B2b heart of portugal and basque country of Spain and France

Hi Jackie,

I've been on both tours, but not back to back and I have traveled to both areas on several occasions. Logistically, it would be easier to do the Basque Tour first, then the Portugal tour, as there are direct flights from Bilbao to Lisbon (See www.skyscanner.com for options). If you do Portugal first, it's a bit more time consuming to get from Porto to Bayonne, but not impossible. The quickest option would be to fly from Porto to Bordeaux, then take the train to Bayonne (about 2 hours). Going overland by train from Porto to Bayonne is quite long and would involve several train changes and a few days.

One option would be to fly in and out of Paris, spending a night or two and then taking the high-speed TGV to Bayonne (you can also fly from Paris to Biarritz, then take a taxi, bus or train to Bayonne). If you have a few days before the tour, you could also consider spending a few days in St. Jean de Luz, which is a nice beach town. Easily connected to Bayonne by train or bus.

After the Basque tour, you could fly to Lisbon (preferably a few days before the tour starts) and see Sintra as a day trip from Lisbon. After the Portugal tour is over, you could spend a few more days in Porto, seeing some nearby towns such as Braga and/or Aveiro by train. With more time, you could go to the Algarve, on the south coast of Portugal. Ryan Air has several flights daily between Porto and Faro. You could rent a car at the Faro airport and ideally spend 3 nights in Salema, Rick's favorite Portuguese fishing village - a great place to relax and unwind after the tours. Then drive back to Faro or Lisbon to drop the car and fly back to Paris to fly home.

You might also try positing this question under the Rick Steves' Tours section of the forum. That way, folks who have done both tours back to back could chime in.

The 2026 tour dates will come out in a few weeks, so be sure to check our website in mid-April!

Happy Travels!

Thanks for the info.