Fafe

Fafe is a working town in the hills of the Ave valley, known across Portugal for its sausages, its old emigrant fortunes and, more recently, for the freshwater beaches and walking country that surround it. Halfway between Guimarães and the mountains of the Gerês, it is the kind of place where the north of Portugal feels most like itself.

A town of granite and green hills

Fafe was called Montelongo until 1840, when it took the name of its own parish. The old centre keeps its granite houses, the arcaded Praça Mártires do Concelho and a pair of handsome churches; the local museum tells the story of the great wave of emigration that took Fafenses to Brazil and, later, France. Its real draw, though, is the countryside: hills, rivers and reservoirs wrapped in vineyards and forest.

What to see

• Praça Mártires do Concelho, the arcaded heart of the town
• The Igreja Nova and the old parish church
• The Municipal Museum, on emigration and local life
• The Queimadela dam and its river beach
• The granite hilltops of the surrounding Serra do Marão foothills

Practical information

Fafe lies in the district of Braga, about 15 kilometres from Guimarães and an hour by car from Porto. The Queimadela reservoir, on the River Vizela, has a supervised river beach, picnic areas and a small campsite, and serves as the starting point for some of the area’s best walks.

Image credit: Queimadela dam, near Fafe, by Carlos Cunha — CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.