Our house is located in Azoia, a 45m drive south from the centre of Lisbon and its international airport. Azoia is a small village at the southern end of the Setubal peninsula. It’s main road is ends at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Cape Espichel, a sacred place of pilgrimage in the 18th and 19th centuries, recently named a national cultural heritage site. In the 19th century King D. Carlos I of Portugal built a country house and hunting pavilion in Azoia.
Around Azoia we can find some of the most beautiful beaches in Portugal. Perhaps the most well known is Praia do Meco. In the early 1970s, the first naturists appeared in Meco, a beach named after a small village nearby. The extensive sands, the cliffs, the clay with which they covered the body, believed to be beneficial for the skin, and a magnificent sunset were the perfect ingredients for naturism.
The beach remained practically unknown due to isolation and difficult access. It started to gain fame in the summer of the early 1970s. A group of American, Swedish and Dutch hippies discovered the beach, with no road access.
Casa do Pico 