Faia is the quietest of the Côa Valley rock art sites, and its distance from the main road is part of the charm. Located on the plateau south of the Côa river, about fifteen kilometres from Mêda, a small town of about two thousand, it is one of the places where Paleolithic artists scratched the animals they hunted onto the schist. Visits are by guided tour from the Côa Museum, and you should book ahead, since the number of visitors is limited.
The landscape around Faia is the Beira Alta plateau, an upland of granite boulders, scrub and small farms at some 700 or 800 metres, far from the sea. The climate is continental: hot dry summers, cold winters with frost and sometimes snow, and a short bright spring. Almond, olive and chestnut trees grow in the sheltered corners and sheep graze on the stubble. The villages are built of granite with slate or tile roofs, and the older houses have stone staircases and wooden balconies.
Not far away, the walled village of Marialva sits on a hill above the plain, a medieval town with a castle and a cluster of stone houses that is almost deserted and quietly beautiful. Further east, Castelo Rodrigo, a hilltop fortress village, looks out over the Spanish border. These are old frontier towns, built to defend Portugal from Castile, and their walls are the best reason to wander through.
For riders, the roads here are fast and quiet, with long sweeping views across the plateau and the occasional steep descent into a river valley. Surfaces are generally good but can be patched, and frost in winter and sudden thunderstorms in summer can make for tricky conditions. Mêda has fuel, though stations are few in the surrounding villages, so top up in Mêda or Vila Nova de Foz Côa before heading out. Cafés in the small towns serve strong coffee, almond cakes and a hearty plate of local sausage, and the prices are low.
The sky at night here is among the darkest in Portugal, and a clear evening reveals the Milky Way.