Odiaxere guide
We like to make it our business to talk about the entire region of the Algarve, not just the extra popular destinations or towns and as such this is our Odiaxere guide.
Odiaxere is a small village found in the Lagos parish, a village not without its own charm but usually totally neglected by tourists because the EN125 makes up its main street and there is very little information about the place to begin with. And it’s a pity because the place has a long history that dates back to the Neolithic era.
Odiaxere makes for a great and little-known pit-stop in the greater Lagos region. The great advantage to the place not being a tourist hot-spot is that you can get some truly great traditional Portuguese food for considerably cheaper than you would in the more popular places. For instance you can expect to get the ‘plate of the day’ lunch for as little as six Euros, and that will include a glass of, usually, local wine. There’s a daily indoor market, as well as a couple of bars where the local meet and mingle.
Off the main road, you’ll find a garden square with lots of seating around a water feature. This is where you’ll see a rather large house with some impressive tile frontage as well as cast iron balcony. From the square you can also see the church and its impressive bell tower, the church having been rebuilt after the great earthquake of 1755. Its impressive stone-carved doorway is the original from the late 17th century.
The Ribeir de Odiaxere will take you down to the ocean, it’s more of a stream than a small river actually, the Moorish word ‘odi’ meaning river.
One major characteristic of Odiaxere is that it used to be heavily involved in the salt industry and you can still see many salt beds, positioned in neat rows.
