Leopold Alfred Gabriel
Germond de Lavigne, a senior French official in the Ministry of War at the time
he was travelling through the province, said:
“At present there are no accessible roads to get from
the centre of Portugal to the west of the interesting province of the Algarve. The
peaks that separate these two regions are only accessible by mule, and the
tracks are not always practicable. The least difficult route would be the one
that crosses the Serra de Monchique and winds down through this small village
to Vila Nova de Portimão and Lagos. A railway is being built to extend the
existing line that links Lisbon to Beja and Casevel; until this has been completed,
we have to get a public coach from Beja to Mértola, an old Moorish city; we
continue down the Guadiana, squeezed between the Portuguese and the Spanish
banks as far as the mouth of the river. There, in Vila Real de Santo António we
come across other coaches, even worse, which cross the whole kingdom from east
to west via Tavira, Faro, capital of the province, Albufeira, Portimão and
Lagos.
In Lagos we hire a coach. During the journey we have
lunch in the beautiful village of Figueira, from the provisions that we brought
for two days. (…) These consisted of bread from Lagos, tuna dried in the sun
and cut into pieces, sardines in olive oil, tinned mortadella, wine from Portimão,
excellent water, chestnut coffee and medronho brandy.
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