a little silver coast history

At the time Foz was very quiet for most of the year, with only Portuguese and a few French visitors in the summer months. August was chaotic as in those days everything closed in August and all the Portuguese had their holidays for that month.

It wasn’t until the summer of 1991 that I met another English person on holiday here.

The few Brits that did come to visit, slowly spread the word until you would encounter the occasional holiday maker here in the summer months, and a few surfers out of season. All that changed around 2004 when the area first featured in ‘A Place in the Sun’, and at the same time was also listed as one of the top three places to invest in a holiday home. Very quickly, buyers were moving in and purchasing homes in and around Foz do Arelho.

São Martinho and Nazaré saw the potential and built scores of apartments aimed at the holiday rental market and suddenly life became very different for all those in the area.

Now we have a sizable ex-patriot community in and around Foz do Arelho, and also many more homes that are used for holiday rentals. There is still a good deal of investment in the area and sales are on the increase again, after a quiet couple of years.