Hidden in the mountains of the Serra do Açor, in the municipality of Arganil, Piódão is one of Portugal's most photographed villages. Its dark schist houses, with slate roofs and doors and windows painted blue, rise in tiers up the side of the valley like an amphitheatre, and in the evening, with the lights on, the village looks like a nativity scene. It belongs to the historic villages network.
The village
For centuries Piódão was one of the most isolated places in the country, reachable only on foot or by mule: the paved road arrived only in the 1970s. That isolation preserved its architecture. The blue of the doors, it is said, comes from the fact that the only paint available in the village shop was that colour. Below, on the square, stands the white mother church of Nossa Senhora da Conceição, with cylindrical turrets, contrasting with the grey houses. You walk narrow steep lanes, stairways and small terraced gardens. A small museum shows traditional life.
Nature
Trails lead from the village to the nearby hamlets of Foz d'Égua, with a river beach and a suspension bridge, and Chãs d'Égua, with rock carvings. Nearby are Fraga da Pena, a waterfall in a wood near Benfeita, and the Mata da Margaraça, one of the last patches of primeval oak and chestnut forest in Portugal. Many villages in the area also belong to the Aldeias do Xisto, the schist villages network (see also Lousã).
Getting there
Piódão can only be reached by car, on winding but scenic mountain roads: about an hour and a half from Coimbra, about an hour from Seia. The village has a few holiday houses and a hotel.