Vale Do Lobo Holidays

About 20km, or roughly 20 minutes by car. Vale do Lobo sits on the central Algarve coast between Quarteira and Quinta do Lago, inside the Loulé municipality, which makes it one of the shortest airport transfers on the whole coast.

Add transfers to your package when you book and the price is locked in before you fly, with someone waiting at arrivals holding a board. Taxis are available outside the terminal if you would rather sort it there.

The unofficial name for the trio of luxury Algarve resorts — Vale do Lobo, Quinta do Lago and Vilamoura. Together they form the most exclusive stretch of the Algarve coast. Vale do Lobo has the most beach-facing character of the three, with its dramatic red cliffs and 2km of beachfront.

One of the most famous par 3s in European golf. It asks for a carry of over 200 metres across a ravine cut into the red sandstone cliffs, with the Atlantic breaking below you. It has been photographed so many times that it has effectively become the symbol of Algarve golf, and non-golfers walk out to the tee just to look at it.

It is on the Royal Course at Vale do Lobo, which is on the central Algarve coast about 20 minutes from Faro Airport, and it is playable by visitors with a tee time.

Very. The Dona Filipa Hotel runs the Kangaroo Kids Club through the summer, Christmas and Easter holidays, with a children's pool and beach club access, and Ria Park Hotel & Spa has a children's activity area 300 metres away running programmes for four to twelve year olds, plus a games room.

The beach is lifeguarded in summer and shelves gently, the tennis centre coaches juniors, and the whole resort is flat, gated and walkable, so older children get some freedom and you get to sit down. It is a calmer kind of family holiday than the big resort strips, which is precisely why people come back to it.

Vale do Lobo is the one with a proper front door onto the beach. Two kilometres of cliff-backed sand start where the resort ends, The Praça gives it a social centre with restaurants and live music, and the Royal's 16th is the most photographed hole in Portugal. If you want a resort that feels like a resort, this is the one.

Quinta do Lago is the quieter neighbour: a large private estate of pine woods and lakes, three championship courses, and a beach reached across a wooden bridge over the Ria Formosa. Choose it if seclusion matters more to you than a square to walk to.

Both are five-star, both have world-class golf and serious restaurants, and they are close enough that you can eat in one and sleep in the other.

Not in the clubbing sense, and that is the whole proposition. Evenings here run on long dinners and cocktails at The Praça, the resort's central square, where Tinto looks out over the water, Sandbanks puts you on the sand and there is live music through the summer. Monica's, at the resort entrance, is the long-standing local favourite.

If you want a later night, Vilamoura's marina is 15 to 20 minutes away with a casino, waterfront bars and a crowd that stays out.

Every month here has something going for it, so it comes down to what you are after.

July and August are the headline: 28°C, twelve hours of sun a day, effectively no rain, the beach club running and The Praça at its liveliest. This is the resort at full tilt.

May, June and September give you 23°C to 27°C with a gentler pace, warm sea and the best conditions of the year for actually playing 18 holes without wilting.

October and November hold 19°C to 23°C, the Atlantic keeps its summer warmth into October, and the cliffs and the Ria Formosa are at their best with nobody on them.

December to March stays mild at 16°C to 19°C and the courses stay open and in good order all winter, which is why the golf crowd keeps coming. Bring a jumper for the evenings.