Discovering Year-Round Riding In Portugal
It was the end of September and over in the UK the autumn chill is just starting to bite, signifying the end of a long warm summer. Often at this time of year in many countries throughout Europe the harsh realisation that warm after-work weekday rides have all but disappeared, as we have to start thinking about layers of clothing and mud-filled rides. There is a place, however, where the summer continues, we headed over to Lagos in Portugal to find out why it had become so popular for end of season and winter riding.
Jim Carol, originally a British DH racer from Shropshire in the UK, moved out to Portugal for the surf back in 2005. Being a self-confessed trail building nut and mad-keen mountain biker, Jim immediately saw the massive potential over there for incredible riding and set about creating his own bespoke trail riding business. To say Jim works hard on the tools and riding bikes is a real understatement, as he is not unfamiliar with working 60 days consecutively, either flat-out digging trails or riding hard, as a trail guide or skills coach.
From the start when Jim got set up running his business “The Mountain Bike Adventure Portugal” he put his life and soul into creating what he sees as his masterpieces when it comes to trails, ranging from a 10 k smooth and flowing steady trail to some seriously gnarly rocky DH trails, where the terrain wouldn’t look out of place at some world-cup downhills. We had three days over there, staying at one of Jim’s recommended nice traveller’s hostel type places, this being equipped with all amenities, the best of which being a swimming pool! Lagos is also a holiday destination, so night times can get as interesting as you want them to be, but riding in the 28° heat the following day after a skin-full of strong drinks can end up being quite a task; as we found out!
Jim has all types of pricing, from half day trail rides up over the beautiful coastal paths for € 20 to full days uplifting up in the mountains for € 60 per person. Also available for those who don’t fancy bringing bikes over is a full fleet of Saracen enduro bikes to hire at a rate of € 10 to € 20 per day. We experienced their kind-of guided uplift rides, where Jim or co-worker Miguel would talk riders through each technical part of the trail, prior to sectioning them for the first run; after that we could bust out a day of full runs.
Jim weighs up the riders in the first few hours, starting on the tamer trails, then progressing onto the rougher, more techy stuff if he feels they have the ability to handle them. To be honest, we wouldn’t recommend the more DH rocky trails to those without a fair degree of skills, we could go as far as to say it would be amazing training for elite-level racers for getting to grips with tougher rough rock sections.
We were picked up from the digs at 9am and ferried over to the riding spots with the twenty-minute drive up the (recently fire-damaged) mountain to a traditional Portuguese café for beautiful strong coffee prior to the morning’s riding of the DH trails. Even in late September the air was hot and dry and the dust made for some interesting following of your buddies down these amazing tracks.
Lunch saw us chowing down on local produce in the form of a picnic brought along for wherever we chose to stop, before cracking on with more runs of the tracks. The going is so fun, but tough on bikes and riders, and at the end of the day we had all well and truly had enough; ready for some local food and fantastic nights out in Lagos and it’s surrounding villages.
We had a fantastic time, a real break from the UK’s quickly changing “end of season” dull and wet weather. We rode and drank hard, certainly burning the candles at both ends, probably needing a holiday at the end of the holiday when we got back home! We would like to thank Jim and all his very hard working crew for such a great time and would highly recommend it for any biking travelers wishing to get away from those “end of summer” blues, especially as, being a holiday destination it would also be a great place to take partners and kids who wanted to just relax and enjoy the sun.
For more information check out: The Mountain Bike Adventure Portugal