Vizela creates application that recreates figures from history in virtual reality
Vizela today presented an application for smartphones that will recreate, through digital technologies, figures of history and local traditions that will present in “augmented reality” the points of tourist interest of the county.
“It will be something of a pioneer in national terms at the level of municipalities,” commented the mayor, Vítor Hugo Salgado.
With the new digital tool, similar to the one that was premiered at Quinta da Regaleira in Sintra, tourists will be received, in virtual reality, by important figures for the county, such as the writer Camilo Castelo Branco, the hydrologist doctor Abílio Torres or Joaquina Silva Ferreira, the inventor of Vizela’s best-known candy, bolinhol.
In the presentation that was held today in the Parque das Termas, it was said that the application will be free and will allow, from the beginning of next year, to know in an interactive way several points of tourist interest, namely the historic centre, the Roman bridge, the chapel of Nossa Senhora da Torcha, Tagilde and São Bento das Peras.
By means of pre-defined pedestrian or car circuits, tourists will be guided by the mascot “Avicella”, a word that in Latin means small bird and that gave the name to the locality.
Once the application is loaded, users will just have to point their mobile phones to the points identified and on the devices of each will be presented various information, using augmented reality technologies that put characters in the places of interest.
A statue will come to life to speak of the millennial history of the hot springs and at the Hot Bica Roman citizens, dressed at the same time, speak of the aquista tradition of Vizela. In the bandstand that exists in the centre of the city, a band of music will appear to execute the hymn of the earth, with all the pomp of times gone by.
In the thermal park, the writer Camilo Castelo Branco, in a nineteenth-century environment, will speak of his passage through Vizela, when the then village received for treatments the wealthy families of Porto.
There, too, an oak will give voice to describe the richness of the park’s centennial flora and the creator of bolinhol will sweeten the walk, showing how to prepare that kind of loaf of bread so appreciated in the surroundings.
On the Roman bridge, one of Vizela’s ex-libris will pass regiments of soldiers and vehicles of that time. In the restored thermal building, tourists will be received virtually by hydrologist doctor Abílio Torres, who died in 1918.
In São Bento das Peras, next to the sanctuary, tourists can sit on a garden bench, point the cell phone on the way and watch the reconstruction of the passage of a Catholic procession. A statue of São Bento das Peras will gain movement and bless the visit.
Not far away, in the Nossa Senhora da Torcha chapel, the bells will ring to welcome visitors.
In the presentation of the application, the mayor of Vizela, Vítor Hugo Salgado, stressed that this digital tool fits the bet of the county in the tourism sector.
“It’s going to be an important asset to value Vizela,” he said, recalling that the strategy is to revitalize the tradition and thermal vocation that was so strong in the past centuries. To that end, he stressed, will contribute the work that is being done so that spa will soon start working again with all conditions for the aquistas.
The Municipal Tourism Plan, ended, points to 10 integrated measures, some already in execution, with the purpose of placing Vizela on the national and international tourist map.
