Odeceixe Windmill

Contrary to the previous days, on 4^th October 2015, we walked away from the sea. It was our first day in the Historical Way. Instead of the green and blue marks, we followed the white and red ones. Another difference is that, oppositely to the Fishermen’s Trail, which can only be walked by foot, the Historical Way is fully accessible to hikers and mountain bikers.

We left Casa Morais and we crossed the town towards the windmill. Since we had to go uphill, the first 600 meters were a little bit tiring. We climbed a long stairway and then a big slope led us to Mira’s watering channel.

This is a very easy trail to follow, even if there was no signaling, it was impossible to get lost. We walked along the watering channel for more than half the trail.

A lonely walker kind of accompanied us until the village of Rogil. It seemed that we were pursuing each other. Sometimes she was ahead of us, then she stopped and we were the ones walking ahead, then we were behind again. However, we spoke only once, when we gave her the water bottle she had lost.

I learned that there’s a large production of sweet potato in the region of Aljezur. I saw sweet potato fields for the first time in my life! They were located right next to the watering channel and we had the chance to see the sweet potatoes being harvested.

Just before we arrived to the village of Rogil, we stopped at a place called “Museu da Batata Doce”. No, it isn’t a museum, but a great place to find the whole kind of regional products and a restaurant where the sweet potato is king. It was a dificult choice, but we decided to buy bolinhos de batata doce e alfarroba (sweet potato and carob cookies). It was a good choice, they were delicious!

We stopped in Rogil to eat our sandwiches and then the trail led us back to the watering channel, which we followed for a few more kilometers.

We come across a detour to Amoreira Beach Circuit, a complementary circuit of Fishermen’s Trail, which we didn’t follow.

We turned right after we passed by Camping Serrão and we found ourselves on a loooong descent! This was a bit hard, especially for JB knees. Fortunatelly, we found a nice wood stick which was a precious help for him.

Suddenly, we had the opportunity to use our raincoats. This was the first and only time we used them. Luckily, it was just some light rain.

It was about 14:00 when we arrived in Aljezur. We stopped somewhere to eat a snack and to make some time until we check in at Amazigh Design Hostel. Meanwhile, we met a woman who was doing Rota Vicentina by bike. She was planning to arrive in Arrifana on that day and asked us to look for her bike while she was going to stroll through the town.

Aljezur

We were very lucky, it started raining heavily right after we had arrrived at our room. Later, we left the hostel to go shopping and to look for a geocache. Then, we prepared a delicious dinner at the hostel’s kitchen, which was very clean and organized. We ate steak with vegetable rice and we tried a delicious pasta with mussels that was prepared by the hostel manager, I think.

We enjoyed a lot our stay at Amazigh Design Hostel. Not only by the place itself, but mainly because of the pleasant and relaxing environment. We had the chance to talk with the girl that we had seen during our walk. She was from Boston and she was running out of time to complete Rota Vicentina, so she was trying to figure out the best plan to visit the main places of the route, especially to reach Cape St. Vincent.

Before going to sleep, we went for a small walk through the town

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