After our visit to Guarda, we were looking for a spot for the night, which we found next to the Caldeirão dam. By chance, we noticed that a hike starts here. We found some information in Portuguese, but didn’t understand much, only that the route is 12 km long, there are 600 metres height difference, it will take about 5 h, and that there are hundreds of stairs. Anyway, we bought 2 tickets online (Euro 2,50 pp) for the next day. (passadicosdomondego.pt)
In the morning, we walked to the dam, from where we could already see the path going down. Our tickets were checked and down we went.
We came past a waterfall and soon reached the village in the valley. From here, the route followed the river Mondego upstream.
The path is mostly a boardwalk, which makes it comfortable to traverse this valley, but there are also sections on a normal path. A couple of times we crossed the river on swinging bridges, which was fun.
The only place for refreshments was a self-service stall, where we got a cold beer and lemonade.
A 2 km long channel takes the water along the valley until it finally drops 45m down to a little power plant, which is still in use.
Along the river there were once many mills, spinning wool and weaving the famous blankets “cobertor de papa”. We came past the ruins of these huge buildings.
We did the route from the right to the left, starting at the dam. At the end we had many stairs, like at the beginning. Maybe it is better to start near Videmonte, walk mostly downhill, and then climb the stairs to the dam with a last effort. It is easy to get a taxi to take you to your starting point, there are signs everywhere with the numbers of 3 drivers.
What a great hike! We can really recommend it. We are now driving in the direction of the coast and up to Porto – more soon!
sieht wie Algarve raus, wo wir im September waren de ct7/dg7ro
Hallo Torsten, Algarve liegt noch auf unserer Route nach Marokko. Lizenz ist fast erledigt. Heute ist die Vorschreibung der Lizenzgebühr angekommen.