Wonder where to go in Portugal if you wish to see dinosaur toys, fossils, real size reproductions and much more? Lourinha got you covered!
While driving in Peniche (or mostly standing still and then advancing just a bit) we came across a huge sign saying that the Dinosaur Capital is Lourinha. We checked on the GPS map and behold, it is actually on route to Lisbon.
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| 014.1 On road to Lourinha, from Peniche, we came across a really red Circus so even if it has nothing to do with this article, I actually love it! |
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| 014.2 And right as we enter Lourinha, there is Santa Maria do Castelo Church (Fact: more than 300 churches in Portugal are dedicated to the Virgin Mary. In fact there was an article in the newspaper saying that 750 was the number, but after reading more about it on the web, another organization actually counted them and the result was a bit more than 300). |
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| 014.3 All over Lourinha, real scale statues of dinosaurs ornate the landscape. In front of coffee shops, in round points, in some intersections. It is really awesome to see them like that and I wish they do that also home (in France). |
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| 014.4 There two attractions marked on the map (see above): the museum, and a huge natural park. At the time we did not knew about the park, so we saw only the museum. |
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| 014.5 A whole section of the Lourinha Museum, it is dedicated to... well Portugal and especially Lourinha. Here we have an old room. |
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| 014.6 There is also a miniature church that is also really awesome. Plus there is a barbershop, some old electronic and analogic devices and... |
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| 014.7 There is also a building, dedicated to dinosaurs! |
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| 014.8 To be honest it is not really huge, but there are replica fossils (not real) depicting herbivores, carnivores, birds and even fish. |
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| 014.9 There are a few T-Rex replicas, and this is the one that inspired me to make the 3D art seen at the beginning of this article. |
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| 014.10 What I loved the most was to see real images of how some fossils were discovered (even if on display we had replicas). We also used a lot Google Translate (back then in 2017, phones could not live translate photos, like they do now). |
Should you come to Lourinha Museum or should you go to Dino Park?
Well, if it rains outside, then yes, visiting the museum, even if is fairly small and with most things: do not touch (even if replicas) it is still worth it! This museum, while not much, it is actually the first one in the region. From here 40 years ago, more and more findings were collected until finally the Dino Park was done and some of the stuff was moved there. In Lourinha city and Museum, dinosaurs are more static, in idle position. There is no several meters high Sauropods (as the one featured in article 009) in the city or inside the museum but there are other ones. But there is a replica and photos about the discovery of the famous embryos (oldest in the world, and unique to Europe, so far).
I will say it again, I loved to see dinosaurs all over the city! It serves as a measurement unit if one would wonder how would they look in a live Dinotopia.
But I will not try to sugarcoat this, visiting also the park (which is not even close to the city...) will make the experience whole.
During our stay we had no trouble parking the car. We found a street not far and also a parking meter to pay for the stay (for all I know, there is no parking at the museum).
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| 014.11 For now this is it for Lourinha, but we will return with our daughter sometime in the future, so stay tuned for that article! |
Thank you for going through this article and we hope you found it interesting!
MiDe.
Finding another legend about dinosaurs in Portugal was really hard. So the only one that makes sense, it is shown in the article 009 and here I will share another legend from Lourinha, that has no connection to dinosaurs 🦕.
