Sancha Lagoon Walking Trail

It starts next to Barranco dos Bêbados and continues crossing the dune on the eastern bank of the lake, crossing the moorland with its scrubland where heather and gorse predominate. It crosses areas of pine forest and allows you to climb to the highest point in the area, where you can observe the landscape, with the ocean, the dunes and the nearby cities (Santiago do Cacém and Sines).

The Sancha lagoon is approximately 15 hectares in size and is located in an inter-dune depression, separated from the sea by a sandbar that is only occasionally breached by the ocean in conditions of extreme sea agitation. The lagoon body is the result of the accumulation of rain carried by the Barranco dos Bêbedos, its main tributary, and also of the rise and consequent exposure of the water table. The surrounding area close to the lagoon has a strong natural character and few traces of human activity.

The predominant natural habitats are the shifting dunes, closest to the beach, and the fixed and stabilized dunes, further inland. In these we find the heathlands, dominated by scrubland, and the dune pine forests. The lagoon area is dominated by reed beds and willows. In all these habitats there are several endemic species (species with restricted distribution), such as the gorse (Stauracanthus spectabilis), thyme (Thymus camphoratus), armeria (Armeria rouyana) and the marcetão (Santolina impressa), a dominant species that, at the beginning of summer, makes the yellow of its flowers the predominant color in the landscape.