At the eastern end of the Lagos waterfront, where the Bensafrim meets the Atlantic, the Fort of Ponta da Bandeira occupies a deliberately modest footprint. It was raised in the seventeenth century to cover the harbour approach, part of the network of coastal defences that protected an Algarve exposed to pirates, privateers and rival fleets. A moat and drawbridge give access to a square enclosure with corner bastions, a parade ground, casemates and a terrace from which cannon commanded the bay. Within the walls stands a small chapel dedicated to Saint Barbara, patron of gunners, faced with painted tiles. Lagos was one of the ports from which Portuguese expeditions set out along the African coast, and it was also a centre of the early Atlantic slave trade, so the fort belongs to a maritime history at once celebrated and troubling. Filmed from the ramparts and from the sea, it offers a legible and photogenic example of Portuguese coastal fortification.
