Chafariz dos Pasmados

The "Chafariz dos Pasmados" in the center of the Village of Azeitão is a fountain projected following the rules of a late Baroque style, built between the years of 1764 and 1777. The legend says that the ones who drink this water will be linked to Azeitão forever.

Azeitão Cheese

This concentrated round of sheep's milk cheese from Portugal is an earthy, tangy, creamy treat. Made with cardoon thistle rather than traditional animal rennet, Azeitão is named for the village where it was born in the foothills of the Serra da Arribida mountain range in Portugal. The pastures where the sheep of Azeitão graze are lush and covered in herbaceous scrub which gives the milk its characteristic rich flavor.

Arrábida Convent

As always happens with almost every one of the litoral sanctuaries, so the foundation of the Arrábida Convent is wrapped up in a pious legend. It began in 1215, when the english merchant Haidebrant brought in his ship an image of Our Lady with Jesus infant, carved in stone and retired from the chapel of a Benidictine Convent. The image disappeared during a storm in portuguese waters and with Lisbon at sight. However, the ship succeded in turning the Espichel Cape, and arriving finally to Alpertuche, were the sea was peaceful. The sailor, resting from the storm, sighted an intense light in the top of the Arrabida Mountain, which he climbed up amid the thicket. He soon found the miraculous image. He then sold all his possessions and ordered the construction of a chapel, where he proposed himself to live alone. Some decades past, the Duke of Aveiro, D. João de Lencastre, asked the Superior General of the Franciscan Order to send a small community of friars to live in the Arrabida retreat. The duke, visiting Guadalupe, contacted an important spanish nobleman, to whom he explained his idea. This nobleman was to come the famous Friar Martinho de Santa Maria, after having founded the Arrabida Convent. The invitation was so accepted, and the recovering of the built areas (with the Memory Chapel) was studied afterwards, together with the utilization of the surrounding grounds. The New Convent is located in the hillside, its whiteness animating the prevailing green.

Wine route of Costa Azul

The wine route of Costa Azul (area known as “blue coast”) is all about the contact of wine with the sea. The route was mapped out in 1999/2000 and includes Azeitão, Palmela, Quinta do Anjo and Pegões. These lands are fertile and include Moscatel and Periquita varieties. Periquita is the Setúbal designation for the recognised Castelão Francês variety.

The Costa Azul

South of the River Tejo you push into the sublime Setubal Peninsula, commonly known as the Costa Azul (blue like the sea). The Costa Azul coast stretches all the way round from Costa da Caparica to Setubal and the Sado Estuary.

Village of Sesimbra

Due to its particular position at the Bay of Setúbal, near the mouth of the Sado river and its natural harbour, it’s an important fishing town.
Besides professional fishing and sport fishing (mainly of swordfish), the most significant revenues in Sesimbra come from tourism. The town is famous for its beaches, fish restaurants and nightlife.A tourist travelling to Sesimbra can appreciate its beaches, traditional fish restaurants and the Arrábida National Park.

House of Wax candles

Of each side of the Church of Ours Lady of the Handle has a line of lodgings for pilgrims. Call of House of Wax candles or simply inns that form the Place of fetichism in the Espichel Handle.To Mrs. of the Handle, given assignment the Sta. Maria of the Rock of Mua, flows several and numerous groups of wax candles (great groups of pilgrims). It was to the assigned person Saloio Wax candle (travelling of the roundnesses of the capital) that the incentive of the construction of the sanctuary fit, as if can read in a tablet next to the door of the church: “Houses of N. done Mrs. of Handle on account of the Syrian of the Saloios in the year of 1757 P. room of the butlers who to come to give bodo”.

Ermida for the Mareantes

The west of the Church of Ours Lady of the Handle, and the House of the /hospedarias Wax candles, (in the behind part and for the right side), concerning 100 meters places it Ermida of the Memory also known by Chapel of the Memory, a vaulted chapel, with blue and white tile panels in its interior. In the exterior two pictures of images in tile meet that very are degraded. Temple constructed necessarily in the place where it prays the tradition will have given the appearance of the Virgin.

Espichel handle

The Espichel Handle places it ocidente of the village of Azeitão, is delimited the south and west for the Atlantic Ocean and the north for 379 national road and Ribeira of the Tellers.

City of Setubal

A short drive south of Azeitão is the large fishing port of Setúbal, one of the most ancient cities in Portugal with a wealth of restaurants and interesting sites to visit.
Celebrated on the first Sunday of September, the town’s annual wine harvest festival (Festa das Vindimas) is one of the liveliest occasions in the region.

Sierra of Arrabida

The 500-metre-high granite ridge of the Serra da Arrábida is remarkable for its vegetation. Areas of the moist northern slope are covered with the untouched original forest of the Peninsula, while the sun-baked southern slopes feature a more shrubby growth, mainly of evergreens.

Castle at Palmela

Castle at Palmela with views over the wooded Serra da Arrabida.
Portugal’s first king, Afonso Henriques, captured Palmela from the Moors in the mid-12th century after a surprise attack on the King of Badajoz.
The knight-monks of Santiago were subsequently installed in the castle’s monastery in 1194.
Situated with magnificent views on a spur of the Serra da Arrábida, Palmela Castle is one of the finest examples of Portuguese military architecture. Constructed by the Moors, it was rebuilt after the 12th-century Reconquest, but was partially demolished by the 1755 earthquake that laid waste to Lisbon. In the castle’s dungeon directly below the keep, the bishop of Évora was imprisoned in 1484 for his part in the conspiracy against King João II. He died there days later, probably from poisoning.