Bar Caloura — Restaurant in Lagoa

We arrive, an old couple hurries in front of us and takes the available ocean view table. No worries! So we wait, but are not greeted. Still ok, we were just enjoying the day. Not in a rush at all. After about 4 minutes a couple who is leaving motions to us to ask if we want their table, we say absolutely! The best seat in the house. They gesture us to sit down in their place. (No one in front or behind us in line) so we laugh with them a moment about the weather. The same server who saw us arrive, and heard me ask my partner if we wait or sit anywhere only then comes over to tell us that he needs to clean the table first, visibly irritated. We say oh sorry, no worries, wait beside while standing, taking in the breathtaking view. He clears all plates and informs us that we weren't sopossed to sit yet, that we were sopossed to wait. When i told him we didn't know, apologised and tried to smile it off, he doubles down with more attitude. I then tell him we were following suit of what the older couple did in front of us, that we didn't know & sincerely apologised again. He tells us there was a list we were sopossed to sign and reiterated how we were sopossed to wait with a very irritated tone. Almost anger at this point. I understand as I've worked service industry for 10 years & can see how tiring it gets when people barge in & break rules..But I'm sure with a tourist town like this, and no obvious "wait to be seated sign" or host , many tourists having a langauge barrier, & every restaurant being different on the island, the staff must be used to this error by now? Mind you, there's 4 open tables.it isn't packed. The couple in front of us didn't sign a list and were greeted right away. So we sit down at the cleared table, but further out so to give him space to clean it. He gets really upset by this, tells us he needs to clean the table, that we weren't sopossed to sit, so we stand up again. Letting him wipe it down. He mentions the list again. He hands us the menus and leaves.Comes back less than 2 minutes later and asks what we want. I say we need a moment. He leaves. Comes back, asks again, & i ask what the cocktail specials are. He says "none. Just the fish on the board. That's it." with serious attitude. Though the menu says house cocktail specials... and the word "bar" is in the restaurant name /advertised on all outside menus with pictures of drinks.. I say we need one more moment , he still doesn't offer us drinks at all & after he talked to me like that multiple times my bf wanted to leave. We felt incredibly rushed, and it was made known we were very unwelcome. Basically, he kicked us out without having to do so. Perhaps it was our clothing that looked old? That i was young and he assumed we had no money and he's used to 65+ yacht clubs? Sadly though, we live here now, and he was wearing a Casa de Abel shirt so to the guy with the glasses, unfortunately for you, you'll be forced to look at our homely apearances around town more often! It wasn't the gestures. It was the tone, the attitude, the judgement of this man, that is so sad. I had been wanting to come here for 7 months. Clearly that man has a sad life to be able to treat any human being so poorly. I hope to try the food in the future, & hope that man has a better day than today. Not sure why he went so far out of his way to make me cry and to be so sour. Perhaps he is dealing with a loss or grief at home. Perhaps he projected an idea of who he thought we were based on how we look that shaded his attitude towards us. What a narrow perception to have in this life. I hope when he is down, or in a foreign & new place of home or visiting, someone will give him more compassion and courtesy than what he shared with us today. I also hope, he is able to open his mind and in turn heart more, so that the rest of the world isn't as...

We really wanted to love this place...and we almost did! We showed up at 9pm on a Thursday. We had heard the kitchen closes at 9:30 so we asked the host if we were too late to order food. He assured us it was no problem. They have this unique system where they place a color-coded plastic card on your table to tell you which server you have - more on that later. Someone quickly puts bread on our table so we sit and munch while we wait for our server. The view is amazing and the atmosphere is great so we were happy to wait. But 25 minutes later we started to worry the kitchen might close before we order food. Then another couple is seated right next to us. We take this as a sign that the kitchen is still open. Then within minutes the other table is visited by their server, but not ours. Minutes later the other table has the same dish we planned to order along with drinks. Finally I asked a server who was not ours if they could help. She looked at our color-coded card on the table and stomped off without saying anything. Then, she and two other serves began arguing in Portuguese, it was rather loud. We get told our server is coming. Five minutes later our server arrives and apologizes saying he didn't know how their system worked. We were so happy to be there enjoying the view we weren't mad at all. We told him it was fine. We just wanted to order some wine and food. He smiled and took out order. The wine comes quickly - all seems well. Then he returns to tell us the kitchen is closed and out of food with only one dish left. We reluctantly accept the one fish of day plate left. To be fair it was well cooked but not what we planned to order. He gave us three pieces of cheese as an apology. As we wrapped up we explained as politely as possible that we were disappointed we couldn't order what we wanted. He told us there was nothing to be done. Another server did casually stop by and say he was sorry this happened to us. We paid full price and left. Perhaps the food is 5 star, but we weren't given the chance to taste it. And perhaps the poor service was a fluke, but it's impossible for us to...

Lovely view of the ocean, sounds are just chill music, people talking, and the waves. Really great atmosphere.

Expect to be parallel parking at one of the viewing platforms on the road outside.

Wow. First off, this place was super busy, but despite that, i was served and seated quickly. There were some dirty tables, but it was clear to see they had just finished a super busy service. After being seated though it was quite a while before a waiter came to me.

I ordered a ginger ale (small size but cheap €1.50), a fish soup, and some island cheese to start.

The fish soup was salty and delicious. Lots of tomato and onion flavour, small pieces of vegetable. Really really nice, everything i would want from a fish soup. Little bits of either orzo or risotto rice floating in there too.

The island cheese was very refreshing and light. I enjoyed it, it came with a dip which was strongly salty. Overall i liked the combo but dont go too hard on the sauce because of how salty it is. Try the cheese on its own first.

Lapas were presented nicely, in a grill pan. Fresh crunchy garlic, zingy lemon. Really yummy, all lapas seems to be. This one did have quite a few pieces of shell in today, and again it was strongly salty. This is a bar though, and bar food typically is quite salty. I enjoyed it overall. But yes the pieces of grit in a few of the limpets / when dipping the bread does bring my experience down a tiny bit. Excellent flavour though.

The desserts are quite cheap so the portions are small but thats A okay with me.

Pineapple cake is dense, moist and subtly sweet, the pineapple on top has a little crunch to it and i love that. 10/10 cake. Elevated the experience.

The azorean pineapple on its own was a mix of tart and sweet. Not much of it, but presented very nicely. Cant go wrong with a bit...