I accept that this will be another mundane post, although I rarely set the bar that high. There is a certain freedom in operating at this level of expectation. Nobody arrives here demanding drama, revelation or moral transformation, not even my two loyal blog readers. This was essentially the reverse of the journey I had made the previous evening, but I like to document things. One day someone may need to know precisely how I got from a budget hotel in Warsaw to the airport, and I intend to be ready for that moment.
This photo was taken just outside of the hotel and I resisted popping into the McDonald’s, which isn’t something that I’ve always managed to achieve. Still, I resisted, which I think shows character. Not a lot of character, obviously, but enough to get me across the pavement.
I had initially planned to visit some more metro stations before going back to the airport, to complete another half-finished project of mine. But the temperature was just too hot and so I decided that I’d walk to the tram stop and take one of the longer routes into the city centre and use it as a tourist experience.
The tram was air conditioned so I was all set and this immediately improved the mood of the entire arrangement.
Pootling along over the River Vistula.
And back into the city centre.
There’s Warszawa Centralna railway station in the background and I was already getting quite sad to be leaving Warsaw.
There we go, the 12:24 from Platform 3.
It’s the next Warsaw Beer Festival in October and I’ve decided I want to go to that, but the dates haven’t yet been released. I hope I’ll be back in Warsaw before that though.
The airport train looked like it would be on time.
And it was. There is something about standing on a platform with an airport train due that makes the trip feel suddenly over, even if technically there is still quite a lot of travel bureaucracy ahead.
And that was that, my short trip to Warsaw was over. It had been a slightly ridiculous routing, a brief overnight stay and probably not the most sensible use of geography, but it had worked. I had slept, eaten breakfast, ridden trams, resisted McDonald’s, crossed the Vistula and reached the airport without incident. That may not trouble the great travel writers of history, but it was all rather pleasing
And another short post as I’ve stayed at this hotel many times before and written about a fair number of them, so I won’t try the patience of my two loyal blog readers for long. There are limits even to my commitment to documenting budget hotel consistency, although admittedly I keep testing them.
It’s routinely the cheapest of the Accor hotels in Warsaw and it’s not hard to get to on the tram or bus, so it’s a very viable option. It’s probably not the best hotel to use as part of an airport layover, but travel should have challenges sometimes as where’s the fun in efficient?
I had arrived too late for my free welcome drink, which is never ideal, but they had given me a welcome gift of some teas and a biscuit. These little gestures are always much appreciated.
Although the hotel is located by a busy road, the view from my window was rather more pleasant.
And a rather lovely breakfast. The meat looked quite frightening, so I went for some more healthy options. And a heap of bread and pastries at the back, alongside coffee, orange juice and tea. And a big dollop of strawberry yoghurt.
With that, I had to start planning my return to the airport, which was slightly annoying as I had only been at the hotel for a few hours. But, there were no noise issues internally or externally and I was able to catch up on sleep after a warm night in Faro the previous day. It was not a long stay, but it did exactly what was required which was a clean room, quiet night, decent breakfast and a biscuit-based welcome.
I won’t linger too much on this post as I’ve written about public transport in Warsaw so many times before. However, this is the train to the city centre and I’ll note here that a 24 hour public transport ticket is under £3. A single underground journey in Zone 1 in London is the same price.
The train stopped for a few minutes at Warszawa Zachodnia railway station, which is all new and shiny. This is moderately annoying as I realised that the Ibis Budget I usually stay at had suddenly become available and if I had realised earlier, I would have switched to this one. But, it meant I instead got to see more of Warsaw at night and there are worse things.
Getting off at Warszawa Centralna railway station.
I needed to change from a train to a night bus and there’s the Palace of Culture and Science. I sent a photo of this to my friend Liam who asked me why it was purple. Unfortunately, no-one seems to know, but it looks rather lovely at night and it is certainly a bold choice for Stalinist architecture, which is not usually known for its playful approach to mood lighting.
On the night bus.
It was quite busy and we sat in the dark for a while which I think was to add anticipation before we departed. Public transport often lacks theatricality, so perhaps Warsaw is addressing this with a brief blackout sequence. Either that or the driver hadn’t turned the lights on yet, but I prefer the more dramatic interpretation.
Let there be light. And off we went, all suddenly illuminated and reassured that the bus had not, in fact, been designed by people who believed passengers should travel by instinct alone.
And safely at the hotel. Public transport in Warsaw really is very easy, it’s cheap, frequent and well signed. Their trams and buses are shown live on Google Maps which helps if anything is delayed and, I know I say this frequently, but no-one was playing music or had their feet on the seats. This is a proper culture. A civilisation can be judged in many ways, but “can I sit on public transport without listening to someone else’s phone or inspecting their shoes on the upholstery?” seems as good a measure as any.
