North Portugal horse riding vacation

Planet

This is the land of wolves and wild horses. We have been involved in the conservation of these 2 species for the last two decades. We produced a television documentary of 52 minutes where we stressed the wolf problems and why they should be preserved. We continue to have in the name of all our tours and in all our marketing the name of the wolf and wild horses for the local people to understand that our visitors came because of this species and because of our well-conserved nature.

We encourage our guests to observe the wild life and write in our wildlife log. The local breed of horses comes from pré-historical times and they are nearing extinction. To help we need to find a good use for them and with it raise their monetary value. If we achieve it the local farmers will breed them and the numbers of the species will rise to. We promote this breed all over the world speaking about them and having them in our stables for the riders discover how wonderful they are.

We create a special week tour that the guests can come with us to the mountain and observe the wild behaviors of the horses and wolves without impacting on their habitat.

In all the rebuilding process of our houses, we used the local materials as much as we could and we make a very big effort to have our houses well insulated and with that, we save energy in our heating system.

The main heater of the house works on wood that comes from the cleaning of the fields avoiding fire in the forest and spending diesel that is usually the local main way to heat the houses. The soap in the bathrooms is produced by us without the normal chemicals of the industrial soap.

In our garden, we have created a big pond that receives the rain water to water our vegetable garden that the guests can use too.

People

We have 4 local people working with us. 2 local experts in yoga, pilates and massages, one local women that works as a house helper and horse handler. The first ones and the last one we send to workshops for they get more knowledge. We are a art village with art studios and resident artists so most of the decor and some furniture of our guest houses are made by a local artist helping him to live from his the art.

For our meals we buy the local products to the neighbours like the honey, vegetables, jam, and ham. We support the local small restaurants, that use meat from the local free animals like the cows that graze free in the mountain, advising our clients to eat there and with our outdoor activities clients we made same of our meals there too. We are a small business so we have a small number of people working for us but we always work with the locals.

During the rebuild of the guest houses it was the local contractors that work there and for maintnaice of the gardens and property we use a small local company that made this kind of work. We ensure the transfer from Porto airport to here. We could do it ourselves but we use for it a local family that the husband and the wife drive a taxi.

We are inside a very small comunity with a very small number of companys where the people can work. Most of them are restaurants and small guest houses where the owner do all the job so our guest houses and outdoor company is a diferent place where the people can work. Is not a big business too but can make some difference.

On all our tours we include visits to local producers.