Surfing Waves

Heya guys!

So we've booked a trip to Portugal in mid October for some wonderful surfing and rock climbing!

However, we're finding it difficult identifying towns/cities where you can walk to the beach, rent a board and surf. And not stuck at a surf camp outside of town, or having to drive with surfboards to the surf beaches.

Does anyone have any recommendations?

So far we have narrowed down on Arrafini and Sagres. Not sure about Lagos as there is no clear info on that.

Thanks a lot guys!

Have you surfed before? There were a few good recommendations to your previous post. Baleal Peniche area has walk to the beach and rent board facilities .
Rock climb, maybe Cliff will give you some answers.

You wanted night life before, there is an amazing amount of information available, but your new research is a little close to your departure time.
BTW what happened to your July trip?

Arrifana is very small with not much to do other than surf I think. There is one west facing beach and you'll be able to rent gear (it will be busy!) There aren't many shops or anything around. If the surf is bad, you need to drive somewhere else.

Sagres is a nice small town, but you will have to stay in the centre to have walking distance to the beach, and you'll only be walking distance to one beach really (or two depending on your competence), which may or may not be working.

Lagos is a much better place to stay with good restaurants/nightlife, but there is only one beach within walking distance and it's usually not good for surfing.

If you really insist on not driving, as Jaffa says Baleal is probably your best option (there are still more options here if you drive though).

All the spots you mention will be pretty busy with tourists and locals.

Have you surfed before? There were a few good recommendations to your previous post. Baleal Peniche area has walk to the beach and rent board facilities .
Rock climb, maybe Cliff will give you some answers.

You wanted night life before, there is an amazing amount of information available, but your new research is a little close to your departure time.
BTW what happened to your July trip?

Thanks for the quick replies guys! The July trip never materialized as my friends and I went on an Iceland trip instead. Now I'm going with my gf. We're beginners when it comes to surfing. Won't the central-northern parts be colder than the Southern Algarve region? Due to this we haven't researched much other than the Algarve region.

Lebowski wrote:Arrifana is very small with not much to do other than surf I think. There is one west facing beach and you'll be able to rent gear (it will be busy!) There aren't many shops or anything around. If the surf is bad, you need to drive somewhere else.

Sagres is a nice small town, but you will have to stay in the centre to have walking distance to the beach, and you'll only be walking distance to one beach really (or two depending on your competence), which may or may not be working.

Lagos is a much better place to stay with good restaurants/nightlife, but there is only one beach within walking distance and it's usually not good for surfing.

If you really insist on not driving, as Jaffa says Baleal is probably your best option (there are still more options here if you drive though).

All the spots you mention will be pretty busy with tourists and locals.

Thanks for this info. When you say the beach at Lagos is not good for surfing, do you mean that the waves are not "good" for pro-level and good surfing? Because, as mentioned, we're just beginners. Can stand on it Last November we were in Tagazhout and had a blast just walking down to the beach and surfing. Al though some days the waves were a bit too big and I had some devastating wipes!

Another option I guess would be to rent a campervan so we can just go stay near the beaches and surf as we please. Anyone have any experience with this? What are the laws regarding this also? As in Iceland you're only allowed to park and camp certain places.

The central parts are only a little colder than the Algarve, but the water is still warm in October. 3/2 was fine for me. I actually surfed in boardies only in November once in the Algarve (I was a bit cold but it was fun).

The beach in Lagos is on the south coast, which means it only really has waves in large swells because the swell usually comes from the western quadrant. You could get lucky and have waves but it also might be poor. The town is a lot of fun though and makes a good base (for driving based surfing).

If you want guaranteed waves in walking distance then Baleal is probably the best option. There are also a few great restaurants there.

All the spots you mention get mega crowded at times, with lots of surf schools and local surfers all jostling for waves. If you're willing to walk down the beaches a little further you can usually get some less crowded waves and avoid annoying the locals.

Lebowski wrote:The central parts are only a little colder than the Algarve, but the water is still warm in October. 3/2 was fine for me. I actually surfed in boardies only in November once in the Algarve (I was a bit cold but it was fun).

The beach in Lagos is on the south coast, which means it only really has waves in large swells because the swell usually comes from the western quadrant. You could get lucky and have waves but it also might be poor. The town is a lot of fun though and makes a good base (for driving based surfing).

If you want guaranteed waves in walking distance then Baleal is probably the best option. There are also a few great restaurants there.

All the spots you mention get mega crowded at times, with lots of surf schools and local surfers all jostling for waves. If you're willing to walk down the beaches a little further you can usually get some less crowded waves and avoid annoying the locals.

What about Ericeira? It's also known for surfing and is lively. Any walking access to surf?

Yes, you can walk to some of the breaks in Ericeira, and the town is nice. The breaks all face west though so if it's onshore, it's onshore everywhere. A lot of the breaks are also rocky in places. There are plenty of surf schools and beginners there, but it's not somewhere that I consider ideal for beginners. I think you'd be better off at Baleal.

If you do go to Ericeira, it'd probably be best to go to a surf camp and let them take you to the best places each day. At certain tides, rocks can be exposed and it would be better to have someone to advise you where you need to be.

Aight. I think we will drop the South as we cannot find any cheaper campervans/sleeper cars for 2 people (only 4 people and more costing 80 euros a day or more, with 2000 euro deposits.)

Instead we'll explore the central area, and work our way up North from Lisbon stopping at:
Ericeira and Balael. However, looking at google maps there seems to be many smaller towns on the way, with sandy beaches, such as: Santa Cruz, the town by Praia da Areia Branca, Consolacao. Any knowledge about these places?

Thanks!

