Today we went to the Municipal Museum of Archaeology of Silves and the Castelo de Silves.

Right, here's a bit of history from a leaflet we got at the Museum .

"During the 1980's whilst undergoing construction work of the municipal canteen, workers found a water well of considerable size completely filled with rubble.

Despite it's size and evident antiquity (amongst the debris lay material that could be dated between the Islamic occupation and the 16th century, the time of it's deactivation) there are no known references to the structure in the medieval texts.

The Cistern-Well was initially deeply excavated into the geological subsoil until it reached the natural water table at around 18 meters. The shaft with a diameter of 2.45 meters is surrounded by a 1.20 meter wide spiral stairway gallery.

The discovery of this important monument and it's proximity to the old city walls led to the local Municipality to build the Archaeological Museum."

Here endeth the lesson!

Fooled you - the history lesson isn't over .

The city of Silves, during it's Islamic period, achieved it's greatest fame and was on two occasions an independent kingdom. Following the Christian conquest, it became the Episcopal capital of the province of the Algarve and remained that way until 1577.

In the 15th century it played an active part in the maritime voyages of the Portuguese discoveries but with the transfer of the seat of the Bishop to Faro during the following century, it started on a period of decline from which it was only rescued by the cork industry at the end of the 19th century.

That really is the end of the history lesson, I promise you. If I could have put it into my own words, I would have done so.

We had a pleasant time wandering around the castle, paid an exorbitant price for two cold drinks, admittedly large ones, 10€!

On the way back we bumped into John and Kim. We met them with Sheila and Barry at Mikki's and John is the guitar player and singer. It turns out they are parked almost opposite us. Shame we're leaving tomorrow.