Praia do Amado

• In the town ofVila do BispoVila do Bispo is the modest town at the crossroads of the Algarve's two coasts: south lies Sagres, ten minutes away, and north runs the wild Costa Vicentina. It is the seat of its municipality and feels like it: a working town of whitewashed streets around a parish church whose interior is lined floor to ceiling with azulejos, a market building, cafés serving surfers and farmers in equal measure, and none of the gloss of the resort coast. Its real estate is the coastline it commands. Down dirt-and-tarmac roads through the hills lie Castelejo, Cordoama and Barriga, huge west-coast beaches backed by dark cliffs, often with more space than people; the clifftop at Torre de Aspa, above Cordoama, is one of the highest points on this coast. The plateau around the town is scattered with menhirs, standing stones raised thousands of years before Portugal existed, and the whole shoreline sits inside the Costa Vicentina natural park. Vila do Bispo suits surfers, walkers and anyone using it as a quiet, unpolished base for the far west: wild beaches by day, grilled fish in town by night.

Praia do Amado, at Carrapateira, is one of Portugal's best-known surf beaches, a broad west-facing arc backed by red-tinged rock and cliffs. Swell arrives here with rare consistency, and the beach has long been a regular venue for national and international surf competitions. Access is easy by west-coast standards, with parking on the low clifftop and short paths down to the sand, all of it inside the Costa Vicentina protected coastline. Away from the water, the reddish rock and open scrub give the place a raw, mineral look. It suits surfers of every level, and non-surfers who enjoy watching them from the sand.