After my little beach walk in the morning, it was time to return to Faro Airport just a few hours after arriving there. And, I will admit that the planning element of all of this was a little sub-optimal. I had flown from Norwich to Faro as the Ryanair flight was very cheap and I noticed I could then fly from Faro to Warsaw with the last minute flight availability from my Wizz Air Multipass. I like Warsaw, as I might have mentioned, so my plan was to spend some time there.
That was until I saw the hotel prices, which have been becoming consistently high over recent months. Warsaw has clearly worked out that I like it and is now attempting to monetise the emotional relationship. I then noticed that there was a flight from Warsaw to Bilbao, which is where I planned to spend a few days. So the new arrangement became Faro to Warsaw, then Warsaw to Bilbao, which looked perfectly sensible on a screen and slightly less sensible when exposed to time, distance and human comfort. Anyway, travel is about the journey and not the destination.
So the issue was that I had managed to not really think through the fact that the flight from Faro to Warsaw was four hours in length and then I discovered that the seating Gods had given me a middle seat. This flight was looking a little less appealing, especially as I knew that I was flying back to Spain the next day.
This is where rail ticketing needs to improve across countries, it’s just too expensive at the moment and I ideally like to use trains. But it was going to cost me £18 to get from Faro to Bilbao (via Warsaw) which also gave me two lounge accesses. Google informed me that to get from Faro to Bilbao by rail required six trains, would take over 28 hours and would cost somewhere around £150.
Security at Faro was efficient from a staffing perspective, but I was slightly inwardly annoyed that the passenger in front of me didn’t know that liquids needed to go in their own bag. This has been the rule for over a decade so perhaps I should be fair. There then followed five minutes while she located her various liquids spread across three bags, as though she had prepared a small toiletries treasure hunt for the benefit of airport security. I remained outwardly calm, which is one of my lesser-known heroic qualities.
Anyway, after that, I got to turn right at the above sign for the first time, which means that I was heading from the Schengen area. Last time I went left and was faced with long queues due to border control requirements.
I could see the non-Schengen area and the queues didn’t actually look too bad, although I still preferred the Schengen option of not needing to show a passport.
There were plenty of seats in the terminal, there were numerous power points and it all felt relaxed.
We were departing from Gate 220 and the whole process was well managed and it was clear where the priority and non-priority passengers needed to wait. The staff here seemed rather laid-back and I noticed that they weren’t checking bag sizes.
The boarding process was all well managed and we weren’t in the extreme Portuguese heat for long. Did I mention that it was too hot? The aircraft was 9H-WDX which I’ve been on twice before, although as it’s part of their Polish fleet, that’s perhaps not entirely unsurprising. The crew were Polish and were impeccable in terms of their friendliness during the flight.
The middle seat arrangement isn’t ideal, but wasn’t problematic and I managed to combine sleeping with watching YouTube videos to make the time go a little quicker. The aircraft was clean, the pilots were professional and we arrived into Warsaw a few minutes ahead of schedule.
Oh good, a packed bus from the aircraft to the airport. Although I was a little time restricted as I needed to cross Warsaw, I knew that there was no border control and so I would be able to get on the train quickly enough. That transpired to be true, it took eight minutes from getting to the terminal to getting on the train, which included buying a ticket from the machine.
Overall, this flight cost me £9 and everything went as expected, so I was pleased with the whole arrangement. It’s rare that I get the middle seat allocated and the flight was relatively full, but there are worse things that can happen. Once again, I thought that Wizz Air’s operation was all well managed and I was delighted to be back in Warsaw, even if just for one night. It might not have been the most logical routing, but it was cheap, efficient and let me continue my little adventure.
There are two lounges at Faro Airport, one in the non-Schengen area which I’ve visited before, and this one in the Schengen area which I haven’t. When I entered the friendly member said that they were full, but I was welcome to come in and wait for a seat if I wanted. Nothing says premium travel quite like being invited to stand near the snacks and hope someone leaves.
I decided I’d invite myself to sit with a collection of other passengers as it’s surprising how social I can be when there’s the chance to eat chicken pies and crisps as well as drink coffee and beer. Incidentally, the two beers didn’t really surprise and delight, but I’m not sure that they were intending to be a craft beer venue.
Another chicken pie, which I very much rated, alongside two pastéis de nata. In terms of the ambience, it’s not great as most people didn’t have access to a table which is a little sub-optimal for eating and for getting work done.