Why don't you just stay wherever you want, but rent a car? You can rent one for about 100 Euros per week, and you can explore all the surf spots. I don't know where you're from, but you can get annual car rental excess insurance for about £40 a year, which means you're covered for insurance aswell and your deposit is safe.

There are schools and board rental up the entire coast from Guincho past Praia Grande and Ericeira to Peniche, Probably the best infrastructure is around Ericeira but Peniche has the advantage of at least having some options in the North Winds.
If you're in a hire car or camper be wary around Ericeira and Peniche especially some of the more tucked away breaks as there has been a massive spate of car breakins this summer, cops don't seem to care as they only target visiting surfers.

Peniche can be wildly crowded and Ribeira D'Illas is always a zoo but a mile or two North San Lourenco is very similar but empty, lots of options.

Hey there,

I spent around 6 weeks in Sagres this June and July, and here are my notes:

1) Arrifana is beautiful as a location, and the beachbreak on the left side of the beach is *very* beginner-friendly. Works on all tides, soft and rolling. The prevailing wind in June / July was from the north, and Arrifana was by far the most consistently surfable wave; due to it's strange orientation, north wind is kept away by the cliffs. It is a small town with not much to do when there is no surf, but I like exactly that.
My (beginner) friends loved Arrifana.

When the waves are very big, there's a legendary right-hander pointbreak on the other side of the bay, but that is definitely a wave to watch advanced surfers on, certainly not a wave for me.

2) Sagres is great - super chill, and due to the peninsula location you have multiple beaches facing different directions. If you stay in Sagres center, you can reach Tonel and the south facing beach by foot; you probably want to get at least a bicycle so you can also reach Beliche (which is a beautiful beachbreak, and a fair bit faster / hollower than the Arrifana beachbreak).

In general, the region is more fun if you have a car - and even more fun if you have a 4x4, as there are quite a few hidden secret gems on the coast. But I loved my stay in Sagres, and with a decent bicycle you get three different spots in non-car range, which is a fairly rare configuration.

3) I spent some time in Ericeira a few years ago. I was very much a beginner then. The town is beautiful, but my main memory was that (a) we still needed a car to get to the different breaks and (b) tons of sea urchins - my wife spent an afternoon with tweezers removing about 50 spines from my foot. So boots are a must .

Hope this helps, and all the best!

tdullien wrote:Hey there,

I spent around 6 weeks in Sagres this June and July, and here are my notes:

1) Arrifana is beautiful as a location, and the beachbreak on the left side of the beach is *very* beginner-friendly. Works on all tides, soft and rolling. The prevailing wind in June / July was from the north, and Arrifana was by far the most consistently surfable wave; due to it's strange orientation, north wind is kept away by the cliffs. It is a small town with not much to do when there is no surf, but I like exactly that.
My (beginner) friends loved Arrifana.

When the waves are very big, there's a legendary right-hander pointbreak on the other side of the bay, but that is definitely a wave to watch advanced surfers on, certainly not a wave for me.

2) Sagres is great - super chill, and due to the peninsula location you have multiple beaches facing different directions. If you stay in Sagres center, you can reach Tonel and the south facing beach by foot; you probably want to get at least a bicycle so you can also reach Beliche (which is a beautiful beachbreak, and a fair bit faster / hollower than the Arrifana beachbreak).

In general, the region is more fun if you have a car - and even more fun if you have a 4x4, as there are quite a few hidden secret gems on the coast. But I loved my stay in Sagres, and with a decent bicycle you get three different spots in non-car range, which is a fairly rare configuration.

3) I spent some time in Ericeira a few years ago. I was very much a beginner then. The town is beautiful, but my main memory was that (a) we still needed a car to get to the different breaks and (b) tons of sea urchins - my wife spent an afternoon with tweezers removing about 50 spines from my foot. So boots are a must .

Hope this helps, and all the best!

Thanks a lot for that input!

We are set on going South due to the weather and want to rent a car. However, it seems like the cheap car rentals, like 120 - 150 euro per week, are quite small cars and can therefore not transport surfboards...

1) Arrifiana: Did you have to drive to the surfspots? And when you say it was a small town - were there at least some restaurants?
2) Great tip regarding getting bicycles! Have they made these surfboard racks for the bikes? Or are there vendors on the beach renting boards?

We still haven't decided if we should get a campervan or a cheap car. Campervan = can transport the surfboards and free sleeping. However, seems to gain access to toilets at campsites one has to pay 20 - 30 euros ANYWAS.... And I am reading mixed reports whether it is legal to camp anywhere. Car = super cheap. 120 euro'ish for a week. But cannot transport surfboards around...

Soft racks, can transport board on just about any car roof!

jaffa1949 wrote:Soft racks, can transport board on just about any car roof!

Yes very true. But the rental companies we have online do not offer this. At least not the cheap ones. For example: driveonholidays.com or rentalcars.com

You take your own soft rack, I alway have one in my travel gear!

100% agreed with Jaffa. My wife and me travel with a pair of these: http://www.surffcs.com/shop/surf-auto/f ... cks-double and drove through good chunks of Uruguay and Argentina with a tiny car. No problem.

Regarding your questions: Arrifana is small, but did have a few restaurants (perhaps 3 or 4). Remember though that we were there in pre-season, so it is possible that some of them close in winter.

There is only one surf spot in Arrifana, the big bay, and yes, that is walkable. Have a look at Google Maps / Satellite pics

There are surf rental places in Sagres in walking distance from the water, but it can be a bit of a hike.

In general: A small rental car during off-season in Portugal should be relatively cheap, combine it with a pair of soft racks and you should be fine & much more mobile than on feet or with a bike...