Portugal 🇵🇹

Written By Dolly Oyebadejo

Porto, Lisbon, Sintra, Cascais. | Sep-Oct 2024.

Some Notes:

  • Portugal is a hilly country. Be prepared to walk up some serious incline while exploring.

  • We stayed in Porto and Lisbon. From Lisbon, you can take day trips to 2 other popular cities – Cascais and Sintra.

  • Getting from Lisbon to Porto is about a 3 hours bus or train ride. We took the Flix bus.

  • Porto

    • We stayed for 2 nights, had about 2.5 days, which felt like a good amount of time. I don’t think you need more than 3 days to explore.

  • Lisbon

    • Transportation: Recommend getting a metro pass for subway and trains.They have a great public transportation system. And ubers were rather unreliable.

    • Shopping: if you are hoping for an Italian or Paris luxury shopping experience, lower your expectations. They don’t have that many stores, and the selection in each store is also rather limited.

  • Sintra

    • Highly recommend visiting for a day trip. There’s plenty to see from castles to coastlines. We enjoyed our tour, we had a private tour for $135 (linked below).

  • Cascais

    • Don’t think visiting here is a must. Probably would be the best to visit during summer trip, since the beaches are the main attractions.

  • Here’s a link to my google doc which has all the information from this post (minus the pics), which may be easier to reference

 

Porto, view from Dom Luís I bridge

 

ATTRACTIONS + FOOD

Porto

  • Hotel One Shot Aliados Goldsmith 

    • Enjoyed this hotel, great location, nice and clean rooms, walkable to basically everywhere. 

  • Gaia Cable Car ride

Gaia Cable Car Ride

  • Porto Cathedral

    • Nice view from terrace

  • São Bento Train Station

    • Known for its beautiful blue murals of tile inside

  • City Center (UNESCO site)

  • Walk across double-decker bridge Dom Luís I bridge

Dom Luís I bridge, view from Jardim do Morro park

view walking onto the top deck of the Dom Luís I bridge 

view from Dom Luís I bridge, with Maria Pia Bridge in the background

  • Sunset at Jardim do Morro park in Vila Nova de Gaia

  • Porto Walkers - free walking food tour

  • Ribeira District — colorful riverside houses

    • Walk the riverfront promenade Cais Riberia with lively cafes + occasional street performers

    • Highly recommend also going for dinner one night — numerous restaurants in the area to choose from. And the riverfront it is quite beautiful at night with the monastery and bridge lit up. 

 

Cais Riberia, riverfront promenade

 

  • FOOD OPTIONS — PORTO

    • Time Out Market Porto

      • An amazing food hall. This is a new location. They have several in different cities around the world. I’ve been to a few. There’s also one in Lisbon.

      • We unashamedly visited this one every day we were in Porto.

delicious meal, and cocktails were amazing!

 
 

    • Pizzaiolo

    • Mercado Municipal Beira-rio (another food hall)

    • Postigo do Carvao

    • A Despensa

    • Terra Noca

    • Taberna dos Mercadores

    • Zenith Brunch & Cocktails

      • Delicious, great menu options. I’ve also been to the Madrid location, which was equally as good.

downstairs at Zenith

Lisbon

  • Altis Prime Hotel 

    • We also enjoyed this hotel. Very nice, accommodating staff. Not far from subway stop. Shopping stores and restaurants nearby.

    • Only downside is when walking, it is up a pretty steep incline.

  • Sightseeing

    • Praca de Comercio — famous yellow square 

Praca de Comercio

  • Jeronimos monastery

  • Bellem

    • Tower of Bellem

    • Monument of Discoveries 

 
 

  • Tours

  • Shopping

    • Luxury stores on Av. da Liberdade

      • We were a bit disappointed about the luxury shopping options. Not all of the major luxury brands have stores in Portugal, and the selection is some of the stores is small. Don’t expect Milan or Paris options.

    • LX Factory — shops + restaurants

    • El Corte Ingles

    • Thieves Flea Market

    • Orto – for niche perfumes

  • FOOD OPTIONS — LISBON

    • Dear Breakfast 

    • Breakfast Lovers

 
 

    • Luka Lisboa - highly recommend

      • DELICIOUS thai restaurant/ asian fusion. 10/10 meal, definitely one of our top meals this trip.

