We booked our Benagil Cave boat tour through South Explorers as a tour that included round-trip transportation from Lagos, a boat ride from Carvoeiro, and a walk along the Algar Seco boardwalk. Antonio from South Explorers booked the boat tickets through Carvoeiro Tours.
With more than 30 years in the business and 4 boats leaving from two different locations (Carvoeiro and Portimão), Carvoeiro Tours is a well-respected and experienced tour company. Their operation ran smoothly from the stand on the edge of the beach. They fitted us all for life jackets (which were more comfortable than most!), showed us where to store our shoes, and led us down to the water’s edge to board the boat. The wet boarding was smooth and safe and we were quickly pushed off from shore and on our way. You can read about our full experience here.
We had two staff members on the boat – a boat captain and a tour guide. We had about 10 guests on board – our family of 4 plus the other couple who was part of our South Explorers’ tour, as well as a group of 4-5 from France. The tour guide was multilingual and gave the tour in French first and then repeated it in English for our group. I was really impressed with his ability to switch seamlessly between the languages and not only give the pre-rehearsed tour in two languages but also answer questions on the fly in either language. Both the captain and the guide were excellent.
The boat ride was smooth and enjoyable. We passed some beautiful beaches and visited 10-12 caves, learning interesting facts about each one as we entered it. Although we weren’t there in the busy season, some of the caves did have some traffic in and out and we felt like the boat was masterfully handled. I was especially impressed with how he backed out of some of those tiny caves! We always felt safe and comfortable.
And clearly they had done this a time or two before! Before we left Benagil Cave, the captain positioned the boat perfectly for the guide to take a picture of each group at the bow of the boat with the cave’s eye above them. This is such a unique picture and one I will always treasure.
Overall we had a great experience with Carvoeiro Tours. The boat was clean, safe, and comfortable. The captain and tour guide were professional, knowledgeable and helpful. After some really rough boat rides on our trip to the Galapagos last year, I had been really worried about this one. But I shouldn’t have been! The ride was fast enough to be fun but smooth enough to be relaxing. We really loved our day out on the water in the Algarve and highly recommend Carvoeiro Tours (and also highly recommend joining them as part of the Benagil by Boat and Algarseco tour with South Explorers).
