From Quinta Do Rossi via Sines and on up to our first Vineyard Stop (23km +110km)

On leaving Quinta Do Rossi behind, we looked for our nearest Service point and supermarket and found an Intermarche in Sines with a motorhome service point in the car park, so off we headed to empty wastes and refill with water and do a quick supermarket shop before heading on to our first vineyard stop at Filipe Palhoca Winery near Palmela (www.filipepalhoca.pt). In Portugal there is a scheme called Portugal Easy Camp (similar to France Passion), where farms, vineyards, and local producers can offer free parking for the night in return for you buying their product. At the vineyard we were going to, we paid 18euros for the night, which is similar to a campsite, and instead of getting free facilities, we get a safe/secure spot for the night and some of their produce which in this case was a pack of 3 bottles of their wines. As we have toilet, shower etc on board and can fill and empty free of charge at service points it makes sense for us to effectively buy wine instead 😂

View through the windscreen when parked up.

We had to arrive by 6pm (closing time for their vineyard shop) and as it was Sunday tomorrow they would be closed, so we would have the site to ourselves. We planned to stay 2 nights and have a chilled Sunday just hanging out in our own space.

Once we had arrived, been given our wine, told we could park absolutely anywhere and walk throughout the vines if we wanted to and explore, we settled in with a glass of the sherry we had bought at our stopover in Jerez. We then cooked kebabs on the BBQ which we had with new potatoes and salad and broke into a bottle of the vineyards Red wine.

On Sunday morning we had a slow and lazy start waking to a cloudy sky for the first time since Donastia San Sebastián and following coffee and cereal we headed off on the "Vineyards Garden Trail" which took us on an 11km walk through sandy trails of Cork Oak forest and vineyards.