa, the big salt water lagoon will always be a companion on the two routes suggested in this post.

Nowadays in Faro it is easy to rent bicycles to travel by these routes.

Riverside Walk - The "Passeio Ribeirinho"

This route starts next to the Marina, in the central area of ​​Faro. After crossing the train line you will go through an old industrial area until you find a leisure park called "Passeio Ribeirinho" located next to the municipal theater.

View from Faro Marina

Keeping us company will always have the water as a "background". As you walk along the Passeio Ribeirinho, you will see a salt exploration that is in operation.

 Passeio Ribeirinho

Continuing, you will reach a tarmac road located in Montenegro but very quickly you will enter again in a dirt road next to the estuary and some old farms. Arriving at the fence of Faro International Airport the route will take you always around the entire fence. Here you can observe the salt flats, lakes, birds, in the summer / autumn there are several colonies of flamingos and also the low-flying flights of planes arriving or departing from the airport. Halfway through the Airport Firefighters, you can make a detour and visit a nucleus from the University of Algarve where some investigations related to the sea and the estuary are made. Despite not being able to visit the installations, the entire surrounding area is very beautiful and you can rest and watch the Ria Formosa and also Faro beach.

Wooden Walkway near Faro Beach

Returning to the main route, you must continue to go around the airport fence that will end next to the outdoor parking at Faro Beach. Here, you must go through the wooden walkway placed over the Lagoon and cross the small bridge to reach Faro Beach.

I also recommend a walk towards the east end of this barrier island. After traveling the entire road you will travel the rest of the dunes on a wooden walkway until the end. This is the area known as "barrinha". It is where the estuary connects to the sea and is also a little busy area for summer and if there is wind, you will see kitesurf lovers.

Wooden Walkway to "barrinha"

Want to visit Algarve

The Algarve is the most touristic region from Portugal.

 

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Quinta do Lago Golf Camp - Ria Formosa View

This route takes us to the pine forest considered as the green lung of the city of Faro. This pine forest and its old salt pans are also a point of great interest for bird watching. The trail starts at the entrance to Ludo, the pine trees forest, where a dirt road will take you to the salt pans that are still in active. In between you can go through the various paths and trails in this pine forest.

Continuing our journey, after arriving at the salt pans you can take some pictures at that point that is known as the "salt mound". And that's right, it is the place where the salt taken from the salt pans is piled up until it is commercialized. Continuing on, observe the salt flats and in addition to several more common birds, such as ducks, you can still find the flamingos that spend a season here. In addition, there are also small turtles of various species that can be seen on the banks.

Ludo

Arriving at the golf course, the rest of the course will go around this course through a bird observatory. Then continue to go around the other golf course, here with the lagoon at your feet. In this part of the route you will cross a large wooden bridge that takes you to the famous Quinta do Lago Beach or Gigi Beach. If you move on you will find lake of the tourist resort of Quinta do Lago.

Ludo route - Ria Formosa

Quinta do Lago Bridge

In our suggested route, the return is made by the trail that takes you to the entrance of Faro beach. Here you can choose to go to Faro beach or return to the starting point again via the access road to Faro Beach.