Festivities, Holidays and Traditions in Algarve

Holy Week

The Holy Week or Easter Week is one of the most important celebrations of the year.  A part from the popular parties of some villages and cities, there are some special and intense religious festivities. Some of the most famous are: “la Fiesta de la Madre soberana”, doubtlessly, one of the biggest celebrations in the South of Portugal (specially in Loulé, an interior municipality), where they do the Virgin’s procession until the San Francisco church, and also, the festivity of the “Antorchas Floridas”, this one with just men who walk through streets completely covered with flowers also carrying altar candles full of flowers.

These Algarve festivities have hundreds of years of tradition and they are a common touristy attraction.

 

Loulé Carnival

The Carnaval in Loulé is considered the most important in Algarve region. It has been celebrated for more than 100 years and of course it has some religious origins. Nowadays, it isn’t a religious celebration and it usually takes place in the end of February, usually from the 21rst and the 25th with many activities, parades and also the local houses are specially decorated with colours.

 

Algarve International Music Festival

Algarve International Music Festival has won its popularity with the years and it is nowadays one of the most important festivals of the region. It attracts every year thousands of visitors during the month when the festival takes place, between May and June. Visitors find there many types of concerts and performances.

 

Castro Marim Medieval festivities

Between August and September you’ll find this huge Medieval Festival at the old fortress of Castro Marim. In the surroundings of the fortress you’ll find a big street market set in the Medieval ages, in the 16th century, and the citizens and houses are also participating in this decoration. Many restaurants change their menu to offer also some Medieval meals.

 

Discovery Festival

The Discovery Festival takes place in Lagos, a famous municipality in Algarve, and despite the festival is quite new it is already well known and the local people participate every year in the amusement performance of an important historic event: to rekindle the Vasco de Gama 15th century, with parades, exhibitions, gastronomic routes and conferences. It takes place in the end of April.

 

Med Festival

Festival Med has already become a national model because it gathers many of the dramatic and artistic arts in Europe. It is celebrated between June and July and it is probably one of the most magic events you can attend to in the region, concretely, in the city centre of Loulé.