This weekend I've been in the very unhabitated part of Portugal in a small village with a couple of residents.
It is called São Miguel do Outeiro, near Viseu in the north middle of Portugal.
Time has not passed this small village by and the houses, streets and roads remain somewhere in the 1900s.
It takes less than 15 minutes walking in all the small roads inside and we walked through the whole village, but if you want to stop on details, and there are years and years of details, you can stay all day there, it is what it happened to me.
Igreja Matriz de São Miguel de Outeiro, where the entire population, predominantly old, gathers every Sunday.
Rosette in stone above a door.
The livelihood continues to be farming and raising goats and sheep.
Small church at the entrance to the village, in the middle of a road junction.
The mailbox of one of the most important houses in the village, the doctor's house.
A cage where all the birds are free.
Abandoned house.
Village below and the floor of a house resting on a rock.
Window decorated with Christmas bushes.
Another abandoned house.
Passage to the gardens.
Old wine barrel next to the communal cellar.
Another abandoned house, in this village more than 50% of the houses are abandoned and in ruins.
Underneath there is a small door where the cattle used to stay. This was a common habit and also served as a way for the houses to be heated.
The village pillory was built in 1766, 11 years after the great 1755 Lisbon earthquake (between 8.7 and 9 on the Richter scale).
Another 3 abandoned houses.
The only old house I saw being rebuilt in this village, as in all Portuguese villages, the reconstruction of old or ruined houses must comply with the original architecture.
I hope you enjoyed the trip, for me it was a different and quite rewarding weekend, although it is a little sad to see villages almost depopulated and practically in ruins, being there we almost felt the presence and life of those who lived there, their day life and how things worked 50 years ago.
