My wife and I who are in our 60s would like to travel to Portugal (never been) and spend time learning the culture, talking with local people, tasting the foods and seeing the beautiful sights. We would like to go for at least 10 days, but not all in one place and not jumping around and seeing 10 cities during our trip. What itinerary would you suggest?
Posted by
TX
2768 posts
I was in Lisbon a couple of Octobers ago. And oh did I love Lisbon.
Suggesting a minimum of 5 days in Lisbon and that is minimum with a full day in Sintra .
I was on a. cruise and we ported in Porto. I chose Braga as. a port excursion and only spent. a few hours in Braga but it was so beautiful with so much to do.
I was in Lisbon towards the end of October and it was very rainy. Sometimes there was light rain but other times, there were cloudburst. You will need rainwear .
Lisbon was still very crowded. I believe that it was still warm.
UPDATE. Also suggest that you include Belem and for a full day if possible.
Posted by
Eastern Iowa, USA
8661 posts
The classic approach would be Porto and Lisbon, with either a stop between (Coimbra?) or side trips from one of those cities. (like Douro Valley from Porto)
Limiting yourself to those two cities, or adding a third easy to get to locale (I would think a smaller town) is the most you should shoot for.
Posted by
San Franciso Bay Area, USA
1084 posts
We were in Portugal last October for 12 days. For that amount of time, we decide to stay 6 days in Lisbon with day trips to Sintra and Evora, 2 in Coimbra, and 4 in Porto (this included a day trip to the Douro Valley). Given the short amount of time we had, we opted to home base in a city and then do day trips.
We are going back this September (hopefully to avoid the rain). We will spend time again in Lisbon and Porto and are still debating on the 3rd city.
Posted by
Alsenborn, Germany
2040 posts
I spent the first week of OCT 2023 in Porto. The weather was great but be advised that in the cities the heat is much more noticeable. We did have a lite rain the day we went on our Douro Valley tour, but it cleared before noon and turned into one of the better days of the week as far as we were concerned. We stayed north of the city proper, in the suburb of Matosinhos, which was really nice as the beach was perfect for sitting with a drink and watching the sun go down.