On this event, we'll take a guided tour of the Arrábida Convent. We'll also use the morning to visit the Lapa da Gruta de Santa Margarida and take a short walk to one of the nearby beaches.

Arrábida Convent:

The Arrábida Convent, built in the 16th century, covers 25 hectares, including the Old Convent, located on the highest part of the mountain, the New Convent, located halfway up the slope, the Garden and the Bom Jesus Sanctuary.

At the top of the mountain, the four chapels, the set of guardhouses for venerating the mysteries of the Passion and some cells carved into the rocks form what is known as the Old Convent.

The convent was founded in 1542 by Friar Martinho de Santa Maria, a Castilian Franciscan to whom João de Lencastre (1501-1571), the first Duke of Aveiro, ceded the land on the mountainside.

Prior to construction, the Ermida da Memória existed where the Old Convent is today, a place of great pilgrimages, where the first four Arrábidos friars lived for two years in cells carved out of the rocks: Martinho de Santa Maria, Diogo de Lisboa, Francisco Pedraita and São Pedro de Alcântara. D. Jorge de Lencastre, son of the 1st Duke of Aveiro, continued the work by having a fence built to enclose the convent area. Later, his cousin D. Álvaro had the guesthouse built and designed the guardhouses on the crest of the hill that connect the convent to the foot of the mountain, leaving three unfinished. Ana Manique de Lara, Álvaro's daughter-in-law, had two chapels built, while Álvaro's son, António de Lencastre, had the Sanctuary of Bom Jesus built in 1650.

With the extinction of the religious orders in 1834, the convent, the cells and the chapels scattered throughout the mountains were plundered and badly damaged as a result of abandonment.

In 1863, the Casa de Palmela acquired the convent, but work didn't begin until the 40s and 50s of the following century. Forty years later, in 1990, its then owner, Manuel de Souza Holstein Beck, sold the convent and the surrounding area, totalling 25 hectares, to the Fundação Oriente, the only institution that, in his opinion, gave guarantees of maintaining the same values with which, in the 16th century, his ancestors handed it over to the Arrábidos.

Lapa da Gruta de Santa Margarida:

Located at the foot of the Serra da Arrábida, by the sea, which can be reached by boat or by land via a path built there by a hermit, descending some 200 stone steps to the site, the Lapa de Stª Margarida cave is an unusual place that is still visited today, where there is a dilapidated chapel built there in the 17th century. There used to be three images there (of Our Lady of the Conception, St Anthony and St Margaret) but they have disappeared over time and one of them is kept in the Arrábida Convent.

There were many pilgrimages to this place in past centuries, especially the Syrian fishermen who came in their boats decked out from all over, and the atmosphere became festive but one of authentic spiritual recollection, where people prayed and sang united by the same feeling of faith regardless of their personal convictions. This is no longer the case today, and the place is somewhat neglected.

The cave measures around 22 metres in length (the number of Elders or Wise Men) but as it connects in some parts with other smaller parts, it measures a total of 40 metres (a number referred to several times in the Bible as a marker of important events. For example: the 40 days and 40 nights of rain in the Flood, the 40 days that Moses spent on Mount Sinai, the 40 days that Jesus spent in the desert, etc.), and it can hold up to 400 or 500 people who, in the past, during the liturgical act in praise of the Saint venerated there, in Sung Mass, with torches in hand, gave the ceiling (made of stalactites) surprising effects that impressed our vision. In this cave, the most beautiful and fine water also flowed from a fountain that has since stopped flowing for reasons that may have to do with obstructions from rocks or dry branches in the water's path through the mountains, as happened in a fountain at the Arrábida Convent that has since been cleared.

Note: In the summer months when the dates of the visit coincide with traffic restrictions on the Arrábida beaches, the visit to Lapa de Santa Margarida will not take place and will be replaced by another point of interest in the Serra da Arrábida.