Walk on the wild side

The Alternative Algarve 8: Hill walking

GoodLife: Late summer, early autumn. Deadline:?

There are many guided walking options available in the Algarve varying in location and severity. Our regular Alternative Algarve writer, Rayner Otter, himself once an Alpine high-level guide, checked out one of the best, the Algarve Walking Experience run by Terry Ames. Together they took a

Walk on the wild side

So I said I could walk… Well, there was a time I could - in all terrains, all conditions. I still do a bit; but now a jaunt to the end of the orchard tells me I’m past my best. It’s all those sporting injuries. A rolling rally car redesigned my spine. Years of high impact activities from squash to running down mountains lost me a favourite hip. And that left me with one leg longer than the other - which in turn resulted in a near-permanently sprained ankle. Then three weeks ago I had an operation on one leg and the day after the doc signed me off…. I went for a walk.

Now, this really should have been that tour of the orchard but, in the interests of good journalism, I opted to join walk-leader Terry Ames for one of his favourite chunks of the Algarve Way. This was a 25 kilometre yomp through the picturesque but hardly visited Serras from Barranco da Vehla to Benafim, a descent of 270 metres with quite a few uphill bits thrown in to slow us down. By the way, for the uninitiated; going down hurts more than going up.

I didn’t confess to Terry that he had a cripple in the team until he was driving us to the starting point in his comfortable people carrier. Fortunately the group was small comprising - besides the leader and me - my partner, the Fräulein, a lovely lady called Cêlianne and two dogs, Rusty and Harry. Terry assured us that he was in no rush and that we could amble along at our own paces. Oh yeah? As though I was going to be out-walked by two women and a couple of mutts!

Two minutes after leaving the mountain-top village of Barranco da Velha, however, I dropped my machismo by the roadside, took a deep breath and said to myself, ’You’ve got another 24.9 kilometres to go - just get there.’ As it was, Terry kept the pace down and for a lot of the way he and I walked together through gobsmackingly fabulous countryside, stopping occasionally for the chattering ladies to catch us up. This made me feel better about my capabilities and gave me a chance to learn something about our leader.

Terry Ames was born in Norfolk but spent much of his life in South Wales. It was there where he really took to walking seriously. Before moving to the Valleys Terry had walked a lot having been involved in game shooting and training gundogs; but that was in Norfolk and, as the saying goes,… ‘Very flat, Norfolk’. He didn’t know what hit him when he first encountered those Welsh bumpy things. But he, like so many of us, was bitten by the urge to climb hills. Before long, he was entering ‘challenge walks’ - huge distances that have to be covered in a set time. One of these is an annual 45 mile (72 kilometres) hike across Wales that has to be done in 18 hours, but the slightly more demanding is the annual ‘Hundreds‘. Yes, that’s 100 miles (161 kilometres), virtually non-stop, which has to be completed in 48 hours. Terry, 64 years old, normally takes 40.

He went on to become a qualified group walking leader and moved to the Algarve seven years ago. Here he set up The Algarve Walking Experience offering bespoke on-foot holidays and excursions based at his house near Salir in the centre of the Barrocal. He reckons that just from there he can take guests on ten different walks and in the whole of the Algarve there are scores more.

His BIG walk is the Algarve Way. Terry is a core founder of the route that crosses our region from the Spanish border near Alcoutim to Cape St. Vincent. This is a modern guestimation of the route believed to have been used to carry the body of Saint Vincent en route to his final resting place in Lisbon and which was later used by monks and pilgrims following the saint’s wake. Historical evidence supports much of the route but, by its very nature, it is, and always shall be, somewhat flexible. There is quite a difference, for instance, between the ‘official’ Almargem route (marked by red and white stripes) and Terry and his colleagues’ path (designated by cistus flower symbols).

Terry recently completed  a sponsored Algarve Way crossing with Father Bob Bates for the charities, Lar de São Vincent and Madrugada. The route threads through 263 kilometres of the region’s finest and wildest country and usually takes ten days to complete. Terry’s Algarve Walking Experience offers visitors packaged, guided walking holidays following this classic route with three-star accommodation and luggage carrying services, or half- to several day tours for residents. A day’s outing such as I ventured upon would cost in the region of fifty euros and could accommodate between two to 16 guests.

Our route took us down the forested banks of the Serras into the rolling countryside of the Barrocal. After traversing the small town of Salir we followed a fertile valley to Benafim. This section of the Algarve Way normally includes a further four kilometres to a night stop in Alte - but that we were spared! And how difficult is it walking with such an expert? Well, despite all my body’s malfunctioning I managed the full 25 kilometres. The last five or so were at a slower pace than I (or Terry!) would have liked but, if I can do it, anyone who can play 18 holes of golf without a buggy can do it. And there are shorter options.

It beats strolling up and down the orchard.