the costa vicentina without the costa vicentina poster
You arrive down a dirt track, park wherever, walk down. No seafront promenade, no terrace, no row of hired sun loungers. That's the first thing you notice at Malhão: the infrastructure simply isn't there, and that's the point.
The beach stretches in a long tongue of sand between cliffs, inside the Parque Natural do Sudoeste Alentejano e Costa Vicentina. The cliff-top trails connect to the coastal path that crosses the park, and on days with good wind there are always surfers. The sea here isn't for leisurely swimming: it has current, it has swell, and it has the respect that any open Vicentine beach facing the Atlantic deserves.
In August it fills up, but it fills up spread out, because the beach is long and the access points are multiple. Come down the north access and you get one version; from the south, another. Out of season, it's nearly just you, the wind and whoever's walking around with a board under their arm.
come prepared for
- a dirt track to the park, no tarmac all the way to the end
- strong northerly wind, almost always, even in summer
- real swell
- sunset on top of the cliffs, stay for that
