8 or 10 days in Portugal

Hi!

I'm planning to spend 8 or 10 days visiting Portugal next August with some friends of mine.

Can someone help me with some suggestions about itinerary and "must-sees", other than Lisbona, Porto and Sintra?

Probably, we will start from Porto in the north and then proceed southbound (we will be travelling by car), as we would like to end our stay with some days at the beach in Algarve...

Any ideas will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Lorenzo

There are a lot of beautiful places in Portugal. Let's see: north of Porto are the Pineda-Geres National Park (nice outdoors area), Guimaraes and Braga (one of them is the religious capital of Portugal), east of Porto is the Douro valley (beautiful, but very touristy), south of Porto Coimbra (university city) and nearby Fatima, Batalha and Nazare. Southeast of Lisbon is a nice city of Evora and in the far south is the Algarve (very touristy). Seeing that you have a car it makes a nice journey to drive along the entire south coast from Cabo de Sao Vicente in the west via Lagos (major tourist place), Albufeira, Faro and Tavira to Vila Real at the border with Spain. Have fun!

Thank you for your reply! You gave me some nice ideas... We are right now building up our itinerary and this will help us deciding what to see....

Can I ask you about Obidios and Tomar? I have read they are really worth a visit, but I have also found some "not-so-enthusiastic" comments about them...

Thaks again!

Lorenzo

I haven't heard of either one of the towns. Sorry.

So...starting from the deep south:

day 1-2
Sagres in Algarve - you can also spend a party night in Faro, it's not so far away. Remember the sunset in Sagre's Cape

day 3-4-5
Going north on the cost you will get to Alentejo area in just couple of hours. You have very nice small villages, with wonderful beaches and lot of young people making surf. Wine and food...perfect! I personally suggest Zambujera do Mar and Vila Nova de Milfontes

day 6-7
Lisbon and sorrounding areas: Costa Caparica, Cascais, Sintra, Cabo de Rocas. Have some party in Lisbon!

day 8-9-10
Before spending a day in Porto you can stop in Obidos and have a look to the cost nearby Leiria

All the beaches at north of Porto are beautiful....but you might not have enought time...

Enjoy!

-snip-

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Portugal is the good place to enjoy your holidays in August.