Avenida dos Banhos

Avenida dos Banhos (Portuguese for Baths Avenue), is the main waterfront street and a popular tourist attraction in Póvoa de Varzim, Portugal.

With the popularity of this district's beaches, summer houses started appearing and was, spontaneously called, Banhos street around 1846.

Café Guardasol development replaced a 1920s notable and popular wooden beach bar covered with a massive summer umbrella.

Since the 1960s and especially in the 1970s and a rapidly incleasing population with returning Portuguese-Africans from Angola and Mozambique, the single family villas which existed in the avenue were replaced by multifamily buildings with little attention to the aesthetics.

One of the most popular tourist attractions in Northern Portugal, Avenida dos Banhos is a 960 metres (3,150 ft) long avenue.

Avenida dos Banhos in a sunny spring day.
Avenida dos Banhos was one of the principal destinations for streetcars.
Avenida dos Banhos in 1921. Café Guardasol's umbrella is visible in the background.
Portuguese azulejo depicting Guardasol beach bar in 1920.
Avenida dos Banhos bikeway. The bikeway route linked Avenida dos Banhos and the Port of Póvoa de Varzim . Later development in Vila do Conde expanded it to the Ave river .