    • Seen – highly recommend

      • Pricier, dressier option, but food, drinks, ambiance were amazing. Well worth it.

      • This place has STUNNING sunset views, get a dinner reservation for right before sunset.

Seen restaurant, sunset view from outdoor space

    • Tendinha  do Rossio – have great cod fish fritters. 

    • Cantinho do Aziz (Mozambique restaurant)

    • Rocco

    • Time Out Market Lisbon– so (?too) many options, pretty overwhelming

prego: a traditional Portuguese sandwich with pork + aoili.

also had some tagliatelle bolognese because I’m a pasta addict.

    • Bairro do Avillez - highly recommend

      • This is like a 3 in one restaurant. They have 3 different areas, which all have different menus.

      • We ate at the Taberna, and food was delicious. It was actually our last meal in Portugal.

 
 

  • Nightlife

    • Barrio Alto neighborhood for drinks and live music

  • Day trip to Sintra

    • 35 min train ride from Lisbon, train every ~20 mins

    • AirBNB guided private tour — highly recommend

      • Diogo was an amazing tour guide. And we really liked that it was a private tour and the tour was customizable – can decide which sites you want to enter, which you want to skip, if you want lunch, etc.

    • Pena National Palace

Pena Palace

    • Quinta de Regaliera 

      • Make sure you enter the Initiation Well! Very cool underground stairway that then exits into caves.

        • Multiple tales for what the Initiation Well was for. One tale is that knights had to go down blindfolded, holding a sword to get a chance to marry the princess.

Quinta de Regaliera 

going down the Initiation well

view from inside Initiation Well

caves as you exit from Initiation Well

    • Moorish Castle

    • Cabo da Roca –westernmost point of Europe

Cabo do Roca

very windy here

beautiful views at Cabo do Roca

  • Day trip to Cascais

    • 40 min train ride from Lisbon

    • Beaches

      • Praia de Santa Marta

      • Praia da Rainha

      • Praia do Tamariz

    • Sunset @ Devil’s Mouth (Boca do Inferno)

    • Food

      • Taberna Clandestina  (for tapas)

      • House of Wonders

        • Good for breakfast, brunch. Really colorfully decorated.

House of Wonders

House of Wonders

      • Santini – oldest ice cream shop in portugal 

ITINERARY

here’s a framework of our itinerary to use as an example

Porto (Sep 26 – 28)

THUR, SEPT 26

  • Land at 10:40 AM 

  • Hotel One Shot Aliados Goldsmith

  • Sao bento train station (3 min walk from hotel)

  • Lunch @ Time Out Market (2 min walk)

  • City center (7 min walk)

FRI, SEPT 27

  • Breakfast @ Zenith Brunch & Cocktails 

  • Porto cathedral

  • Gaia cable ride

  • Dinner at the Ribeira District (11 min walk from hotel)

SAT, SEPT 28

  • Breakfast @ Hotel

  • Bus to Lisbon

    • Porto Campanha at 14:30

Lisbon (Sep 28 – Oct 3)

SAT, SEPT 28

  • Arrive at Lisbon Oriente at 17:45 

  • Altis Prime Hotel

  • Dinner at Luka

SUN, SEPT 29

  • Breakfast: Dear Breakfast

  • Praca do Comercio

  • Bellem

  • Dinner at Seen

    • 5 min walk from hotel

MON, SEPT 30 — Sintra

  • Breakfast at hotel

  • Train to Sintra

  • AirBNB private tour 10:00 - 5 PM

  • Train back to Lisbon

  • Dinner at Time Out Market

TUE, OCT 1 — Cascais

  • Breakfast at Breakfast Lovers

  • Day trip to Cascais

WED, OCT 2

  • Chill and shopping

  • Dinner at Bairro do Avillez

THUR, OCT 3

  • Depart at 5:40 AM

    • Airport 10-15 mins away from hotel

Dolly Oyebadejo
Previous

Lagos, Nigeria🇳🇬
Next

Marrakesh, Morocco 🇲🇦