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Trip to Portugal end of September through 2nd week october - 15 full days

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Hello Everyone! This will be my first time traveling to Portugal and I have a skeletal Itinerary of places and areas that I would like to go. I have already knixed several after reading some posts about touristy and long queues etc. (Coimbra, Obidos, Sintra etc.). So this is what I was thinking and I would love every and all recommendations or comments of whether this is a good start, what to skip / what not to, any hotel / food recs etc. Thank you SO much in advance! I don't have a set amount of days in each city since I've never been so that would be helpful as well.

Fly into Porto. Then the douro valley - amarante, lamego & pinhao. Then aveiro and costa nova do prado. Still debating on coimbra - many posts say also touristy so most likely will take that off the list. Then head to nazare and alcobaca monastery. Thereafter head to lisbon and take a day trip to belem. After a lisbon would like to go to Evora and maybe go to Monsaraz. Then on the way from evora stop at parque natural do sudoeste alentejano and marinha beach on the way to the algarve coast. Thinking of albufeira, faro estoi (would like recommendations of which to do if not all)

Then flight from faro to porto then home!

Thank you so much for all the help !

Posted by
205 posts

We've done the RS trip in Portugal and it was fine. We now go back to Portugal every year but only to Lisbon and Porto. Take the train between Porto and Lisbon. I agree, Sintra is a waste of time. The Douro Valley is beautiful but not a lot to do. But, we love Douro Valley wines and restaurants in both cities. My recommendation is to take a food tour in each city.

Posted by
2299 posts

Belem is very interesting and wonderful. You can easily spend a day there.

On my cruise, we ported in Porto and I took an excursion to Braga. Very interesting and beautiful.

If you are looking for a hotel in Lisbon, I can recommend Be Poet Baixa.

I was in Lisbon the end of October and it was still crowded but manageable. It rained almost every day . I do not know if this is typical weather or not.

I loved what I saw in Portugal.

Posted by
7166 posts

Base your trip on where you want to go, not necessarily on what others say.

Last September we were in Portugal as part of a longer trip. There were no lines in Coimbra, not even for the university tour. We spent three nights there and enjoyed the city. While touristy, I preferred Óbidos over Aveiro. Either can be seen in a couple hours, Nazaré is a typical beach town so there are plenty of tourists there. Even so, we enjoyed two nights there. Between Óbidos and Nazaré we stopped at Alcobaca Monastery. It takes a couple hours to see. When we were in Lamego there was a large festival going on so it messed up where I was going to park. The highlight was climbing the 600 steps up to the Santuário de Nossa Senhora dos Remédios.

During our time in Portugal we didn’t travel south of Óbidos. With the exception of Porto there were free parking lots in the places we visited. I looked them up before the trip, bookmarked them on Google Maps, and was able to drive right to them. We had a rental car.

Posted by
11 posts

Thanks so far!

Also forgot to ask - obviously between the major cities taking the train - would it be better to hire a private car / driver to get to all the places outside the major cities like in the duoro valley / along the algarve coast or just take trains / public transportation!

Thank you! :)

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