Land of fishing and maritime tradition, deeply religious, marked by the Church, from which highlights its main entrance of large decorative, has always been subject to Fortunio the drudgery and misery of the sea. Today, alongside the nature of fishing craft, catering, trade and tourism are the main economic activities.
Alvor is well known for its beaches and its fishing village near the mouth of the river ..
Died here on 25 October 1495, the king of Portugal D. John II. Shortly after, D. Manuel raised it to the town the county seat, a status would lose in the early nineteenth century. The small town was made only by the village and had, in 1801, 1 288 inhabitants.
The Ria de Alvor is one of the three wetlands in the Algarve and one of the twelve of the country. The importance of those are for the preservation of a critical ecosystem for wildlife and nature is attested by the fact that they set a global day and in any civilized country, they are subject to extreme protection, which means a right Community "non edificandi" total of the first defenders are usually their own mayors and local populations. In the case of the Ria de Alvor, however, and despite even have been a personal intervention in defense of a British prime minister, despite being enrolled as one of the sites Natura Portugal, there is today no rating law that protects the "protection" of elected officials and real estate interests of order. The official explanation is the inability of understanding the two state agencies responsible for this, which of course is a euphemism to mean the permeability of such bodies underground interests that move around the estuary.
We, therefore, that the Presidents of Lagos and Portimão, taking advantage of the World Wetlands, decided to protect the estuary of Alvor. And how they intend to do so, beyond the broad statements of principle quoted above? It is best to pass the word to them, because everything is crystal clear as the waters of the Ria de Alvor.
Alvor
where Hannibal landed with their elephants
Deep down in the country, the ancient kingdom of Algarve, a land now called the foreground at the dawn of tourism in Portugal, King recalls a story that points out as the greatest of heroic management as having conquered the root-provider if it was unfolding through the centuries to mark the presence of those who went to posterity with the enviable title of Prince Perfect.
This land is Alvor and reminds us that far from the Queen, his wife and cousin, D. Leonor, of the charity is his cousin and heir, D. Manuel, Duke of Beja and especially the owner of your Heart and the bastard who wanted to come to stick the crown of Avis, there expired at the sea salt that his great-uncle desvirgar, in the rush of the ships, barges and ships, in conquest of the secrets of the towel that settles unwind in front of you.
Today, those going on tour to Alvor tourism, can not move their eyes to the vocation of this figure was odd that the fourth king of the dynasty founded by King John and I were there finou 25 October 1495, after remaining a few days in Caldas de Monchique. But in Alvor also took baths in a medicinal mineral water has been lost. In the village street and a stone house, which has the arms of Portugal, says there have been expired man, to quote Elizabeth, the 'Catholic' Queen of Spain.
It is worth setting the evocative phrase that says: "In this place where once stood the palace of the Captain-General of Alvor, D. Alvaro de Athayde, died in 1495 EI-King John II --
1960 - City of Portimão ".
Alvor is a land of fishermen and small farmers to the sea and the ground will get the basis of its economy. For tourism is now facing. And the reasons and motives will not starve him to being breathed by the outbreak of progress in a strong breeze is blowing across the Algarve. Just to remind the visitor that landed on those beaches many of the legions when the Carthaginian Hannibal, the Punic wars, conceived the plan will destroy smug and proud Roman Empire, within their own borders. And who does not ensure that land which was lower than its famous elephant trampled the first time, land of the Iberian Peninsula?
The truth, according to historians assert upright, Hannibal, the Carthaginian pierced, their galleys bristling with oars handled by slaves, in those sands where the thriving gardens and bleached in the sun at Midday, salt crystals, pyramids. That's how the five miles further to the east arrived, 436 years before Christ, the descendants of exiles Dido stunning hot slopes of Philistia. Would this form of Porto Hannibal born in Lagos.
And Alvor win the name when he was subject to Arab rule and gave him the prefecture of ALBUR, which means, uncultivated field. From Albur born one day, Alvor, which became the land of illustrious people. Noted, among others, D. Francisco de Tavora, first Count of Alvor, which left a reputation for brave and honorable man. Was viceroy of India and when one day he was surrounded by numerous army led by warrior Sambagy, had the happy inspiration of having to open the tomb of St. Francis Xavier and give him command the defense of Goa. This gave credence to Portuguese forces weakened, much of which was made up of Indians. Taking advantage of the persecution that the Grand Mogul army moved to the Maharat Sahbagy, D. Francisco de Athayde to repeat the exploits of the now legendary feats of arms, Portuguese in Goa.
The sea around Alvor offers unparalleled scenery where blue water and always quiet. All calls to the home. That's where the sun passes the winter. Lure after the sun descend countries nórdlcos the descendants of those in the third invaded by force of arms, the Iberian peninsula. They call themselves, now Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Finnish. With it, the things that tend to be the purest representatives of Arianism. Alvor is a kind of gem nestled at the scene that the man is helping to beautify and draws tourism. The tawny sands and ocean waters, espelhentas and sultry, the air is not polluted by the canyons of smoke blackened the factories, the heady and intoxicating perfume of flowers that spread pollen clouds, the spots of fig orchards. almond and carob trees, lend the environment climate that invites you to come back and
travel the path that D. John II calcurriava when, after losing the long journey from Lisbon to Portimão by steppe Alentejo, there came to seek relief and physical ailments retemperança for their afflictions of the soul.
Centuries is the same fantasy environment to be a paradise, paradise in southern Europe, without overwhelming the flora of the equatorial lands but offering many there are in, the calm of land just now lost but now troubled by the glow of a renewed Portugal. The village nestles in its two-storey houses, its people living in temência God and always looking to the sea that gives the daily bread, born of a cyclone history does not matter which one - Hannibal or the Arabs, the truth is that as Troia at the mouth of Sado, where a tourist town is born, too Alvor, timidly nestled in the shadow of the church of S. Sebastian and he received the favor of Kings and the nature is emerging around the skyscrapers of Century City, fifteen passed on one in which the barbarians of the Carthaginian mercenaries there established a summer camp to anticipate that they have been fatal : that of Capua, where he lost and lost cartago.
Just to recall what had been the landing of the famous African warrior, it is worth going to Alvor where it hangs, the plunge, the light in your eyes in line with orizonte, a figure shrouded in mist of King D. John II.
Armando De Aguiar