Starting from Corte António Martins, the trail follows rural roads and will let you visit settlements in the Baixo Guadiana region and privileged landscapes on the coastline.
The trail crosses through Corte António Martins, a village of houses scattered among vineyards, vegetable gardens and dryland orchards with holm oaks, carob and almond trees. Despite the modernity of the buildings, there are vestiges of the old rurality of the region, such as the typical schist kilns.
The vegetation is denser in the ravine of Rio Seco, and it is composed mainly of oleander, reeds and cattails, and large cork oaks. Mediterranean scrubland grows on the slopes, mainly gorse, Montpellier cistus and cistus, lavender and mastic thyme. Mammals such as the wild rabbit and the hare are common in the area, as are birds like the Eurasian jay, the hoopoe or the azurewinged magpie, among many others.
In Pomar, the trail follows a stream along whose wetlands grow vineyards, flanked by monumental holm oaks, carob and olive trees. This small village presents several examples of the Baixo Guadiana’s traditional rural architecture: walls and dry stone walls in schist, roofs of straw and Portuguese tile, haysheds, cattle sheds, ovens, stone benches and wells.
The ascent to the hill of Boa Vista (literally "good view") does the trail's name justice. For about 3 km of road, the view extends through hills dominated by pine and beds of cistus and, to the south, over the ocean and the coast line, from the bar of Cacela-a-Velha to Isla Canela, in Spain.
A new crossing of the Rio Seco and its tributary will show you areas of wellpreserved riverside curtain, with willows, oleanders, beds of reeds and cattails. At Rio Seco’s ford, you will come across an impressive escarpment of schists and greywackes.
Municipality: Vila Real de Santo António
Location: Corte António Martins
Type: walking and cycling
Circular trail: yes
Distance: 10 km
Average duration: 3h
Cumulative elevation gain: 260 metres D+
Type of path: dirt paths and asphalt roads
Start of the trail: 37º 13' 16.03'' N 7º 33' 46.98'' W