Day 57 – Friday 23 Feb 18 – Alcoutim
We drove 9 miles to Alcoutim where there is another motorhome aire and a picturesque riverside village.
Even though we arrived early in Alcoutim the popular aire was full. Luckily we’d spotted another place with motorhomes just down the road and nearer to the village.
After lunch we walked down to the Guadiana river which is the border between Spain and Portugal. Lovely to sit and watch the boats and see the Spanish village Sanlucar across the other side. See photo at top of page.
As we wandered through the narrow cobbled village streets we spotted this lemon tree.
The castle was built in the 14th century to defend the village and control trade on the river. In the 17th century Alcoutim had a reputation for smuggling tabacco and snuff from Spain.
The steps to the church in the photo below were built by military engineers in 17th century to better link the church with the village.
The views of the old castle from the hilltop church were great.
Later in the evening, after spending a couple of hours sitting in the sunshine reading, we walked back down to the river and found a little village shop. We popped in a found it stocked the few bits we needed to see us through to Monday morning. We changed our plan slightly therefore and decided that we didn’t need to move on to a bigger town to find a supermarket tomorrow and could stay another day in this delightful location.
Weather – Sunny and warm, 23 degrees.
Distance driven: nil
Overnight stopover: Alcoutim, N37 28.356, W7 28.387. Water, waste, elsan at the official aire 300m away.
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