Best town to stay in the silver coast area to be able to visit surrounding areas

Alcobaça and Coimbra.

Thank you. Can you expound on that please?

Nazaré, Obidos, Fatima and Batalha are all fairly close to one another. Coimbra is closest to Nazaré and Aveiro is further north. I visited the first four - plus Alcobaça - while staying in São Martinho do Porto. All were easily reached as day trips from there and I liked the town as a home base.

You can visit Aveiro on your way to Porto. Coimbra is worth 1-2 nights. The rest are fine as day trips with a car.

Thank you! Sorry for my misspellings.
I should be more clear. I won't have a car. I'm doing this all by train or bus. Would that change your answer?
My home base needs to have either option. And yes, planning on seeing Aveiro on way to porto or from porto.

Another question. Yes, the first four are close and alcobaca...do I need a full day for each of those 5 towns or can some be combined? Thank you for your time !

Yes, it would change my answer. Aveiro and Coimbra would be easy by train. The others not so much.
I just took a quick look at Rome2Rio. Obidos to Fatima takes three hours. Fatima to Nazaré is over two hour and is only twice a day.

Depending on the number of days you have, you might need to drop a couple of these.

Use the Rome2Rio site. It’s likely your best resource.

Thank you!

bcarp601, I just returned from a solo trip in Portugal using mostly public transportation and had the same idea as you are considering during my planning stage. I opted for organized day trips with a tour company from Lisbon to visit Fátima Obidos and Nazare. Since I was traveling solo, I didn’t want to drive and found public transport too daunting. This may not be for you because you can really only touch the surface of these places while on a tour; but it worked for me. Later on in my trip, I went to Coimbra via train and stayed 3 nights, then on to Porto for 2 nights.

This is just a thought that I wanted to share what worked for me. Now if I had a traveling partner during the trip, I probably would have taken Kathryn’s advice and rented a car for the area. But because I was traveling solo, I chose a day trip.

Happy planning to you. Portugal is wonderful

Hi Linda, I appreciate the input. I've been to Portugal before, but from Lisbon area to Algarve. Now I'm exploring Silver Coast area and Porto. I don't mind public transport but it seems a challenge to get to some if these smaller towns. I'd rather not do a tour, I want to take my time. I'm traveling solo too and don't want the stress of driving ! How was your weather. My trip won't be until mud Nov...hopefully no bad weather.

I was in Portugal for the second time too. Previously, i went from Seville, Spain to the Algarve and flew home from Lisbon. The trip this year was from September 28 to October 19 starting out in Iceland and ending in the Douro. So, weather was blazing hot in Lisbon and Coimbra (10/3-10/13) and cooled down with a bit of rain in Porto and then almost every day of rain in the Douro (10/13-10/18). I would plan on cooler weather with rain chances in Porto.

Edit to add: you will note that I live in Seattle so, a bit of rain doesn’t bother me in the least. In fact, I was grateful after the heat in Lisbon/Coimbra

Thank you. Yeah, I don't mind a little cooler for visiting the sites. Better than sweating but hoping not a lot if rain. My brother lives in Puyallup.
Thanks again

Hello- I'm heading to Coimbra this weekend, I was there in April with spouse. Easy train ride from Oriente in Lisbon. Really enjoyed strolling along the river and the University Garden, specifically the bamboo area. You can get to some of the coastal towns via public transportation, but once you want to head inland to smaller spots, much harder. Luso is about 35 minutes away by bus, with the adjacent Bussaco Palace making it a potential visting spot for you.

This is a solo trip, staying in Coimbra 3 days and will then pick up a car to explore Aviero and Lousa.

Thank you! Is driving by yourself difficult? I'm wondering if it's hard to get around portugal. Are the signs in english?
As in road signs.

We recently spent time in the places you mentioned and drove between them. Since they are fairly close together and we were not in a hurry we used mostly the back, rural, roads to avoid tolls. For navigation, we used Google maps and it would display non-tolls route options. The rural roads were two lanes and I felt fairly well marked. The speed limit varied, but when entering towns or residential areas it was 50kph/30mph and it was continual small town after small town. If you’re short on time, paying the tolls would get you to your destination quicker.

We had all our lodgings and free parking locations bookmarked so maps took us right to them. Had we not researched them ahead of time, driving in the towns and cities would have been confusing.

Portugal is super easy to drive in, roads are well marked, 'interstate' type highways have toll readers that are linked to your rental car, the bills are charged to the same credit card you used for rentals. Those roads seem to be very lightly traveled outside the main urban areas. I always get the smallest cars available, getting through town walls and up to castles are the trickiest driving. Very safe after you park it. Don't drive in Lisbon, Porto, or Sintra. I drop off my car just inside Lisbon, Hertz has an easy location about 2 miles from airport, just off Avenue de Liberdad. Easy to get taxi to your lodging.

This will be my fifth trip, I usually pick up the car 3rd or 4th day to let jetlag settle (if coming from states). Hertz also has a downtown Coimbra location on the river, that you can walk to for pickup. Easy to leave city from there. If you want to see the outskirts, a car is the easiest way.

https://juliedawnfox.com/day-trips-from-coimbra-thatll-make-you-want-to-stay-longer-in-central-portugal/

jaimeelsabio- Without a phone/data plan, or Garmin, there is no way we could find some of our lodging. One way streets, construction, yikes. Just a note that not all town have good cell coverage. You can download map sections to your phone from your google map account when you have wifi.

@bdokeefe. - I downloaded maps for offline use prior to the trip so no phone/data plan was needed. It worked perfectly well. While in country, I updated them when I added or removed bookmarks while connected to WiFi.

We had the same issue. No car but want to visit the silver coast area. We are currently staying in Caldas da Rainha. It has a good central bus terminal and a train station. Since coming here by train (we could have taken the bus) we have taken the train to San Martinho da Porto (beautiful lagoon and ocean mix) takes 8 minutes, taken the bus to Obidos and Batalha and the bus to Foz do Arelho (lagoon and beach as well).
It is a middle sized town, easy to walk around, feels very safe and has a daily fruit and vegetable market. Did I mention good stores and restaurants.

Thank you all for these great suggestions they are very helpful!