My Favorite Airbnb: A Gorgeous Family Villa on a Special Stretch of the Algarve

After a blisteringly hot summer in London, the thought of feeling windswept on the Algarvian coast—and retreating back to what looked like the most grandiose Airbnb I'd ever seen, called the Red Chalet—sounded especially lovely. So lovely, in fact, that I didn't think twice about booking a flight and leaving the hazy English heatwave behind for a long weekend. Pitching the idea to my family was an easy sell, too. Some of them hadn’t been abroad for 10 years, and many had never visited Portugal. Now felt like the perfect time to make the trip. When we arrived one weekend in June, we were greeted by the Red Chalet's beautifully bright orange groves and blooming bougainvillaea. The colors sparked an immediate sense of joy, and a fizz of anticipation bubbled through our group. Swallows—the country's most beloved and recognizable birds—darted past intermittently, a subtle but very real reminder of our location on this special stretch of the Algarve. The house itself was even more impressive than I could have imagined. It stands tall overlooking the ocean and is set behind a wrought-iron gate between the historic church square of Nossa Senhora dos Navegantes—speckled with peo