Algarve Almanac: Cliffs, Crusades, & an unsolved Crime in Portugal

THE THEORETICAL:
THOUGHTS ON THE ALGARVE

CLIFFS

Burial and resurrection is a theme in The Algarve. Bones of a kind are all around you. The Algarve is composed of limestone, sandstone, and mudstone. The latter two are composed of layer and layer of sand or mud cemented together. Limestone was one or the other before being cooked by heat and pressure. The youngest rock in the region predates the first humans by millions of years. The famous Ponta da Piedade in Lagos a collection of yellow arches and pillars standing tall against crashing ocean waves — is sedimentary rock almost entirely made up of remarkably well-preserved sea shells conspicuously cemented together. Buried and cooked underground, they have been raised up by tectonic activity to become the stunning strip of pillars, arches, tunnels, and grottoes where Portugal meets the Atlantic. While in Lagos, visit Forte da Ponta da Bandeira, and beaches such as Pinhão, Camilo, and Dona Ana. The area also offers boat tours to the Bengali Cave. Tours leave from several locations between Portimao and Corveolos.) I visited those cliffs and beaches in winter. It was wonderful. Every beach was relatively small and deserted. (If there is a square meter of sand along the Atlantic, no matter the obstacles, the Portuguese have built a path to it.) Each had its own proscenium of karstic stone. It is an arresting coastline. I watched as wave after wave pounded away in a beautiful and frightening dance of ocean and stone, wave and wind. The result is a karst landscape of cliffs and beaches that are sublime. (You can learn maybe more than you want to know about the formation of karst landscapes from a geologist by clicking.

I visited The Algarve in January at the height of Omnicron in Portugal so the ballet between limestone and ocean played to a nearly empty house. Most restaurants and cafes were closed but there was always a hotel and a restaurant or two open for business. The closer to the beach, the fewer establishments and, unfortunately, the fewer Portuguese. The southern coast of Portugal ends at the small but significant town of Sagres. This is where Prince Henry the Navigator first pursued his interest in exploring The Atlantic and changed European history. It’s Cape St. Vincent is the terminus of the Parque Natural do Sudoeste Alentejano e Costa Vicentina. It is a UNESCO World Heritage site candidate for its flora, fauna, geology, and history. Strolling along the lighthouse and fortress at Ponta da Atalaia and Pedra das Gaivotas, I was moved by the imagination of the Prince Henry, who thought to ask, “What lies over the horizon?” and of the countless Portuguese who had the courage to let the wind take them to the edge of the world.

CRUSADES

If Lisbon was a good spot for focusing on the Age of the Discoveries (see my post on Lisbon), then The Algarve was the place to go further back in Portugal’s long history to the Romans, Moors, Crusaders, and, intriguingly, the Knights Templar (which I will treat in another posting on Portuguese mountain towns.) Although the geology first drew me, it was the history of the area that captured my imagination. The human history of the Algarve is at least 3,000 years old and includes the Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans (who called it Lusitania), Visigoths, Moors (North Africans), and Crusaders. Each enjoyed their time as rulers. (The current ruling class appears to be Berkshire Hathaway.) Portugal is a thousand-year-old nation. Its borders have existed just about continuously and consistently since its founding. It was carved out by Alonso Henrique of Spain and wrestled from the Moors. The entire Iberian Peninsula of Europe was the scene to the violent contest between Western Christendom and expanding Islam. Much of it happened in The Algarve, which was the western edge of the Arab empire. The Arabic term for the region, الغرب, romanized as al-gharb, meaning “The West”. The Romans — you can see ruins today — prized The Algarve for its salt. They built roads and planted orchards. In the 5th century, they were pushed out by the Visigoths. Islamic armies under Tariq ibn Ziyad, crossed the Strait of Gibraltar in 711 and begun n the Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula. The Moors stayed for 500 years and if you pay any attention to Portuguese culture, you may become convinced that they have never entirely left. You see the influence in the prominence of olives, and almonds in the cuisine, in the Portuguese language, in architecture, and design. Far is almost the same distance from Brussels, the seat of the European Union (1821km), as it is from Tripoli, Libya in North Africa (1975km). Lisbon was reconquered with help from Crusaders who happened to be passing by Portugal by ship in 1147 on their way to the Second Crusade in the Holy Land. The Algarve was the last region of Portugal to be taken back from the Moors. At Silves you can visit a former Moorish castle and walk the walls around the entire remaining Medina of what was for several hundred years, the capital of Muslim Algarve. The original fortress dates from the 10th century, taken by Dom Sancho I during the Reconquista in 1189. Tavira was conquered in 1239. Faro, which had a large Jewish population, was taken ten years later, under Alfonso III, whose statue you can find outside the archeological museum. Maybe there should be a statue somewhere in the Algarve to Pope Celestine III. It was his series of edicts, issued starting in 1195 (and continued by other popes) that made fighting the Arabs in Portugal the moral equivalent of fighting to retake Jerusalem. And the Algarve was a whole lot closer and easier for Crusaders from England, France, and Germany to reach. While other European powers played a more significant role in the Crusades, probably no other country in Europe was more significantly impacted by them.