The pastry selection.
I noticed a family group didn’t like their high seating table and so I swapped them for my sofa seat. Like some sort of angry cat, I like sitting high up and watching over things. I got another chicken pie to celebrate, because altruism requires fuel.
It’s a perfectly decent lounge in terms of the friendliness of the staff, the cleanliness and the food options. However, it’s simply too small and it was at or near capacity for nearly all of my stay. I was fortunate that I was able to get this table, which was also near a power point, but it’s not the most laid-back in terms of the atmosphere.
I’ve got my annual Priority Pass card and so my expectations for lounges are always quite measured. But they have just 39 seats available in this lounge (it’s 70 at the non-Schengen lounge) which is really quite a small number given how many flights are departing from the airport. Normal entry is €30 and I would be disappointed if I had paid this to find myself struggling for even anywhere to sit.
In my never-ending quest to report the mundane, I was so hot in Faro, although I’m not sure whether I’ve mentioned the weather, that I found a petrol station to pop into. I went in for a cold drink, but realised they also had a little café section, which felt like a significant upgrade from my original plan of standing outside looking like I couldn’t afford my own car. I wasn’t sure how much my espresso would cost, but it transpired to be about 70p. Across southern Europe they realise how to sensibly price their espressos….
I wasn’t entirely sure whether I was allowed to eat the crisps I had also purchased in the petrol station while sitting in their café area, but nobody said anything. I’m also not sure they seemed especially troubled by much behaviour generally, which is one of the quiet blessings of certain roadside establishments.
The drink I had chosen was Sumol and I’ve discovered that they have around fifteen different fruit flavours. This one is apple, mango and guava and it is a limited edition flavour tied to the eclipse on 12 August 2026. This is another rabbit hole that I didn’t know that I needed to go down, but I feel the need to try more Sumol flavours now if they put this much effort into this concept, reaching for the heavens and all that….. Travel broadens the mind, although occasionally it does so through a petrol station fridge.
I spent some of Tuesday morning visiting the Parque Natural da Ria Formosa, which was beautiful, fascinating and entirely too hot. This is always the difficulty with nature reserves in southern Portugal, they contain wonderful landscapes, wildlife, salt marshes, mudflats and lots of crabs, as well as the quiet sense that one is somewhere ecologically important, but they also contain the sun, which can be rather insistent and, frankly, sub-optimal.
There was, however, a glorious two-minute period when it poured with rain and everything suddenly became lovely. The air cooled, the path freshened up and I briefly felt content with the weather arrangements. Then, naturally, it stopped, the sun returned and the whole landscape resumed to being too hot. But, full credit to the local authorities, they’ve created a long boardwalk and it made the whole area much more accessible.
Anyway, that’s enough weather narrative, so some photos….
When walking near Faro I saw this road sign pointing towards Montenegro, which briefly confused me, as I had not expected to stumble across the Balkans quite so close to the airport. I was fairly sure that I had not accidentally walked from Portugal to the Adriatic, although given the heat I wasn’t ruling out mild hallucination. Have I mentioned that it was hot?
The explanation is obvious once I actually thought about the name, which is always slightly annoying in retrospect. Montenegro simply means “black mountain” or “dark mountain”, from ‘monte’ and ‘negro’. The country of Montenegro has a similar meaning, linked to the dark forested slopes of Mount Lovćen, while the Faro place name is said to come from a dark or densely wooded hill visible from the city. So this was not Portugal randomly borrowing the name of another country, but two places using the same fairly practical description. Sometimes a hill is dark, and people decide not to over-complicate matters.
There is something pleasing about these repeated place names, especially when they momentarily make a road sign look more exotic than it really is. For some reason I thought that there might be something more complex about this whole arrangement, but it was all quite logical.
I posted earlier about the fiddler crabs in Faro and, when I was looking for my aircraft video, I remembered that I had also filmed the crabs. This was presumably because, for a brief moment, I thought I was David Attenborough, albeit one with less gravitas, fewer camera crews and a much higher likelihood of getting distracted by airport infrastructure.
The video captures the little crabs scuttling about on the mudflats of the Ria Formosa, going about their business with much more purpose than I was managing in the heat. Did I mention that it was too hot?
My morning walk to the beach involved walking along the road next to Faro Airport, and I found it quite exciting to stand underneath the landing aircraft. I appreciate that some people require major cultural landmarks, dramatic landscapes or meaningful human encounters to feel enriched by travel, but I am apparently satisfied by a loud aircraft passing overhead at close range. Well, it excited and delighted me anyway, and that is enough. Not every travel highlight needs to trouble UNESCO.
