Monte Da Palmeira: Why We Return Again And Again To This Precious Villa

Whitewashed villages, wildflower meadows and Moorish castles form the backdrop to Monte da Palmeira. Mary Lussiana explains why her family has continued to return to this Portuguese retreat over the years.

Review: Monte da Palmeira

I am counting the days right now until I turn my car towards Spain and drive into the unspoilt eastern Algarve. A road through little whitewashed villages clustered around the church, bordered by meadows with wildflowers and donkeys. Every so often, I will pass the ruins of a castle which whispers of times past, when Romans and Moors lived these lands, perhaps feeding from the same olive and carob and almond trees that we do today.

But once I am through the gate, I will try and remain there all week. For my whole world will be between these walls.

That world is my husband, three children, one daughter-in-law, two grandchildren and, of course, Bellini, our yellow labrador. The house counts too, as an object of affection, for it is already filled with memories of happy times past. Each of us loves this house, no doubt for endlessly different reasons, and conversations after a long and lazy lunch often turn to: ‘If I lived here…’

It just is perfect. Not too big and yet space for us all to have those corners necessary to retire into sometimes. We can breakfast under the orange trees at the side of the house and read undisturbed in the little terrace that comes off the main bedroom on the first floor, with views over the swimming pool.

One practical reason I love it is that there are enough plates and knives and forks to eat dinner off without having to unpack the lunch things from the dishwasher first. There is a long marble table set in the shade with wisteria curling around the lean-to roof and a window into a summer kitchen to pass food back and forth. From there you can see the glint of the swimming pool, enticing on a hot day, and hear the bells of goats in the nearby fields. It works best at lunch when the heavy spotted blue pottery plates, made locally, are groaning with red tomatoes and the neighbouring inbuilt BBQ, the domain of my sons, is scenting the air with a mixture of grilled meat and anticipation.

In the evening, we gather on the stone seats that run alongside the wall, allowing us a view of the hills as the sun sets. Drinks come out from the summer kitchen and we plan the following day.

We should head into nearby São Brás de Alportel, we say, once the largest cork-producing centre in Portugal, to show the cork museum to the children. They can see where it comes off the trees and how it is processed. Or we could taste goats’ cheese at one of the farms, interrupts someone (in my family everything always circles back to food). ‘Yes!’ shout the children. Then candles are lit and supper is served. Games are pulled out – Articulate, a firm favourite.

And finally, bed. Perhaps first a night-time swim by the light of the moon. My younger son retires to his cottage by the pool. The elder carries a worn-out four-year-old in his arms up the stairs to their bedroom, where white curtains billow around the iron frame of their bed, the children’s quarters tucked around the corner and beyond a bathroom all in soft pink marble, which is the reason my grandchildren love the house so much. It is marble from Estremoz, in the Alentejo, and comes in white as well, but this one, known as rosa, is a favourite. It clads all the bathrooms in the main house, cool to the touch in summer and warm to the eye in winter.

For we have been here in winter too. Then, we light a log fire in our room, which has its own sitting room and opens out onto the terrace. But mostly we curl up in the huge sofa in the main drawing room, where the vast fireplace warms the whole room. Our daughter will read, someone will play ball with the dog outside and we will talk of what we are going to do in summer.

For despite the best-laid plans, we have still to go to the cork museum and the goat farm, go down to the sea for a swim or visit the old Moorish castle we pass each year. Because what this house does, unlike any other I have stayed in, is create a protective bubble in which we can waste time with each other. And isn’t that what a holiday should be about?

Start and finish a conversation because our mobiles are forgotten somewhere in the house. Read – and live through a seven-year-old’s eyes – the latest Famous Five adventure from the beginning to the end. Hear about the heartbreaks, the office politics and the travels of the year, all washed down with the best wine that I begin to put aside straight after each holiday finishes, already dreaming of next year.

Doubles from £390pp if sleeping nine. montedapalmeira.com