The road went straight on, flanked by long plains of creeping wheat and dry grass. Whether the golden colour came from the sun or was radiated by the earth, I can’t say. The Alentejo has this magic: to make you contemplate what you don’t understand, in a passivity that doesn’t require much response.
Not knowing where it was going, I entrusted myself to the unknown that fate had to offer me. I followed the wooden sign with the hand-painted name “Matinha”. It was all I knew, it was all I was looking for. I just had no idea that on the other side of the sign was the name of a “refuge”.
In the heart of a hidden valley, it was this printed word that I found, in the contours of this place.
Herdade da Matinha came to me as soon as I sat down, and presented itself without ceremony: it invaded me in every way.
I entered without asking permission. When you’re at home, you don’t ask to exist. It just is. You simply are.
