Monchique is located in the western Algarve and a great place to visit if you want to take a break from the beaches. With a car rental you can easily drive on the main road up to Monchique and you can just feel the adventure ahead thanks to the eucalyptus trees and yellow flowering mimosas lining the road.

You’ll find a bunch of local pottery shops, cafes and local restaurants lining the road, all of which more than willing to accept your patronage. Actually one of the most popular pastimes is to take a seat at one such restaurant and dig into some chicken piri-piri.

Once you reach the centre of Monchique you’ll find a revamped square with a restored nora – well – which features tin buckets meant to fill up a water tank, now functioning as a water feature. In the past, the nora was donkey-driven to pull up water from the well for as long as 10 hours a day.

As you might’ve noticed already all over the Algarve, the town square is a great place to find a couple of restaurants.

Walking around the place you’ll find bronze lifelike figures of adults and children as well as a working public laundry – the very manual, very labour-intensive type of public laundry – still used by the locals to was and scrub their clothes.

The main church features some wonderfully elaborate Manueline carvings on the exterior door and also in a religious vein, looking up into the hillside you can see the ruin of a 17^th century Franciscan monastery.

For the more alcohol-inclined visitor, you should try the local clear spirit called ‘Medronho’, similar to schnapps it is made by distilling the red strawberry-like fruit of the arbtutus tree/bush, it’s a strong and very acquired taste.

Even if the solar plant has been green-lit by the regional authorities, its construction is causing a lot of distress for the residents in the Fonde da Apra area of Loule. They’re concerned about the fact that their properties have plummeted in value because of the plant and have vowed to take their case to Brussels if the project is not stopped.

For a bit of background, several studies into the compatibility of the plant with various aspects of Loule’s projected development have shown it to be lacking. An evaluation carried out by the Algarve Committee for Regional Development and Coordination which showed that the project “encroaches on a Site of Community Importance”; an environmental impact study carried out by the Cascais-based project consultancy company Matos, Fonseca & Associates, found that the land the plant will be built on was found to be home to fauna of “conservational interest” even if the land is not covered by the “Special Protection Zone” status. The survey did conclude that the overall impact would be minimal and ‘insignificant’ and would also occur mainly during the construction phase, saying that the impact on the landscape would be of “little significance and reduced magnitude”.

That conclusion is vehemently contested by the frustrated locals who are not fond of the idea of a solar power plant being built next to their homes.

One British couple said that they acquired their property on a hillside directly overlooking the plant because they like the view, and now that view is being wiped out.

That appears to be the main concern of most the inhabitants, saying that while they understand the importance of renewable energy and that they have nothing against the solar plants, but they just don’t like the fact that the plants are being built in full view of the villas and in a residential area.

We’ll keep an eye on this story and see how it unfolds.