Douro River and the Douro Valley in North Portugal - UNESCO World Heritage Site... Where the world renowned Port wine comes from...
It doesn't matter where you come from, where you live, who you love or what you believe in. When the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization - UNESCO creates a legal instrument to determine the preservation of the historical and natural heritage of the Douro valley and the Douro region, it is a case to seriously consider a visit to these places and landscapes.
Celebrate the life, beauty and diversity of the places that UNESCO has given particular attention to in the Douro region. They are unique, protected places, which retain in themselves a unique beauty that not only deserves to be visited, but deserves to be immortalized.
In 2001, UNESCO classified 24,600 hectares of the Alto Douro Wine Region as World Heritage, spread over 13 counties: Mesão Frio, Peso da Régua, Santa Marta de Penaguião, Vila Real, Alijó, Sabrosa, Murça, Carrazeda de Ansiães, Torre de Moncorvo, Lamego, Armamar, Tabuaço, S. João da Pesqueira and Vila Nova de Foz Côa.
The Douro River offers landscapes so fabulous that they are embedded in the memory of those who see them. The special climate - its own microclimate due to the mountain range that protects it from the influence of the Atlantic Ocean - guarantees the essential conditions for the production of the world famous Port Wine and makes the landscapes even more beautiful, imposing and breathtaking, in any season.
But Nature was not solely responsible for the formation of such unique landscapes. The Douro people also contribute a lot to its fame and magnitude. The steep banks of the Douro Valley have been shaped by man over the years, allowing him to plant vineyards, spread out in pleasant and original terraces, on authentic balconies facing the sun.
And this duality between what the environment naturally offers and what man's hard work has managed to do is what makes the landscape of the Douro Valley so unique. All this, of course, did not go unnoticed and made UNESCO classify this region as a World Heritage Site. Therefore, this whole region calls for a calm visit, with time, by car, boat or train. In addition to the pleasure for the eye, the terraces also have the function of preventing soil erosion.
Photography: Kat Piwecka