A planned project to create a luxury manmade island off the coast at Vale do Lobo could boost and improve the quality of tourism to the region. With 400 hectares of land, the Vale do Lobo resort is approximately three times the size of Monaco, and this new concept, which exceeds all that has gone before, will increase its size and push the boundaries of Vale do Lobo to the water.

To reinforce the team and improve the musical quality, the Orchestra of the Algarve have contracted Maestro Cesário Costa as Artistic Director. The new maestro "is one of the most active of his generation", states a source from the Orchestra. Cesário Costa concluded the Higher Course of Piano in Paris and gained a Masters in Orchestra Direction in the Higher School of Music of Wurzburg, in Germany.

Foreign tourists feel very safe in the Algarve. This is the principal conclusion to come out of a study published last week during the III Jornadas de Segurança, organised by the PSP. A questionnaire, carried out by the Higher School of Hotel Management and Tourism of the University of the Algarve, was given to 1262 foreign tourists coming from their home countries, in Faro Airport, between 7th July and 14th October.

Twenty Canadian tour operators will be visiting the Algarve on 15th November to get to know the destination, especially with regard to senior golf and tourism, with a view to their promotion in Canada. The initiative is organised by Star Travel, the principal operator in western Canada and responsible for the greater part of the Canadian tourists who choose the low season to visit the Algarve, the average stay being 22 days.

With the objective of strengthening the bet on the German market, during the month of November, ten German journalists and a representaive of the travel agency HWBA PR will visit the region, in an initiative by the Association of Tourism of the Algarve (ATA).

Severiano Ballesteroshas hit the first shot on the soon to be completed Quinta do Vale Golf Resort in the eastern Algarve. The symbolic gesture on Thursday, October 26, served to christen the land on the course which he has designed. Located next to the Guadiana River in Castro Marim, the luxurious resort looks set to revitalise the area as a whole.