The Algarve has a geography problem that works entirely in its favour. Its best beaches are not long open stretches but coves cut into ochre cliffs, reached by wooden staircases, each one hidden until you are on top of it. That makes the shoreline feel far larger than it is, and means two towns a short drive apart can feel nothing alike.
It is also the part of Europe where a golf holiday and a beach holiday stopped being separate categories. The courses sit between the resorts rather than away from them, which is why so many groups end up booking a week on this coast with half the party never picking up a club.
Old Town or Marina?
That question settles most of the rest. Albufeira’s old town is a knot of steep cobbled lanes dropping to the sand, full of small restaurants and the kind of shops that sell the same six souvenirs. Vilamoura, twenty minutes east, is a purpose-built marina — wide, flat, modern, lined with boats and terraces, with the golf behind it.
Albufeira is better for wandering and for a first visit. Vilamoura is better if you want to stay put, eat well and play. Neither requires a car, which is not true of much of the Algarve.
Staying in Albufeira
Holiday Inn Algarve Albufeira
Walkable to the Old Town’s cobbled streets, with a pool, a straightforward dining room and rooms that do not try to be anything clever. Suits: couples who intend to eat out most evenings.
AP Adriana Beach Resort
Sits in the quiet between Albufeira and Vilamoura, which gets you both within a short drive and neither on your doorstep. Children’s clubs, a proper entertainment programme and a run of sports activities. Suits: families who want the resort to be the destination.
3HB Golden Beach
Self-catering apartments close to both the beach and the resort centre, with a good pool area and kitchens that are actually equipped rather than nominally so. Suits: anyone who would rather buy breakfast at the market than queue for a buffet.
Staying in Vilamoura
Hilton Vilamoura Golf Resort and Spa
Five acres of manicured gardens with some of the finest eighteen holes in the region attached, plus a beach concession down at Falesia — which is the trick that makes this work as a family base and not only a golf one. Falesia is the long red-cliff beach the Algarve puts on its postcards. Suits: a group where only half of it plays.
Tivoli Marina Vilamoura
Right on the marina with direct access to the sand, freshwater pools, a spa, and rooms that come with access to the beach club if you want the day organised for you. Suits: a couple who want to walk to dinner past the boats.
Beaches Worth the Staircase
Praia da Falesia runs for miles below striped red cliffs and never feels crowded because it is simply too long to fill. Praia da Marinha, further west, is the one in every photograph of Portugal — arches, stacks, clear water — and deserves an early start. Olhos de Agua, between Albufeira and Falesia, is a working fishing beach with freshwater springs bubbling up through the sand at low tide.
The cliffs mean steps, often a lot of them, and almost never a lift. Worth knowing before booking a hotel whose “beach access” turns out to be a hundred and twenty of them.
When to Go
The Algarve has the longest usable season in mainland Europe. May and early June give you warm water without the August crowds; late September and October are the quiet secret, with the sea at its warmest after a summer of heating and the golf courses suddenly bookable. July and August are hot, busy and expensive in that order, and the cove beaches that make the coast special are precisely the ones that fill first. Winter stays mild and green, which is why the courses never really close.
Where to Land
Choose between lanes and a marina, then let everything else follow from it. Jet2holidays covers the pair, awkward staircases down to the sand included. Our other guides to tricky shorelines sit at 2minuteread.