Sintra
SINTRA
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A thirty-minute train ride from Lisbon found us in Sintra at 12pm.
The station and the ticket office look a bit special.
Sintra is described in our guide book as a mix of natural and man-made beauty, fantasy castles set amid exotic tropical plants, lush green valleys and craggy hilltops. Sintra was popular as a summer getaway for the Portuguese kings.
Our accommodation for two nights at Chalet Saudade Vintage B&B guest house was an easy five-minute walk from the station. We were delighted with our large and very comfortable room. The guest house is beautifully appointed and a substantial breakfast was served in the cafe across the street, also owned by our hosts.
From the front, Chalet Saudade looks like a 2-storey house, but we didn’t realise that it stands on a steep slope and has another three floors below ground level. That was just the start of our ‘almost vertical drop-off’ experiences around Sintra.
We had booked 3.30pm tickets for the afternoon of our arrival for the Peña Palace so after a quick bite of lunch and giving up on Uber (four drivers accepted then cancelled) we jumped aboard the #434 bus which in itself was a (tortuously) fun ride up the steep, winding (understatement) narrow roads to the Palace. Even with booked tickets we had to join a queue. Ivor kindly did the honours while Glyn found a place to sit for the 30 minutes wait.
The Peña Palace is built on the site of an old monastery that goes back to the Middle Ages. Unfortunately, the 1775 Lisbon earthquake caused major damage with very little left of the original buildings. Along came Prince Ferdinand (later King Ferdinand II); in 1838 he acquired the old monastery and transformed it into the 19th century romantic fantasy style castle it is today. The family lived here at various times of the year until 1910 when many of the Portuguese nobility fled to Brazil to escape the revolution. The Palace was classified as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1995. The interior of the palace is beautifully restored and the furnishings are much as they were when the occupants took flight.
Next morning we had 11.30am tickets for Quinta da Regaleira. A Gothic/Renaissance style mansion built between 1904 and 1911.
It was designed by Italian Luigi Manini for a disgruntled but very wealthy monarchist, António Augusto de Carvalho Monteiro, two years after the Royal family was deposed. The castle is impressive from the outside, however our interest in visiting was to explore the magnificent gardens with lush landscaping. One works one’s way up past the chapel, passing tunnels, caves, turrets with spiral staircases, a 90-foot deep well with spiral pathway down to the bottom, all the while taking in views of lush vegetation and plentiful flowers.
'Palace'.
Chapel.
Gardens.
The 'unfinished' well.
The 'finished' well - 90 foot down.
Monteiro was quite a person it seems – when he died his funeral was held in Lisbon; a train was booked to carry the body and mourners from Evora to Lisbon; businesses in all the towns along the route closed their doors as a mark of respect when the train passed through; and the cream of Portuguese society as well as his many employees attended the funeral.
We spent two hours meandering around the gardens, following pathways and climbing up to viewpoints before our bus ride back into the village for lunch, and we then headed to the Moorish Castle in the afternoon.
The Moorish Castle is located in a beautiful mountaintop forest setting (watching the Google Maps display of the route as we were driven up the mountain was like watching a snake writhe).
The castle was built by the Moors and was taken by the Christian forces in 1147. We found ourselves climbing both the lower and the higher towers and were rewarded with wonderful views down the valleys towards Sintra and other villages.
We've had a busy two days in Sintra and loved our time here. Tomorrow it’s a train back to Lisbon with a connection to Evora - our last Portuguese village before flying to Seville in Spain.
This featured blog entry was written by IvorGlyn from the blog Portugal & Spain - 2025.
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