Our little adventure in Portugal continues with a day trip to Monte Gordo. But before we get to that, I must tell you about last night’s “nightcap” at the Palace bar. The bar had run out of Limoncello, so Tiago the barman, gave us what he called a traditional Portuguese nightcap. Holy moly – I must be a Portuguese tradition to A) poison all visitors and B) drink liquid rocket fuel. Apparently, it aids digestion. However, I think that’s only because all your other internal organs immediately shut down when you drink it. It took us about an hour to drink one small glass each! Damn you Tiago and your Portuguese traditions.

About one hour’s drive from our Palace hotel in the village of Estoi, we came across Monte Gordo, a former Portuguese fishing village, now orientated towards tourism. Monte Gordo, even in Winter, was full of tourists, presumably from the northern hemisphere, as they were wearing swimwear (with no apparent regard for body age or shape) and lying on sun lounges on the beach. Meanwhile we were wearing jeans, boots, coats and scarves. I haven’t been here long enough to acclimatise.

There are restaurants all along the beach (on the actual sand) connected by timber boardwalks and surrounded by deck chairs and permanent straw-topped umbrellas. We sit by a table in the sun, enjoying the typically delicious and very affordable wine of the area. It’s only 1 Euro for a glass. The Atlantic Ocean gently rolls up onto the shoreline – although I imagine the surf can get quite big along this coast when the swell picks up.

Further down the beach, the sky is full of seagulls, there’s a collection of objects (we’re too far away to see what they are), and lots of fluttering flags. As we get closer, we see it’s a collection of timber fishing boats, maybe 40 in total, each one chocked up in the soft sand, dragged there by a tractor, which waits patiently for the other boats to come in after their morning of fishing.

As the fishermen clean their nets, the seagulls wait hopefully for the morsels of fish deemed unsuitable for the market. They are the biggest seagulls I’ve ever seen – they make me think of duck a l’orange for some reason.

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We meet Antonio Banderas – he was cleaning squid and red mullet at a wash station at the back of the beach. He speaks 7 languages and tells us he’s also a singer and a model. He sings a few lines which makes me immediately hope that he does most of his singing out on the boat, thus minimising the ear-bleeding damage he can do. I snapped a picture of him – his modelling career must also occur mainly on the boat?

From Monte Gordo, it’s only 30 minutes to the Spanish border, and with no fanfare, no border security, we’re back in Spain. Three hours later and the Rock of Gibraltar looms large in the front windscreen. We avert our eyes (hard to do when you’re driving right towards it). An hour later, we’re back in the apartment at Puerto Banus, and it feels like home. #IloveSpain #LovePortugaltoo