In early June, we will be driving from the Douro valley to Lisbon via one or two days in Coimbra. Our plan is to spend one day sightseeing in Coimbra, but then spending the next day visiting Tomar, Batalha and Alcobaca, maybe Obidos. Is Coimbra a good base for two nights for visiting the outlying towns? Would it be better to spend a second night in Tomar or other town?
Posted by
Brooklyn, NY
3844 posts
When we were deciding our driving day trips for this September, i went to Rome2rio.com and put in each place from our base, Tomar. I did so many combinations to see if we could visit 3 places in one day, specifically Fatima, Batalha, and. Alcobaca. Try different combinations. The website also shows you the stops on a map, helped me decide which order.
Posted by
11159 posts
Stay in one of the towns listed to use as a base for visiting that group of towns. We used Obidos which we didn’t really care for. These towns all need to be visited. Our favorite was Alcobaça.
Posted by
Twin Cities of MN
5581 posts
We stayed in Batalha and visited Obidos on the way from Lisbon. From Batalha, we visited Nazare/Sao Martinho, Tomar and Alcobaca. We stayed in Coimbra after Batalha
Posted by
OP
43 posts
This is all so helpful. We’ve decided to stay one night in Coimbra and tour that city, then one or two nights in Tomar or other nearby location. I see the comment about Obidos echoed in many posts as well. Love the helpful site Rome2rio.com!
Posted by
Mid-Atlantic area
6547 posts
To me, Coimbra deserves 2-3 nights. While there we didn’t take day trips. We did spend 4 nights in Tomar and took day trips from it. One day we visited Batalha monastery and Fátima and on another we visited Almourol castle. The rest of the time we stayed in Tomar and visited its sites; most notably the Castle, Convent of Christ, Church Santa Maria do Olival, and Igreja de São João Baptista. If you didn’t visit Almourol castle, you could easily visit Óbidos and Alcobaca monastery on the same day.
I will add that you may have had your fill of monasteries, convents, and religious sites before seeing the last one.
There are free parking lots in each of the places I mentioned. If you plan carefully you can avoid some of the toll roads. Not that it means much, but Tomar is closer to Batalha, Alcobaca, and Óbidos than Coimbra by about 20 minutes driving time.
Posted by
Twin Cities of MN
5581 posts
We didn't find Tomar to be very central to the other cities we wanted to visit. Make sure to double check on google maps or similar. I agree that Alcobaca and Obidos can be short visits. We were glad we visited, but didn't feel we needed much time in those locations. I would absolutely not skip Tomar or Batalha.