Portugal Active – walking, cycling and family holidays

As one of the lesser-known places in the south of Europe, the Alentejo coast surprises for its superb scenery and wide range of Mediterranean habitats.

Walking and Cycling through is the best way to get in touch with nature. Alentejo Adventures is based on the coast in the picturesque town of Vila Nova de Milfontes perched on the banks of the Mira Estuary.

Also the Southwest coast of Portugal provides the perfect place for a great family adventure: unspoilt rural landscapes, hospitable locals and people, one of the cleanest rivers in Europe, deserted beaches. Full days packed with 1001 adventures in the fresh air and sunshine.

The walks and cycling circuits take visitors through the varied landscapes of the Natural Park from the Cercal hills through the undulating cork oak and pasture to the dun scapes of the coast. The area's unique geology, flora and fauna has lead to the classification of protected areas within the Natural Park where only pedestrians are allowed to pass. Here 750 different plant species and 200 bird species are known to exist. Portugal is a must for ornithologists with its cliff-nesting storks, raptors and for its position in the migratory corridor.

The Southwest landscape is one of the most unspoilt in Europe, with small amount of human marks on the landscape: an under populated territory, with no industry and methods of agriculture that have seen little change in hundreds of years. From the information that we gather from earlier centuries, we can understand that the low population density of the area, left a vast area of waste land, only with occasional occupation in the valleys formed by the rivers and streams, and small hamlets of people that lived in the mountains, dedicating their lives to shepherding and exploitation of cork. The whole coastline was characterized by the absence of human mark in the landscape, excepting the land around the main villages