From Landscape to Archeology: Marble Trail Tour in Vila Viçosa

This is a tour for those who want to know the marble industry in detail. In this tour we take you to the marble quarries, to the sawmills where the marble is industrially shaped and to the artisans workshops where the marble is shaped by hand. Not to forget the unique scenery of the quarries.

Marble Quarry Center

In this tour you will visit the local Marble Quarry Center with passage and presentation of several quarries and visit to one of those quarries. The emphasis is on the marble extraction processes, existing dangers, used machinery, economic and artistic aspects without missing the breathtaking sceneries the quarries provide.

Marble Craftsmanship

The second stop of the tour will introduce you to the traditional craftsman transformation of marble, focusing on the techniques, the machinery used and the huge variety of marble pieces produce by the artisan workshop.

Marble Transformation Workshop

The third and last stop of the tour is at an industrial marble transformation workshop, where mechanized marble transformation will be presented, the different machines used, the existing dangers, the different examples of final products and the entire operational context of a sawmill.

How to get to Vila Viçosa

By bus

Available from main cities (including Lisbon): Rede Expresso (National Bus Service)

Available from all over the Alentejo: Rodoviária Alentejo (Local Bus Service)

By car

The main road connections to the Anticline are via the A6 highway and the national roads N4, IP2, N254, N255 and E245.

From Lisbon (189 km): Bridge 25th of April, A2 highway (exit 7) towards A6 highway (exit 8) toward N255

GPS Coordinates: 38.78123, -7.417639

If you like industrial tourism, the marble industry is by far the most significant you can find in Portugal. Join us!