Landscape

The Southwest landscape is one of the most unspoilt in Europe, with small amount of human intervention in its history: an under populated territory, with no industry and methods of agriculture that have seen little change in hundreds of years. From the information that we gather from earlier centuries, we can understand that the low population density of the area, left a vast area of waste land, only with occasional occupation in the valleys formed by the rivers and streams, and small hamlets of people that lived in the mountains, dedicating their lives to shepherding and exploitation of cork.

The whole coastline was characterised by the absence of human mark in the landscape, excepting the land around the main villages. The fishing populations were scarce and fishing was a complementary activity to agriculture. The fisherman were farmers who considered the proximity to the sea a chance for higher income. In the sixties we saw the first big emigration occurrence. At the same time the construction of the Mira irrigation canals began. Pine trees were sown against the sea winds. Conditions for a deep change in the agriculture landscape were created. Nevertheless the population decreased. Only in the eighties appeared anew factor that speeded up change: tourism. It was essentially in the shore populations that the greater changes were felt. Populations, which were marked until then by relative isolation, became centres of a tourist influx. In 1995 the Natural Protected Area became a National Park. Thus arose an Institution that aimed to give value to the natural resources, landscapes and cultures in order to promote the economical development and the well being of the population in harmony with nature, assuring the active participation and contribution from public and private bodies within the population.