Crime

I knew nothing about The Algarve when I arrived to tour the large [market in Ohlao,] an active fishing village. There was one large pavilion for the fish-mongers and another for purveyors of vegetables and fruits. Afterwards, I wanted a coffee, Pasteis da nata, and some sunshine. I also wanted a newspaper. I have made a habit of searching out a local English language newspaper from time to time. I don’t do it often but it is something I look forward to because reading a newspaper— they still exist! gives me some sense of the local culture. Satisfied that I had seen enough octopus and cod, I went looking for a newspaper and found two: The Portugal News (which I had seen before) and The Algarve Resident (which I had not). It was a bonus to find them at a corner store at the market. Filled with newspapers, snacks, bottled drinks, and clerks joking with their customers, I was reminded immediately of the candy stores of my youth in New York. Minutes later, out in the sun, with a view of the marina, shoppers milling by, and my coffee and pastry before me, I read of the prison death of Maria Malveiro. Maria Malveiro killed and dismembered 21-year-old Diogo Gonçalves. With the help of his girlfriend — with whom she was also romantically involved, Mariana Fonseca, Maria spread parts of the young man’s body in several places in The Algarve. The motive for the crime was compensation of seventy thousand euros. Maria, a security guard, was sentenced to the maximum penalties for the crimes of qualified homicide, desecration of a corpse, illegitimate access, computer fraud, simple theft, and use of a vehicle. Mariana, a nurse, was acquitted. I was appalled by the inhumanity of the crime. I was too a bit surprised by the leniency of the sentence, and I was fascinated — but I guess not surprised — by her prison murder. Before going further, let me stress that Portugal is a safe country, much safer than the US. I never once felt in any kind of danger in Portugal. I never even heard an argument or a horn blown in anger. Still, there was this shocking crime. In the same paper was a short article about a crime dating from 2007. It was an update about the case of a 3-year old girl gone missing from her vacation home as her twin siblings slept in the apartment and her British parents ate with friends nearby. I had never heard of the Madeleine McCann case. True the disappearance occurred in 2007 and it happened in an obscure region of a small European country. A blond three-year-old girl disappeared from her parents’ vacation villa in nearby Praia de Luz. Why on this balmy winter day, surrounded by Portuguese couples and families enjoying the sunshine on a Saturday morning, and never once feeling in danger of my person or property, was I eager to learn more about these crimes? Perhaps it was the jarring contrast with this beauty of The Algarve. This region is like California without any of its mega-cities, desserts, huge lakes, or snow-capped mountains. The Algarve is filled with orange and lemon orchards; olive trees and blue jarcandas make it a garden. The limestone karst towers, arches, and cliffs frame its beaches with geological pageantry. This did not seem like a place for gruesome murder or child abduction. Shortly afterward I found The Disappearance of Madeline McCann on Netflix. I took photos and videos of the Atlantic’s waves smashing into the cliffs during the day and then watched an episode back at my hotel at night. I traveled to one dramatic geological site or Roman ruin during the day and then pondered my suspicions of the parents (very wrong) and of the likelihood of one theory or another. As one participant in the case noted, Hollywood screenwriters could not conjure up so strange a story.