The three towns are as different as could be. They aren’t listed in the same guidebooks; they’re not even in the same part of the country. All they have in common is their cuteness.
Obidos is the quintessential tourist trap. Buses drop their charges just outside the walls of the old town on a street lined with bakeries, cafes and souvenir shops selling products made from local cork. After King Dinis married Isabel here in the 13th Century, Obidos became known as the “wedding town” where couples continue to tie the knot to this day.
Navare
Navare, on the coast, boasts a wide white-sand beach. With the exception of the old ladies in their layers of petticoats, the beach road has all the charm of Seaside Heights, NJ. Some of the women dry fish along the beach but most are hawking rooms – “zimmers” – for the night. The petticoats are a tradition from when woman watched for their sailor husbands to return from the sea and it could get pretty chilly on the beach. Just a block off the beach you can get lost in a maze of alleys, seafood restaurants and more “zimmers,” where freshly laundered sheets and towels flutter in the breeze.
Walls of Marva
Marvao sits on the Spanish border, its castle walls built in the days when protection from Spanish troops was a necessity. It’s whitewashed streets were pretty much deserted when we visited, perhaps due to a “plague” of mating earwigs, pincers ready to give the unwary a good nip.
