Day Trips · Alcobaça

A Day in Alcobaça

20 minutes from Nazaré · The Monastery of Alcobaça

Let’s leave Nazaré for the day....

Alcobaça is only about a 15-minute drive. Let’s park near the town square, grab an expresso and a Pastel de Nata at this outdoor cafe and chat...

That massive building sitting right in front of us....that’s the Monastery of Alcobaça.

Now here’s a fun fact for ya...the monastery was founded in 1153 by Dom Afonso Henriques, Portugal’s first king, and construction started in 1178...so not only is it over 800 years old but also became one of the largest and best-preserved Cistercian monasteries in Europe and was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1989.This is a Paragraph Font

But we aren’t just wandering through an old church today.

Inside is one of Portugal’s greatest love stories...and probably its saddest.

Dom Pedro was the son of King Afonso IV and was married to Constança of Castile. Inês de Castro arrived in Portugal as one of Constança’s ladies-in-waiting, and Pedro fell in love with her.

After Constança died, Pedro and Inês lived together and had children, but Pedro’s father worried that Inês and her powerful family could become a threat to the Portuguese throne.

In 1355, the king ordered that Inês be killed. In 1357 two years later Pedro became king and said that he and Inês had secretly married, making her the rightful Queen of Portugal.

He then had two incredible stone tombs created for them inside the monastery.

Fun fact

The tombs sit facing each other so that, according to the story, when Pedro and Inês rise on the Day of Resurrection, the first person each of them will see is the other...Imagine.

Let's wander farther into the monastery...There’s the cloister, the monks’ dormitory, the dining hall and an enormous 18th-century kitchen with a chimney that looks big enough to cook dinner for half the town.

This place wasn’t only used for prayer. The monks helped organize and farm huge areas of land surrounding Alcobaça. They introduced agricultural methods, ran a school and helped turn the region into one of Portugal’s most important fruit-growing areas.

Alcobaça is still famous for its apples today...

and sits where the Alcoa and Baça rivers meet, and some people believe the town’s name came from putting the names of the two rivers together.

There are little streets, local shops, cafés and restaurants surrounding the monastery, so we’ll find a spot for lunch and then go looking for something sweet...you can’t come to Alcobaça without trying the "doces conventuais".

Try a cornucópia, a crispy horn-shaped pastry filled with sweet egg cream...

and it goes perfectly with another expresso.

You’ve got nearly 900 years of Portuguese history, one of the country’s greatest love stories, an incredible monastery and some of the best pastries you’re ever gonna taste...

honestly, it's a super cool daytrip from Nazare...

and it’s all only about 15 minutes down the road.