day 1351 / 450:
last month, we visited Portugal for the very first time......our destination was all about the house that we had hired. we went with two other families and all three of us had stumbled across the same property and fallen in love......
the place is called Casas Na Areia and is an hour and a half South of Lisbon.....it's in a rural spot near the beach and captivated us with its rustic and relaxed, yet chic, beauty.
the land used to belong to fishermen and rice farmers and you are still surrounded by rice paddies and sand dunes......
the layout reminded me of going to game reserves in South Africa where there are individual sleeping huts and one main communal house for cooking and relaxing......
each family had there own thatch roofed hut, with a gigantic sandpit in the middle....the main hut, made of reeds and wood has a kitchen, large linen covered chairs for lounging in and a big communal table........the main feature of the main hut is that it has a fine sand floor table....made cosy with underfloor heating.....
in the sleeping huts, there are king size beds, slick bathrooms and cement floors.....this is rustic living with serious style.....
the kids were obviously blown away with being able to play with buckets and spades in the living room and it has to be the first and only time that I will ever say.....'try and keep the sand inside girls'.....
i will share some more of our trip (and the area) over the next couple of days but we came for the house.....and certainly, it was a big part of what made our visit to Portugal so spectacular.
