I’m outside a community hall in the middle of nowhere, seated on a grey plastic chair with tubular legs, in front of a computer on a wobbly trestle table. On an incline that makes my pencil keep rolling towards my lap. I’m wearing JW Anderson mules and a bathrobe provided by the accommodation, and it’s starting to rain.
Less specifically, I am at the CAPITÃO residency (named after a cat), in São Marcos do Campo, Reguengos de Monsaraz, Alentejo, Portugal.
I passed by Lisbon before venturing to the great Alentejo. Two days devouring prawns, oysters and sardines while sleeping in the gorgeously kitsch Hotel Florida (the John Travolta room). This is a region relatively unspoiled by the tourism that plagues Lisbon like butts in Mykonos. It is big (the biggest) with lots of wine, cork, wheat, olive oil, sheep and black pigs. Condé Nast Traveler named Alentejo as "one the best destinations in the world for 2022, and in the same year, the New York Times put Reguengos de Monsaraz in their "top 52 places for travellers to visit for a changed world". From here, though, it looks a bit like a Hollywood western. Lots of old things, Cucina Povera, traditional practices and architecture. It is a State in the South, kind of like Calabria. It is dry. Authentic. Far from rich in both senses of the word. It's not a cosmopolitan region. Rather, it's a bunch of little plots of towns between lots and lots of land. Look up ‘Migas’, and you’ll get the idea.
São Marcos do Campo is a place on the plains. The only routine that exists in this village is the weekly drop off from the grocery truck, the lascivious winks from old men in coffee shops, and the angry barks from locked-up dogs when walking past front doors. Rural is an understatement. A walk from one side of the town takes 10 minutes, and affluence is spotted with fresh coats of white paint. There are no Porsches here, and the closest thing you’ll get to golfcore is an Alentejan tweed cap (boina alentejana). The region is not unknown, but it is definitely more for those in the know. Alentejo’s coast plays host to some big names: Christian Louboutin has a house in Melides (he built a hotel there in 2023), and apparently, Anselm Kiefer, John Martin and Vincent Van Duysen have places nearby. Eddie Roschi, co-founder of LeLabo, also built a house here. It looks fantastic. However, the cashed-up creatives and their pads on the coast are not the whole story.
The woven earth and bushes might be brittle and sharp, but that’s the beauty of it. David Moralejo, Head of Content for Condé Nast Traveler, called it a place "where the beatniks read Pessoa". Funny, if you’re old enough to know who the beatniks were or have heard of Fernando Pessoa. That said, he makes sense when walking through São Marcos do Campo, where the tiny bars and terrace tables are packed with Sagres. Jack Kerouac would have loved it. A bunch of old blokes drinking cold beers and getting drink drunk. Surrounded by empty roads and grey sky and long sawdust fields withering under bulbous clouds with grit rain and nocturnal thunder.
The plains lead out to cork forests and their trees that make up 45 per cent of the species in the region. Most of the trees we saw were holm oaks and olive trees, with the occasional lemon and orange trees in the village looking seductive and just underripe. There are also a lot of vineyards. The clouds peaked from behind the rippling yellow lines that glowed under the horizon. They watered the grapevines that race across the hills like stretched stockings.
What to do in Alentejo
We spent a day in Monsaraz. A village on the top of a hill. It has a view of the river Guadiana and on the horizon sits Portugal’s frontier with Spain. The Monsaraz Castle sits above most of the whitewashed buildings, constructed in the 14th century and still standing in the sunlight.
Nearby is the Orada Convent (built between 1700 and 1741). A place that is, besides being a rural hotel, a spectacle in wood. A harmonious church sits within, covered in checked marble tiles, its altars sear overhead, ornamented with ungilded wood carvings that wrapped around in a mostly baroque style developed from the Evora School.
Drink wine. Tomás bought six wines from Gota a Gota in Porto, which come from a variety of regions in Portugal. I left some notes below.
The Chapel of Bones in Evora is quite the cadaverous endeavour.
The Mayor of Campo and Campinho (two of the nearby villages) invited us to have Sunday lunch at his restaurant, Monte de Palaios. He cooks there, and we had a buffet situation alongside a big family celebrating someone’s 60th birthday. Great dogfish soup. There’s a lake a few kilometres away. A man was fishing there and spoke about ducks and fish and water levels and tourism (this was before he realised I couldn’t speak Portuguese).
Eat more lunch, Ensopado de Borrego, tender lamb and crumbling potatoes with a stew of beef stock and bread. The bread in the soup was as juicy as the lamb, glistening like cartilage.
Went into an artisanal pottery workshop in Sao Pedro do Corval, where two ladies sat in an air-conditioned room, painting everything by hand. Gorgeous.
Looked at some shoes.
This place is not for the faint-hearted. The food is heavy, the days are slow, and the wine can sometimes taste a bit like grease. The cats are not too friendly, and the glare from the buildings is no joke for an epileptic. Old men sit slouched on weaved picnic chairs, blue, red, and white.
Wobbly chairs and cracked cobbles. There are weird wending walks from point to point, uncomfortable stairs and dusty castle entrances and fading churches. It feels like it’s in the middle of nowhere. In many ways, it is.
And sometimes that’s just what we need.
In the last week, one of the dogs that always barks lets me pat her from the outside of a fence. She winces when I walk away. She growls at passing cars but stays calm near us. She’s probably lonely, but when we pass by, neither of us feels alone.
Wines to drink in Alentejo
Pequeno Dilema 2022
The first night we consumed a bottle from the Douro in the North. Grown from 520 to 580m altitude vineyards, this was a fresh and unimposing white with a juicy Eggplant Parmigiana. The nose had a touch of vanilla and on the palette, some just-underripe white plum.
NATUS 2021
Catarina opened this for lunch on our first Thursday. It comes from the rich schist soils of central Vidigueira. Trincadeira and Castelão combine into a bright and ripe red aged in old Portuguese oak and chestnut barrels. A bright cherry red with fresh flavours. Easy-drinking energy here.
Sem mal Branco 2021
Some Vinho Verde for our Saturday. Bit of bubble but not too much, very fresh, great with lunch by the pool. We did just that, and its vibrant lemony notes and sharp acidity were a real treat from the North.
Palácio da Brejoeira Alvarinho 2022
Had my first Portuguese chook with this Vinho Verde. Fresher aromas of tropical fruit, citrus, quince? More mineral in the mouth, with a balanced acidity that held for a good minute.
Quinta de Saes Saes Tobias Farm 2022
Its aroma hit me with ripe pears. Maybe a sneaky peach. Tasted some Seville orange (don’t ask why) and stone. From the Dão using cerceal grapes, this juicy situation lasted a touch too long.
Arvad - Negra Mole 2023
Great looking bottle. Earthy nose. Notes of wet clay, rain and wet limestone. Goes down the gullet with faint tastes of ripe plum and slightly tart raspberries. Not my favourite.
