Hello all,
I am in the midst of trying to plan our first visit to Portugal in just a few weeks away.
We are traveling from NY to Lisbon with our 23 yr old daughter and meeting her twin sister there who will be joining us from the UK.
Plan is to arrive on the 19th at around noon from NY and have that day and the next (20th) to just get into exploring the area of Chiado and it's surrounding neighborhoods until my other daughter arrives evening of the 20th. don't want to do to much without her being there
21st - arranged tour of lisbon 1/2 car 1/2 on foot - a lot planned
22nd - arranged Sintra/Cascais tour
23rd - questioning a tour we arranged to Evora/Alentejo area for this day?
24th/25th - should we stay in Lisbon as most places will be closed for the holiday
or
should we stay near Evora after our tour (2 nights?) and return to Lisbon later on the 25th to have 26, 27 and most of 28 to do many things we haven't gotten to from the tours (tile museum, gulbenkian, shop, eat, walk, tram, lift.....) our flight leaves at 7pm on the 28th.
we could also switch Sintra and Evora tour days and stay near sintra for Christmas 24 & 25??
or not do Evora until the 26th after Christmas, where we would just stay in Lisbon 24 & 25 and still have 27 and 28 there.
Just not sure as I'm starting to feel like there is too much time in Lisbon - am I wrong? Would it be nice to stay in Lisbon for the 24th and 25th even though there will not be much of anything to do - what if it rains those days?? Concerned our girls may not want to spend 3 days in a row with a tour guide as well so maybe breaking it up if we stay in Lisbon.
As for our accommodations, assuming we stay in Lisbon the whole time, we have booked an apartment near the Teatro Trindade in Chiado until the 24th and then s small boutique hotel Alecrim Au Chiado (anyone stay there?) for the remainder - so we are pretty much in the same area for the whole time. Thought it would be a good place for our first visit to be in the heart of it all but worried about it being too much for the whole time.. They are all cancellable at this point in time. Looking for any and all advice - so confused. Thanks so much