Suggested Tour Routes to see the best destinations in Portugal
Portugal is quite compact and easy to travel around. However, most widely sold tour offerings combine it with Spain, and a few even add Morocco. This means you get to see Fatima, Lisbon and not much else. But there are some “purely Portugal” tours available and these seem excellent value.
There may be fewer “big ticket” tourist sights in Portugal, but this can be an advantage for those who like to really get into the local culture and experience the country in a more relaxed and perhaps enriching way. What’s more, relatively cheap car-hire and interesting manor house hotels and pousadas make it quite possible to do it on your own should you wish.
As usual, there’s a lot of common ground as to tour routes, although travelling in either direction works. Starting from the capital, Lisbon, this tour would take around 12 days, but could easily be longer:
Note: links to the towns go to photo albums on the Travel Signposts website
LISBON – Sintra – Obidos – Alcobaca – Nazare – Fatima – TOMAR – Conimbriga – Coimbra – Bucaco Forest – OPORTO – Viana do Castelo – Gulmaraes – Vila Real (Mateus) – VISEU – Guarda – Belmonte – Castelo de Vide – Evora – ALGARVE – Lagos – Cape St. Vincent – ALGARVE – Setubal – LISBON
For a briefer tour, it’s simple to bypass some destinations, as distances are short.
Check out our interactive Satellite Map of Portugal
If you think of anything I left out of this post, please feel free to put that on the comment.
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