Till this day the town retains much of its recent historical charm, featuring many cobbled streets, old houses and very colorful bougainvilleas. Nowadays the highest point of the town is dominated by the parish church.

The town of Porches is a great place to explore one of the characteristic features of Algarve house architecture, elaborate chimneys. In the past the chimney used to signal the status of the house owner and was also used as a type of signature of the builder.

You may not expect it from such a rather small town, but there are quite a few very good restaurants which focus on evening dining, so much so that booking in advance is advisable during the busy summer months. Obviously there are also many cafes and snack bars, as well as a small market.

The area around the town has been known for hundreds of years for its clay pits and in the past the place produced some very large terracotta pots which you can see dotting the townscape. These were used to store wine, water and olive oil. Unfortunately the industry declined during the 19^th century due to imports of cheaper and lighter pottery and china, however the town was put back on the map back in the 1060 by the Irish artist Patrick Swift. His revival of the ancient Algarve style of pottery decoration sparked renewed interest in pottery in the town and nowadays Porches pottery is well-known across the continent. Besides the traditionally decorated pieces, Moorish decorations are also used and everyday items featuring these designs are created too.

The closes beach is divided into two by a 100-meter long tunnel, which you should check the tides before going into.

Four explosives were used to sink the Oliveira e Carmo corvette – a disused warship – while dozens of other boats, both commercial and private, filled with onlookers, observed from at least half-a-mile away. It took two minutes and twenty-one second to sink the old corvette, three miles off the coast, where a pioneering underwater museum will be created.

The sinking was very carefully prepared, with 220 tonnes of concrete having been placed in the vessel in order to ensure that it would not turn over while sinking – thanks to the extra weight it slowly gained momentum till it disappeared beneath the surface. We should note that the sinking was in fact postponed to this date because of adverse weather conditions, so as to ensure proper positioning of the wreck.

Divers from the Maritime Police then went under to ensure that the corvette had indeed reached the sea’s bottom correctly – which it had.

The second vessel was a smaller patrol ship named the Zambeze – it was sunk later in the day, with much less fanfare than the corvette. One should expect this considering that this was only half the size of the corvette.

In preparing for their sinking, both ships were very thoroughly cleaned and decontaminated before sinking – so as to not pose an environmental threat to the waters – and also all the pieces that could compromise the safety of the divers were also removed during this process.

The Ocean Revival project was announced in August of last year, a three million Euro project meant to create an underwater museum off the coast of Portimao. The idea behind the museum is to increase underwater tourism off the coast of the Algarve, by forming artificial reefs which would create a safe diving environment.

Whether or not you’ll be planning a trip to Portimao during your Algarve trip, you can surely visit the place for a few days or a day-trip with the help of our Algarve car rental services.