O Sítio "The Place" - Nazaré Village | Portugal

Hello Everyone :)

Still with the smell in the air of the sea air brought in the last article elaborated around this place, but this time in the opposite direction.
On the last one, we had to go down to the cliff almost to the waterline, but this time we went in the opposite direction, to its extreme, to the highest point of this place, a place called the Sítio, a name that has the same meaning as the translation.
Before making a brief written and visual description of the place, allow me to point out a small tip:
If you arrive there by car or other transport that doesn't only have 2 wheels, you'll only be very lucky to find parking close to the central square.

For a moment we thought it would be possible as the visit was made at a time still far from the high season, but the truth is that Nazaré is no longer visited only in summer, but throughout the year.
With luck you will find parking in surrounding areas further away from the square and next to residential areas, but the best thing is to park down there in the village and then take the opportunity to discover the village, take a walk along the waterfront, enjoy the extensive beach and the crystalline waters and after all this, closer to the golden hour, go up to the place that i share today on the Ascencor that takes us to the top and brings us back down whenever we want.

But let's get to what brought us here today, O Sítio "The Place".
This special place located in the village of Nazaré has its history intertwined with a famous local legend, located at the top of the escarpment of the promontory of Nazaré.
According to historians, the first building on the site took place in 1182 and was the construction of a Chapel located above a cave where a religious image of Nossa Senhora da Nazaré was hidden during the Muslim invasions.
This is one of the most prominent places, next to the Ermida there is a natural protrusion like a balcony known as the Bico da Meméria, where everyone moves to take that real photo and have an absolutely privileged view over the entire coast, with the village laid out down there at sea level and with the whole beach at our feet.

For many centuries this place has been the destination of many pilgrimages.
A few years later, the Sanctuary of Nossa Senhora da Nazaré was built in this same place and the religious image was transferred there.
The legend that is associated with this place tells that a noble Portuguese warrior was hunting on a foggy day and when he saw a deer he immediately started following it to the top of a cliff where he would find a cave with a religious image in a place so dangerous that only his prayers to the image would have saved him from a fall of more than 100 metres, and he had a Chapel built over the cave in memory of what happened.
Now i understand the image of the deer that is on the way down towards the fortress next to the cliff :)

Something that did not go unnoticed during our visit were the large fabric banners with red letters, spread all over the place, including on the "balcony" next to the Ermida with messages such as: "Don't let the Wall Fly" or "Our history without Bico will be erased from memory" and after some research i realized that the messages were placed by a civic movement in defense of that secular brand image of Nazaré, being that the place associated with the "miracle" of the image, face the intervention project on the cliffs with the aim of providing greater security and protection of goods and people by replacing the centuries-old vernacular protection walls with metal structures, as well as a series of interventions that could and certainly will change the character of the site.

The Movement understands that until there is an in-depth study and all the information inherent to the result of this study on the real need for intervention is disclosed, the intervention project should not move forward.
At the moment i have no formed opinion on the subject :/

That's all for today, i hope you enjoyed the visit as well as the description.

Photo by @aleister
Camera - Canon EOS 600D
Lens - EFS 18-55mm / 70-300mm
Location - Portugal

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Value your time, because every fraction counts, and the price of anything is the amount of life you trade for it.
May the memories of the travels be eternalized in the photographs, and may the photographs transport us back to the travels ;)