Driving from Porto to San Sebastián or Bilbao

My must see is probably different from yours, but it would be easy to spend a month between those two locations. It just depends on what you want to see and do, and the route you plan to take.

Remember to check the drop fee for dropping the rental car off in another country. Consider taking a bus to Santiago de Compostela or other city/town and renting the vehicle in Spain.

Dozens of interesting sights on the way, it´s an 800km itinerary. Spend at least two days in Bilbao, a week in San Sebastian seems too much.

We originally planned to fly between Porto and Bilbao but the flights didn’t work for us. We also looked into the restrictions for dropping off cars across borders and it is very reasonable through Avis.
We understand the distance and would welcome suggested routes and anything noteworthy along the way. Open to anything!
Understand everyone’s tastes are different but certainly there are some towns/areas more stop worthy than others :).
As for our time in San Sebastián, we are house swapping so our length of stay is non negotiable. That said with San Sebastián as our base, we are open to visiting other places, definitely Bilbao, and potentially France. That was why I was asking about Bilbao and Bordeaux.
We will be spending our first week in cities (Lisbon and Porto) and live in a city (Boston-US) so a change of pace in San Sebastián is something we are looking forward to.

If you are renting a car in one country and dropping in another, you will pay a huge drop charge.

Between Porto and the Basque region of Spain, you could go north and visit Santiago de Compostela or go a bit east and visit Salamanca. Both are great places to see.

We liked Bilbao and you could do two days there. The Bordeaux region of France is great, but not sure you have the time. You could visit the very nice and interesting city of Biarritz, France, which is close to the Spanish border and in the small French Basque region of France.

You could head from Porto and enter Spain by Puebla de Sanabria. It’s a small town with a nice, small castle, main plaza, and old church. It makes for a nice stop. From there you could head towards León, then over to Burgos before heading north.

Just south of León is the town of Valencia de Don Juan a couple kilometers off the main road. There is an architecturally nice castle at the edge of town. It’s worth a short stop.

Hi thanks for the great info! My husband has a corporate account with Avis and we were told, in writing, that the border charge between the 2 countries was 23 euros.

Corporate accounts could very well be different, but I suggest checking again to be sure that 23-euro charge covers actually leaving the car in Spain rather than just using it in Spain and returning it to Portugal.

I can't remember what it's called, but the coastline between San Sebastián and Bilbao has a unique geological formation. I feel like there's a park there.

From the Avis site it says:
“ If you want to pick up the vehicle in one country and drop it off in another country, you can expect it to be between 430.50 EUR and 535.00 EUR.”

The 23€ appears to be just for driving across the border, not dropping off the vehicle in Spain. As acraven stated, double check.

Along the north coast at Zumaia are unique flysch rock formations. One can get a good view of them from the town’s beach and San Telmo chapel.

Just been today on this geological formation, the "flysch" of Zumaia, but be careful where you park as there are many restrictions.

Donostia-San Sebastian is a working city of 200,000h, do not expect a resort town as it is not and weather tends to be rainy (it rains less during the summer, of course, but it rains). Beautiful, but a city, not a town, make sure your apartment has a parking place available as parking in the street is very complicated, and underground parkings are costly (well, we find them expensive at +20EUR per night). Bilbao, Bermeo, Lekeitio, Getaria, Zumaia to the west; Pasai Donibane, Hondarribia, St Jean de Luz, Bayonne to the east (Biarritz has a famous name, but it´s more or less a beach, a casino and expensive shops...nice, but that´s it).