Last summer, on a trip to one of our favorite regions of Portugal, Alentejo, we took a cruise with Alqueva Tours on Alqueva Lake to take in the sunset, waterfowl and water. What we didn’t expect was to learn so much. From our many previous visits to Alentejo, we knew that Alqueva was Western Europe’s largest freshwater lake. We also knew that it was man-made, but we knew little of its actual history.
The Alqueva dam had been in planning since the 1950s and the time of Portugal’s dictator António Salazar. It was not until the 1990s, however, that the Portuguese government restarted the planning for the dam. In February of 2002, the dam’s floodgates were closed creating the lake along the Guadiana River which runs to the Atlantic Ocean and forms the southernmost part of the Spanish and Portuguese border. A second, downstream dam, at Pedrógão creates a second reservoir which, along with its pumping station, helps with the water supply and recovery of water flow.
In July of 2023, a floating solar park near the Alqueva dam with 12,000 photovoltaic panels spanning 4 hectares was unveiled. This solar energy source is projected to eventually supply power to 30% of the inhabitants of southern Portugal.
The Lake is used as a water supply for agriculture, recreational activities like boating, beaching and swimming and provides a home and water source to area ducks, herons, geese and wild boar. In addition to enjoying the lake, you can visit the charming hilltop town of Monsaraz, go star gazing at the nearby observatory in Portugal’s dark-sky country, or stay in one of the area’s many wine hotels.
But the most interesting thing we learned was that the lake area flooded the old location of the town of Aldeia da Luz. In preparation, however, the entire town was reconstructed identically (with modernized roads) near the water’s edge three kilometers away from its original site, on higher ground. All 363 residents were relocated. Even the cemetery was dug up and relocated to the new town. In present day Luz, “the town that moved”, you can visit the museum which tells the story of the moving of this town.
While the museum tells the, at times heartbreaking, story of what was lost in the old Aldeia, since the reconstruction was done nearly identically, if you didn’t like your neighbor in the old town, you could just continue your feud like nothing happened when you moved.
Sources:
The Traveling Ridleys 
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