Portugal itinerary help
 

Hello we will be in Portugal (June 2023) with 2 teens (ages 19/17)
flights are already booked for 7 nights/8 days.
So far this is what I have planned
arrive Lisbon early morning - catch train to Porto around 11AM.
arrive Porto late afternoon - stroll downtown and stay night
Day 2 - visit local winery ( no tour ) just do our own. Thinking of visiting maybe 1 or 2 winery and cruise tour and come back to Porto. Is this doable?

day 3 leaving Porto ( private car service) to Lisbon and stop along the way and visit Nazare, Obidos and maybe one more area.

Day 4 - hang around Lisbon and sightseeing
any recommendations ?
day 5 - visit Sinatra
day 6 - algarve?
day 7 - ?
day 8 leave Portugal.

I think your plan is too ambitious. 7 nights gives you 6 full days, not 8 full days. And you have 4 destinations planned, not counting Obidos and Nazare. I have not been to the Algarve but from what I understand, it is a long drive and not worth it for 1 or 2 nights.

I assume you are flying home from Lisbon, right?

Since your flights are already booked, I think a possible itinerary could be:
Porto - 3 nights
Lisbon - 4 nights with a day trip to Sintra OR
Lisbon - 3 nights AND Sintra one night

The reason I suggest possibly an overnight in Sintra is that people have been commenting on how busy it is. We visited Sintra as a daytrip from Lisbon but that was in 2018. And it depends on how many palaces/castles you want to visit in Sintra.

You ask for sightseeing recommendations in Lisbon. What does your family like to do? Lisbon has some wonderful museums, Castelo Sao Jorge, the Alfama neighborhood, Belem with the Jeronimos Monastery and Discoveries Monument, and many miradouros (viewpoints).

If have haven't already done so, I suggest buying 1 or 2 good guidebooks to help you plan. I used Fodors.

Agree with karenWoo - drop Algarve, do Sintra as day trip or overnight.

In Porto, presume you refer to Douro valley wineries. Do you plan to drive? I'd not advise it, as it is a decent drive and the roads to the wineries in the Douro valley can be rather narrow and steep. It's one of the few places where I'd recommend a small group day trip. We used efun tours and had a marvelous all day trip stopping at three different wineries including a delicious lunch at one. They also offer an itinerary that includes cruising, but everyone I know who has done that said it was rather boring and would not do it again.

here's another idea thought I had
Catch a train from Lisbon to Porto (day of arrival) spend 2 nights in Porto. (Day 1 (half day) & 2 (full day in porto - maybe visit winery for half day?)
Day 3 - morning - Hire a car service to Lisbon (and make stops over in Coimbra and Nazare)
Day 4 - day trip to Sintra - get back to lisbon at night
Day 5 - day trip to Algarve ? is that possible? (via car service?)
Day 6 & Day 7 - Spend in Lisbon
Day 8 morning - leave Lisbon?

We have been trying to get to Portugal since 2020 and planning for Spring 2024, 16 days and still have so much to cut from our itinerary. You have so little time here…have you used google maps or rome2rio to look at distances. Lisbon to Porto by train is 2.5 hours. Driving from Lisbon to Lagos is 3 hours. I would either change my inbound flight to Porto or spent the entire 6 days in Lisbon and day trip to Sintra or overnight and if you want some beach/seaside you can go to Cascais which is 40 minutes by train or 23 minutes by taxi from Lisbon.


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I agree with BethHar about omitting Algarve. It's not worth it for a day trip. Admittedly, I have not been to the Algarve but many seasoned posters here do not recommend going there unless you can spend a lot of time there because of the long drive. We drove through Cascais and made a brief stop when we did our guided tour of Sintra, and we thought Cascais was very pretty. We commented it would be a nice place to spend more time.

So I have decided to omit Porto from our trip and do Lisbon and Algarve instead. That being said. I am looking for recommendations in algarve (Lagos vs Albuferia)
main center town to stay in that region centrally to stay.

How to help

you have two choices

Lisbon and the Algarve, only do this if you like beaches and golf courses
Lisbon and Porto (train inbetween visiting other ancient cities), only do this if you want to visit real Portugal

up to you

There are more than beaches and golf courses in the Algarve. I suggest using Lagos as a base to visit other towns and the coast





and here is the album https://flic.kr/s/aHsmENSCvb

but given the short time, I am not sure that the OP will see much more than the coast.

Are there high speed train between Lisbon and Albufeira?

rome2rio.com
seat61.com
https://www.cp.pt/passageiros/en
are probably what you need, do not touch the "ninja" website with a barge pole

Thank you.
lotnof information and I do wish now I should have taken more days off for this vacation to take advantage of Portugal.

Yes, skipAlgarve. Also skip Nazare and spend more time from Obidos on day trips visiting Alcobaça, Bathala. Look at Evora and consider adding it.