Located in the heart of the Alqueva DarkSky Reserve, between the medieval village of Monsaraz and the shores of the reservoir, the Alqueva Lake Observatory (OLA) was founded by Leonel Godinho, a civil engineer passionate about the region's sky.

The OLA was the realisation of "the dream of a young man who, when accompanying his grandparents in the countryside, was fascinated by the magnificent sky".

"When I started to grow up, I realised that we are truly privileged," he emphasises.

Thousands of tourists

Currently, according to the founder and current director, the space receives “around 16,000 tourists per year” for astronomical and solar observations, physics-related activities, simulation of lunar craters, light refraction, among others.

Mission to Mars

The observatory also has a vocation for educational sessions, such as the analogue mission to Mars that is taking place until Sunday, with the participation of nine young students, and for “experiences more linked to the scientific field”.

More innovation

“But, after 10 years, we want to innovate, we want to do more and meet some of the needs that we have seen in the educational system and also in people's recreational activities,” he emphasises.

In the pipeline is the construction of a “space station with the necessary requirements” for carrying out analogue space missions, taking advantage of “a region that has optimal conditions for this type of test”.

International cooperation

To that end, agreements have already been established with the European, French, Austrian and United Arab Emirates space agencies, which “guarantee that we will have great scientific developments and experiments here,” he points out.

Missions' area

Leonel Godinho says that, unlike other places where these analogous missions are carried out, such as deserts, the Monsaraz area has “good access, restaurants and hotels, which allow us to support those who participate in these experiments.”

The future space station will, among other features, “recreate the compression and decompression process and the way astronaut suits are preserved, joining the control centre, whose construction is practically complete.

“We will have laboratories on the station itself, as there are on a spacecraft, robotics, biomedical, geology laboratories and the communications part” that simulate contacts with the control centre and planet Earth, he adds.