One Week

One week in Portugal.

You have one week. Follow this and you'll have the best vacation of your life. Trust me.

Day 0 — Arrival prep

Friday Evening

Fly from the US to LIS — you’ll land in the morning.
Don’t eat on the plane. Flights from the US East Coast to LIS are almost too short. By the time they serve and collect the meal, you have 3–4 hours of flight time left. Instead, eat at the airport and try to sleep as much as you can on the hop over.

Day 1 — Arrival in Lisbon

Take an Uber to your hotel (I recommend Hotel das Amoreiras). Drop your luggage.
Walk from your hotel to Jardim da Estrela, stroll through the park, grab a coffee, and marvel at the Basílica immediately opposite the park.
Make sure you have €10 cash on you and walk up the hill to Campo de Ourique. Grab lunch wherever you like. Keep walking to the entrance of the Prazeres cemetery — this is the single best place to guarantee you can catch one of the iconic trolleys, including the 28. They only take cash. Wait for the next one and hop on.
Take the trolley into the heart of Lisbon. Hop off at the Sé Cathedral.
Walk from the Sé to Praça Luís Camões in Chiado and explore.
Head back to the hotel, change, shower — do not nap.
Take an Uber or walk to Mercado de Campo de Ourique for dinner. Tons of options, casual, and you’ll leave wondering why the United States doesn’t have these in every neighborhood.

Day 2 — Old Lisbon and Belém

Schedule a Tuk Tuk tour ahead of time and have them pick you up at your hotel.
Have them take you all over Alfama and Graça.
Ask them to finish the tour in Belém.
Spend the afternoon visiting the monuments and monastery in Belém. Walk up the hill from the monastery to the Lisbon Royal Treasure Museum. It is absolutely worth it. Tour Ajuda Palace while you’re there.
Head back to Lisbon and grab dinner at one of the spots on the Eat list.

Day 3 — Sintra and the coast

Take an Uber to Sintra — about 35 minutes. There is also a train, but it runs every half hour and only leaves from a couple of specific stations in Lisbon.
Have them drop you in the town of Sintra. Explore a bit, then either grab a Tuk Tuk or walk up to the Pena Palace.
Skip going inside the Palace — the outside is pretty enough and the interior tour is slow. Instead, hop on the bus or walk over to the Moorish Castle.
Finish your tour by visiting the best palace in Sintra: Quinta da Regaleira. Explore everything on the grounds.
Grab another Uber to Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in Europe. Ask nicely or hire a car onward to Praia Grande for sunset. Eat dinner at Bar do Fundo (reservations required).

Day 4 — North to Porto

Time to travel again. Portugal has one high-speed train, the Alfa Pendular. It is a delightful way to travel. Book first class (it doesn’t cost much more) and hop on from central Lisbon. You’ll get meals or snacks in the dining car, WiFi, and a fairly scenic trip.
About 90 minutes in, you’ll make your first stop in another city — Coimbra. Coimbra is the charming university town of Portugal. Worth hopping off, eating lunch and exploring the afternoon, then continuing on. Book tickets with this in mind — you’ll need separate bookings.
Arrive in Porto that evening. Check into The Yeatman, a beautiful hotel on the south side of the river amid the ancient port houses. Porto is built into a nearly vertical cliff on the north side of the river — from the hotel you have the best views of the place. Close to the city, away from the chaos.

Day 5 — Porto

Enjoy Porto. I don’t have many recommendations other than: try a Tuk Tuk and skip the Harry Potter bookstore.

Day 6 — Choose your own adventure

Take the train or a boat tour east and explore the Douro valley. If you really want to get off the beaten path, book a cabin at Casa do Rio at Quinta do Vallado — we try to do this every year. You’ll need a rental car and a couple of days. Otherwise there are vineyards within day-trip distance.

Day 7 — Last day in Lisbon

Take the Alfa Pendular back south from Porto to Lisbon. Enjoy one last afternoon and evening at the Tile Museum. Pack your bags.

Day 8 — Departure

Head home. Try to arrive at the airport two hours before your flight if you’re checking bags. The airport is overcrowded and struggles to scale up during peak hours.
The biggest danger is exit immigration. Once you pass security you’ll arrive in a large atrium. Lounges are up the escalators if you have status. Otherwise grab a snack and hang out. If you’re flying back to the United States directly from Lisbon (or anywhere outside the Schengen Area), you will need to go through exit immigration. This can take 20–30 minutes. Time it into your departure — too many friends have spent too long in the waiting atrium thinking they were done with lines, only to see their gate appear and realize they hadn’t accounted for an extra 30-minute process.