Attractions and Places To See around Vimeiro - Top 20

From the chapter house on the ground floor, a staircase leads up to the dormitory. This staircase was rediscovered during renovations beginning in 1930. Located on the first floor, the dormitory extends 66.5 meters in length and 21.5 to 17.5 meters in width along the entire east side of the medieval part of the abbey, thus covering an area of almost 1,300 square meters. In its current form, restored through renovation, it presents itself in its original medieval state. At the southern end, the dormitory opens with a large round-arched doorway to the northern transept of the church. A staircase formerly led down from there, as the Cistercian rule required two separate entrances to the communal sleeping quarters. At the northern end of the dormitory were the latrines, which—again according to a general rule of the order—had to be separated from the sleeping quarters by a separate room. The wastewater flowed into the abbey's garden on the north side. The monks slept together in the dormitory, fully clothed, separated from their neighbors only by a movable partition. The abbot alone had his own cell, located on the south side facing the church. This arrangement is typical of most Cistercian monasteries of this period. A narrow door in the center of the western side leads to a narrow spiral staircase, which today provides access to the kitchen, but in the Middle Ages led to the calefactory (warming room, see below). This staircase also provided access to the upper cloister. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kloster_Alcoba%C3%A7a

The entrance to the chapter house features a particularly striking facade with staggered columns. The chapter house served as the meeting place for the monks and was, after the church, the most important room in the monastery. It bears this name because the chapters of the Rule of St. Benedict were read aloud there daily. Elections and similar communal ceremonies of the monks also took place there. In the entrance area to the chapter house is the gravestone of an abbot whose identity is no longer known. The floor of the chapter house was formerly completely covered with such gravestones, as a Cistercian rule from 1180 stipulated that abbots had to be buried in the chapter house, meaning that the monks made their decisions on the graves of their deceased abbots. This type of burial was a significant exception to the general Cistercian rule, which forbade the burial of monks within the monastery. That's why you'll find a door leading south in the southern transept called the Porta da Morte (Door of Death), because deceased monks were carried out through it for burial. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kloster_Alcoba%C3%A7a

To the west of the new kitchen lies the refectory, the dining hall for the monks, a three-aisled hall measuring approximately 620 square meters (29 x 21.5 meters). Above its entrance, in medieval Latin, is the difficult-to-interpret inscription: "respicte quia peccata populi comeditis," meaning: "Remember that you are eating the sins of the people." The room impresses with its beautiful proportions. It has windows facing north and east, overlooking the new kitchen. On the west side, a stone staircase leads to the pulpit of the lector, who read from monastic texts during meals. The monks sat facing the walls and ate their meals in silence. The abbot sat with his back to the north wall, observing the proceedings. At the southern end of the west side, the refectory opens into the former medieval kitchen, now a side room leading to the cloister of the Cathedral of Afonso VI. A few meters further along, another opening can be found in the same wall, two meters high and 32 cm wide. It leads to the aforementioned side room, and there is no scientifically sound explanation for it. A long-standing legend claims that this opening served to monitor the monks' weight. They were supposed to pass through this door once a month, which is only possible by leaning sideways. If they were too heavy, they were put on a diet. The damage caused by the conversion of the refectory into a theater in 1840 (with 301 seats, 120 of which were in the galleries, and 5 boxes) was largely repaired during the restoration. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kloster_Alcoba%C3%A7a

The exact date of the monastery kitchen's reconstruction is disputed, despite a date of 1712 inscribed within the kitchen. However, it is assumed that the new kitchen was completed before the construction of King Afonso VI's cloister, thus likely towards the end of the 17th century. In the center of the kitchen, a chimney was built over a base of approximately 3 x 8 meters and reached a height of about 25 meters. Two flanking chimneys of the same height flanked the kitchen, forming the highest point in the monastery's roofscape after the church and its nave. Such structures existed in Portugal only at the Convent of Christ in Tomar and the Royal National Palace in Sintra. The hearth of the main chimney is recessed to hold the embers, so that these facilities—after centuries of abstaining from meat—were now suitable for grilling and roasting whole cattle. A ditch of the levada, the artificial side channel of the Alcoa River, flows beneath the kitchen floor. On the west side of the kitchen are seven large stone basins, each with two spouts depicting mythical faces or grotesque masks. Water flowed into these tub-sized basins, fed by a channel running inside the wall. In 1762, the kitchen received its current tiles, which cover both the walls and ceiling. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kloster_Alcoba%C3%A7a

The first cloister was probably completed around 1240, along with the church, but it may have collapsed. It was replaced around 1308–1311 by the present-day Claustro de Dom Dinis, also known as the Claustro de Silencio (Cloister of Silence, because speaking was forbidden there). It has a circumference of 203 meters and an average height of 5 meters on the ground floor. At the beginning of the 16th century, a second story was added to the cloister by order of King Manuel I (1469–1521), giving it two levels. Access to the upper level of the cloister is via a spiral staircase in the northeast corner, which also connects the kitchen to the dormitory. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kloster_Alcoba%C3%A7a

On the southwest hillside of Cabeço Gordo, almost coinciding with the administrative boundaries between Porto de Mos municipalities and Alcobaça, the Memory Arc it was built, probably in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century and was restored in 1830, by King Miguel, as shown in one of its inscriptions. The bow, perfectly round, has only two inscriptions, one in Latin almost imperceptible, due to stone erosion, registered in 1758 and composed by Friar Bernardo de Brito, in the beginning of the seventeenth century at the behest of Alcobaça Monastery Abbot. According to tradition, that History denies, the monument was built by the monks of the Cistercian Order, for marking the land donated by the Portuguese first King Afonso Henriques. However, its construction only intended to give material evidences of the vow of D. Afonso Henriques, invented by Alcobaça chroniclers.

This spot offers a magnificent panorama of the coast and a 360 degree view. On the historical aspect, it was built by the Cistercian monks, it measures 4 meters high and 3.62 meters wide. The arch has no decoration, only two inscriptions: the first, the oldest written in Latin, testifies to its creation. The second inscription refers to the reconstruction of the monument, carried out by D. Michael in 1830.

Salir do Porto has a river beach, on the bank of the Tornada River, which flows into the bay of São Martinho do Porto. Salir beach is famous for its sand dune about 50 meters high. Once the largest in Europe, the Salir Dune stands out in the dune landscape of São Martinho Bay. The core of the Dune is partly made up of red sandstone, a vestige of an older dune – a fossil dune. There are other rock beaches in the coastal area that are locally called Quebradas. It was in the Ruins of the artisanal Customs House of Salir that the caravels that participated in the discoveries and conquests were built during the reigns of D. Afonso V and D. João II. The extinct parish was made up of the towns of Salir do Porto, Casais de Salir do Porto and Bouro.