I Lay My Heart On The Castle.

The Castle stole my heart. I can’t imagine anywhere else as the flagship of Wine with a View. I always knew this place, overlooking Lisbon, on the all seeing hill of this fair city, would see my dream – of combining the the wonderful wines made in Portugal with fabulous views – come true. 

The XI century saw the Castle rise by the hands of the Moors and here it remained, for centuries, changed with its Lords, times and seasons. But what it overlooks hasn’t changed: the river Tagus, the sea, the lives of the people of Lisbon and its visitors.

The day I realized that the Castle would indeed come true, I sat on a corner of its walls to breathe it all in. The neighbourhoods unfolding down the hill; on the other side, the other hills with its own stories; and at a distance… the shore. The Tagus shore touching Lisbon and bringing travellers and the frenzy of the South shore. The Terreiro do Paço. There, at the Terreiro, with the ferries and the ships as a backdrop, you feel this Lisbon, opened to the world, eager to welcome and to be either the arrival or the departure point. Always open, it says goodbye light-heartedly because the city knows they will come back. This is the view from here, from the Castle, today still, one thousand days after Wine with a View opened. The same ground conforts me, the same walls make me proud, the same towers take me to a Lisbon who has never lost its essence, and the same trees offer me shade on sunny days.

I knew this was it, from day one. And since day one the visitors (I wonder if they can tell my eyes say this is the most special place in Lisbon), mirror what I know. Seating on the same walls, walking the same ground, they look at the same horizon I see and there they stay, glasses of serendipity on their hands, Verde, bublly (the Bairrada one, oh, the Bairrada!!) if the day is warm, and red, Ginja de Alcobaça or Port if the temperature asks for a little more warmth. They’re the ones who make my dream come alive: they see the city like I see the city, knowing a glass of wine from Wine with a View will make it all the more special.
Thank you Castle, thank you those who visit each day and share the vision I had.