Riverfront
The São Francisco.
Wlacyra Lisboa — CC BY-SA 4.0 · GLandovsky — CC BY-SA 4.0 · GLandovsky — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Otávio Nogueira from Fortaleza, BR — CC BY 2.0
Penedo is a historic town on the São Francisco river in southern Alagoas, on the border with Sergipe, 173 km south-west of Maceió, home to about 64,000 people. Its name means «the big rock»; it dates from the early 17th century, became a town named São Francisco in 1636, and was reached from the sea through the wide river mouth. Its historic centre holds important examples of Portuguese and Dutch colonial architecture, 18th-century churches and convents, and the Casa do Penedo, which keeps the town's memory in a permanent exhibition and a library of more than twenty thousand books. In October 2023 Penedo joined the UNESCO Creative Cities Network as a «City of Film». Walk the riverfront and the old lanes; nearby Piaçabuçu is where boat trips to the river mouth start.
The São Francisco.
Portuguese and Dutch.
The town's memory.
Banks of the São Francisco river, Penedo, Alagoas
About 173 km south-west of Maceió, on the São Francisco river.