Faro, Portugal

The Algarve - Portugal
This exchange is located just 2 km from the village of Mancarapacho and 15 km from the city and international airport of Faro or 3 hours drive or train from Lisbon.

Entrance to estate

Ed, the owner, was born in Holland, and started building this estate in Moncarapacho over 35 years ago. He lives much of the time now in Sri Lanka as he loves the lifestyle there as much as Portugal.
Ed was a travel guide for the last 15 years and now trying to retire and enjoy the many return exchanges he has yet to complete.
He would even like someone to take over the running of his estate as Ed has now finished all the development and would like for someone else to take on the estate as a business.
As a travel guide he not only knows several languages he knows all the history and information about each place he has visited.
A very knowledgeable and interesting guy, he has traveled lots more than me.
He loves India and Sri Lanka and up until now I have not really been interested in those places ... but looks like I will now have to investigate.

On his estate he has 5 private villas each complete with a swimming pool and car to use.

One of several swimming pools

There are large supermarkets at the nearby town of Olhao just 5kms away, this town is also the nearest train station.
You can either spend all day at the villa lazing by the pool and doing very little or exploring the Algarve region ... I did both.
When I had visitors we would explore the area:
When on my own I was content with a daily 2km walk into Moncarapacho and the rest of the time relaxing on the balcony of the apartment, admiring the view and enjoying the warm weather.

The roads in Portugal are really bad and any signposts are just there to confuse you.
For some reason the councils enjoy building roundabouts ... I am certain they are not all required.
I had a map and have a good sense of direction and was trying to be careful to get the right exit in the roundabouts ... But still got it wrong on several occasions.
A GPS would not have helped because all the roundabouts are new.

I arrived in June and I think that was a good time to visit. I don't like places to
I was there in shoulder season and the traffic was bad and were many delays caused by roadworks.
I would hate to be driving around in peak season if the roadworks was still ongoing.
They are trying to improve the roads ... But I don't know ... Not impressed so far.
There are many beautiful towns and cities in the Algarve.
Tavira was not too far away and a more authentic town well worth seeing.
The coastline is very impressive and there are many coastal walks.

All the plants on this estate have been planted by Ed as seedlings and they thrive in this environment and need no watering and little maintenance.
The estate has its own bore water so the water can be hard and soap does not lather as much as
normal town water does. The other issue with bore water is that it has a lot of minerals and most of the water fountains has ceased to operate as the jets become clogged with calcium buid up.

Pond (Turtle lives here)

The apartments and Villas are all finished to a high standard and each has deck chairs and a barbeque so that guests can make the most of outdoor living.

Upstairs apartment at front of estate

There is a trampoline and a tennis come basketball court and also a table tennis table.
There is also a spa and sauna on the estate but not sure if these are really required as you are more likely to want a cold shower to cool off.

Tennis court and swimming pool

If Ed is not able to take you to the airport or train station on your departure then his helping hand that looks after the pools and all the other maintainance activities will take take you.