Hello. My wife and I are planning our first trip to Portugal and to the mainland of Spain. I would like to drive to Alicante Spain from the Algarve, but my wife is not too keen on the idea. I know it will be about a 5.5-hour drive, but by the time we drive back to Lisbon, then fly to Madrid, then into Alicante...ALC is about the same time. What our your thoughts.
Thank you.
Dino
California
Driving from Faro to Alicante is ~500 miles ( 800+kilometers). Expect you will need more than 5.5 hrs.to drive that distance.
Where else are you going? Is there a better way to order your trip to make these 2 points easier to reach?
Connections between Portugal and Spain aren't good, especially when you're not involving one of the big cities.
Does your trip end in Alicante or elsewhere in Spain, or are you looping back to Portugal? If you pick up a car in Portugal and drop it off in Spain, you're likely to be hit with a really major surcharge that will make you forget that 5-1/2 hour drive.
I think TAP Air Portugal flies between Lisbon and Alicante, so that would be one possibility. What some other people have done, I believe, is get themselves over the border--probably to Seville--by bus and then move on from there by train. Of course, it's likely that none of them were heading to Alicante.
Rome2Rio lays out a bunch of options, none of them particularly attractive. Don't trust the travel times, frequencies or fares you see there. They are often crazy wrong. Just use the information as a guide to what sort of transportation might be available and where you might transfer. Keep clicking through the website and you'll eventually find the name of the company providing the suggested transportation. Go to its website for accurate schedule information.
Do you have a particular reason for choosing Faro and Alicante? They are not near the top of most visitors' lists.
According to Michelin it’ll take 8h 30m if not longer: https://www.viamichelin.com/web/Routes?departure=8000%20Faro%2C%20Continental%20Portugal%2C%20Portugal&departureTid=city-1893303&arrival=03001%20Alicante%2C%20Community%20of%20Valencia%2C%20Spain&arrivalTid=city-1188057&index=0&vehicle=0&type=0&distance=km¤cy=EUR&highway=false&toll=false&vignette=false&orc=false&crossing=true&caravan=false&shouldUseTraffic=false&withBreaks=false&break_frequency=7200&coffee_duration=1200&lunch_duration=3600&diner_duration=3600&night_duration=32400&car=hatchback&fuel=petrol&fuelCost=1.451&allowance=0&corridor=&departureDate=&arrivalDate=&fuelConsumption=6.8:5.6:5.6&shouldUseNewEngine=false.
I just checked to see how much taxes are since you would rent in PT and drop off in ES and it’ll will cost $1,126.43.
Air Portugal has a flight departing from Faro with a connection in Lisbon to Alicante for $88.
Acraven already touched on the surcharge for dropping off a car in another country. Personally, unless you were stopping at additional towns and cities, I wouldn’t make that drive. I’d turn the drive into a minimum 2 week trip. Assuming you’ve never been to any cities along the route, I’d consider stopping in Murcia, Lorca, Granada, Antequera, Sevilla, El Rocío, and Huelva. The are a number of other places one could stop. I just mentioned some along the main route.
Thank you to you all for your response and great information and advice.
I did know that there would be some kind of a surcharge for driving the rental car out of Portugal and not returning it to when I had rented it from (Lisbon Airport), but could not find info on the charge....so having that information, a flight will be the answer. I should have said from the Algarve to Alicante and not Faro, but I was thinking of flying out of Faro if we went the route.
The reason for the trip to Alicante is so we can explore and enjoy many of the beautiful beaches I have heard and read about on the Costa Blanca, which is much of the reason to traveling the Algarve after exploring Lisbon and the surrounding areas.
From Spain, we will be flying to Italy for two weeks before coming home to California.
Awesome information. Thank you again.
As a Californian you may not be impressed at all with those European beaches. Remember that the population density in Europe is much, much higher than ours. If you're traveling during the summer, the beaches are likely to be packed. All of northern Europe will be looking for a sun fix. You don't need one. If that European beach time is a must, I hope some folks here can help point you toward places in the areas you've chosen that will be interesting to a Californian.
Thank you acraven, but we will be there the last week in May. I think we will be okay. In 2019 we visited Mallorca for 10 days in the beginning of June. Loved it there. Did the entire island from Palma to Arta to Deya to Soller and everything in between. Our biggest worry now is Europe being closed down again because of COVID.....only time will tell.
Thank you.
