Castelo de Sines

På den låga kullen över hamnen i Sines, the castle looks out over the Atlantic that carried the town’s most famous son eastwards: the fortress where tradition says Vasco da Gama was born around 1469, in the household of the castle’s commander.

Kustens fästning

The castle was built in the fourteenth century, in the reign of King Pedro I, to defend a stretch of coast long raided from the sea, and its keep — the torre de menagem — still anchors the walls over the old quarter. In the following century the fortress passed to the Order of Christ, and the town below grew around the fishing harbour and, later, the navigator’s memory.

Sjöfararen och donjonen

Vasco da Gama’s father served as alcaide of Sines, and the tradition that the future explorer of the sea route to India was born inside the castle gave the building its place in national memory. The keep now holds the town’s natural history museum, and the ramparts look over the beach and the modern port — a short walk from the Porto Covo kusten i norr.

Det här får du se

• Slottsmurarna och donjonen över gamla stan
• Vasco da Gama-traditionens märken
• Naturhistoriska museet i tornet
• Utsikten över hamnen och stranden
• Kustvägen mot Porto Covo

Praktisk information

Slottet står i centrum av Sines, på Alentejokusten, omkring en timme söder om Setúbal på kustvägen. Gamla kvarteret är kompakt och gångbart; sommarvärmen är stark på kullen — ta med vatten. Museets öppettider varierar — kontrollera officiell information.

Bildkredit: Castillo, Sines av Diego Delso — CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.