Lisbon, Portugal 7 Day Itinerary

Lisbon, Portugal: 7-Day Itinerary

Pena Palace draws over 8,000 people a day in peak season and the queue between 11am and 3pm can run two to three hours, so the single most useful thing in this whole itinerary is booking a 9:30am entry slot and being at the gate by 9am. Everything else here bends around that fact.

Day 1: Arrival and settling in

  • Arrive at Lisbon Portela Airport (LIS), which sits close enough to the center that a metro ride (red line) into Baixa takes about 20 minutes and beats a taxi in daytime traffic.
  • Accommodation: Baixa or Chiado puts you within walking distance of most East Bank sights and nightlife. Hotel Lisboa Plaza and Myriad by SANA are solid mid to upper range picks, Memmo Alfama trades a bit of central convenience for hillside Alfama views that are hard to beat at sunset.
  • Buy a Navegante card (formerly branded Viva Viagem, both names still circulate) for 0.50 euros, then load it with either single 1.90 euro rides or a 7.25 euro 24-hour pass if you’re moving around a lot that day. It works across metro, tram, bus, ferry, and the urban trains out to Sintra and Cascais.
  • Explore Baixa and Chiado, Rossio Square, and the Elevador de Santa Justa, then have dinner nearby. Try bacalhau in one of its hundred-plus traditional preparations, and get your first pastel de nata at A Brasileira or Café Nicola rather than waiting for the famous bakery in Belem, you’ll want a baseline for comparison later in the week.

Day 2: Historic Lisbon

  • Morning: Walk the narrow lanes of Alfama, Lisbon’s oldest surviving neighborhood, and stop into the Fado Museum to understand the mournful, string-backed music genre before you hear it live later in the trip.
  • Afternoon: Jeronimos Monastery’s carved limestone cloisters are the standout Manueline building in the city, pair it with the nearby Belem Tower and the Padrao dos Descobrimentos monument on the river. Antiga Confeitaria de Belem, baking the original pasteis de nata recipe since 1837, is worth the queue, but go right at opening or after 5pm, midday lines can run past 30 minutes.
  • Evening: Ride tram 28 for the classic hill-and-valley route through Alfama and Graca, but treat it as one of the highest pickpocket-risk rides in the city, not a relaxing sightseeing trip. Keep bags zipped and worn on your front, and consider it a five-minute photo op rather than a full loop if the car is packed.

Day 3: Modern Lisbon

  • Morning: MAAT’s curved riverside building and LX Factory’s converted industrial blocks both give you a contemporary counterpoint to the tiled, cobbled old town, LX Factory in particular is worth a slow wander for its bookshop-in-a-warehouse and rotating design shops.
  • Afternoon: Parque das Nacoes, built for Expo 98, has the Oceanario de Lisboa (one of Europe’s larger aquariums) and the cable car along the riverfront near the Vasco da Gama Tower.
  • Evening: Time Out Market is fine for a first-timer’s tasting menu of the city’s better-known chefs under one roof, but if you’d rather eat where Lisboetas actually eat, Mercado de Campo de Ourique is the quieter, less touristy version with the same food-hall format and noticeably lower prices.

Day 4: Sintra and Cascais

  • Morning: The Rossio to Sintra train takes 40 minutes and costs about 2.45 euros one way, departing every 20 to 30 minutes, easily the most efficient way out. Book your Pena Palace time slot online before you leave Lisbon, in peak summer the popular morning windows sell out three to five days ahead. Get to the park gate by 9am for the 9:30 slot, that alone is the difference between walking straight onto the palace terraces and standing in an hour-long queue on the access road. Bus 434 from Sintra station runs every 15 to 20 minutes and covers Pena, the Moorish Castle, and Monserrate Palace on one hop-on ticket for under 7 euros.
  • My take: pick two of Pena Palace, the Moorish Castle, and Quinta da Regaleira, not all three. Sintra’s hills and cobblestones eat time faster than the map suggests, and rushing the ornate, symbol-laden Regaleira gardens defeats the point of visiting them.
  • Afternoon: Continue to Cascais for a change of pace, its town center and marina are easy walking after a morning of steep Sintra paths.
  • Evening: Return to Lisbon for dinner. Pack a light jacket regardless of the Lisbon forecast, Sintra’s ridge has its own foggier microclimate that catches people off guard.

Day 5: Belem revisited and Alfama nightlife

  • Daytime: If you skipped it on day 2, the Coach Museum (Museu Nacional dos Coches) houses one of the most complete collections of royal carriages anywhere, more interesting than it sounds. The nearby Jardim Botanico Tropical is a quiet, shaded break from the sun.
  • Evening: Alfama comes alive after dark. A Capela and O Bar do Fado both host traditional fado, the improvised, melancholic singing style that’s core to Lisbon’s identity, book ahead for the smaller rooms since seating is limited and word has gotten around.

Day 6: Beach day

  • Morning and afternoon: Carcavelos is the closest proper beach to the city and easy by train from Cais do Sodre, good for a half-day. For a longer stretch of sand and better surf conditions, Costa da Caparica across the river has more room to spread out and rents boards if you want to try.
  • Evening: Have dinner in Almada near the Ponte 25 de Abril, the suspension bridge modeled by the same firm that built San Francisco’s Golden Gate, and the views back across the Tagus at dusk are some of the best in the region.

Day 7: Last hours and departure

  • Morning and afternoon: Use remaining time for souvenir shopping, a last coffee, or backfilling anything missed earlier in the week, Alfama’s smaller ceramics shops tend to have better prices than the tourist strip near Rossio.
  • Departure: Head to the airport with buffer for metro delays during peak commute hours, the red line gets genuinely packed on weekday mornings.

Transportation: The Navegante card covers metro, tram, bus, ferry, and urban rail out to Sintra and Cascais, load it once and top up as needed rather than buying single paper tickets each ride.

Things to know: Portuguese people are generally welcoming to visitors, though English thins out once you’re away from the main tourist corridors, a handful of basic phrases go a long way. Portugal uses the euro.

Tips: Ginjinha, the sour cherry liqueur served in small chocolate cups at hole-in-the-wall stands around Rossio, is a cheap and genuinely good local ritual, not just a tourist gimmick. Watch your bag on tram 28 more than anywhere else in the city, that’s where the pickpocketing complaints concentrate. Caldo verde and feijoada are worth ordering at least once outside the main tourist streets, where the prices and quality both tend to be better.