Alpiarça: Travel and tourism

Alpiarça (as Almeirim) lies in the center of an important wine region, surrounded by leafy trees and pleasant sceneries. Set in the vast and fertile plain known as lezíria, stretching east of the Tagus, the county is also known for horse breeding.

The town has a pretty twin-towered parish church, built in the late 19th century and with fine paintings from the 17th century.

Just outside the town, there is an important and striking museum, Casa-Museu dos Patudos, surrounded by vineyards. It used to be the residence of José Relvas (1858-1929), a wealthy and cultivated politician from the I Republic (1910-1926), as well as a diplomat and an art collector.

The house was built between 1905 and 1909, with a fine tiled and colonnaded loggia, and lodges a collection of decorated tiles, furniture, precious porcelain and exquisite glazed earthenware, Oriental and Portuguese carpets and tapestries, and sculptures and paintings by foreign and Portuguese artists of the Flemish, French, Italian and English schools.

In terms of gastronomy, the local specialities are sweets made of eggs, almond cakes, sweet potato and almond pastries and raisins of muscatel grapes.