Besides enjoying Portugal’s enchanting landscape, fine wines, sandy beaches and warm year-round sunshine, the best moments for many visitors are served up in the country’s eateries, with the dining experience further enhanced by the choice of soups and other starters … Read more
Nicknamed the Blue Island due to its abundance of hydrangeas, Faial in the Azores is like a floating garden of orchards, wild exotic flowers and fertile pastures right in the middle of the Atlantic.
Evoking the Middle Ages, the grand old Castelo de Guimarães still exudes much of the boldness and pride that created the kingdom of Portugal many centuries ago.
Read the transcript of our podcast – the Portugal Travel Show – covering several destinations in Portugal, including Lisbon, Madeira, Douro and the Algarve.
With immense geographical allure and a wealth of seafaring history, Sagres offers a taste of the real Portugal, a town famed for its maritime tradition with the unique status of being the most south-westerly place on the European mainland.
Rising conspicuously from the vast open plain, about an hour’s drive north-east of Évora, the lovely town of Estremoz is one of the most rewarding places to visit in Portugal’s picturesque Alentejo region.
One of the pearls of the Portuguese Riviera is the upmarket resort town of Estoril located 26 km west of Lisbon and just 3 km east of cosmopolitan Cascais.
With its broad avenues, large squares and a pleasant air of prosperity, Castelo Branco is an attractive town of parks and gardens and a very good base from which to explore the border region of central Portugal.
Few places in Portugal are more welcoming and atmospheric than the Aldeias Históricas, a series of a dozen ancient and very historic villages spread out mostly along the Spanish frontier in the heart of the country.
Located about an hour’s drive north-west of Funchal, the enchanting seaside town of São Vicente is a place of spectacular visual splendour and arguably one of the most precious jewels in Madeira’s glittering tourism crown.
One of the most picturesque seaside towns in Portugal, Nazaré is a bustling resort with a large crescent-shaped stretch of golden, sandy beach on the west coast of central Portugal.
Nestling a few kilometres inland from the Algarve‘s rugged west coast, Aljezur is an attractive little place of striking white houses and red roofs, surrounded by oak woods and fields emblazoned with wild flowers.
One of Portugal’s greatest literary figures, Fernando António Nogueira Pessoa is posthumously regarded as the most extraordinary poet of his generation.
Portugal’s national gallery is the magnificent Ancient Art Museum where visitors to Lisbon can view an outstanding collection of paintings, sculptures and decorative arts spanning more than 700 years.
Boasting an idyllic waterside setting in the north-eastern corner of the Algarve, the enchanting town of Alcoutim is a place of unspoilt peace and quiet just across the River Guadiana from neighbouring Spain.
Famous for its sugar plums, Elvas is also a citadel whose Spain-facing fortifications match those of Badajoz across the border a few kilometres away.
Known as the Green Island (Ilha Verde), São Miguel is the largest and most developed in the Azores, Portugal’s verdant nine-island archipelago in the mid-Atlantic.
Portugal’s ever-popular and intensely heartfelt national song is known as fado, which holds UNESCO’s Intangible Heritage of Humanity award and is celebrated the world over as a major performing art.
Recalling times from days gone by, Aldeia da Cuada (pictured) on Flores Island in the Azores, is a very rare accommodation treat right on the western edge of Europe.
Nestling on the eastern shores of Terceira Island in the central group of the Azores, the picturesque port town of Praia da Vitória features a large bay with a long sandy beach and a modern marina popular with ocean-crossing vessels.
Uniquely situated behind a long offshore sandbank, the Ria de Aveiro stretches for about 45 kilometres between Ovar to the north and Mira to the south, reaching a width of about 10 kilometres at its widest point.
Located 30 kilometres north of Abrantes, the small town of Vila de Rei (which means King’s Town) is a pretty place set in a wonderland of pinewoods, lakes, running streams and waterfalls right in the very heart of Portugal.
Perched on a high cliff facing the Atlantic, just 10 km west of Mafra, the pretty fishing town of Ericeira metamorphoses into a lively holiday resort during the summer months, with numerous cafés, restaurants and bars opening up alongside its … Read more
This pretty stone cottage with its lovely garden is in fact a restaurant located in the idyllic seaside hamlet of Fajãzinha on the west coast of Flores Island in the Azores, right on the western edge of Europe.
Devastated by a succession of earthquakes over the centuries, Setúbal is rich in relics of the past and nowadays is one of the busiest ports on Lisbon‘s southern shoreline.
The largest place in the archipelago and capital of both São Miguel Island and the Azores since 1522, Ponta Delgada is a charming city stretched out along a wide bay on the island’s south coast.
Set on a glittering bay against a background of soaring green mountains and nestling picturesquely into the shelter of the verdant hillside, the enchanting city of Funchal attracted Madeira’s earliest settlers in the 15th century.
One of the remotest places in Europe, Flores (along with its sister island, Corvo) is part of the western group of the Azores archipelago and is classified as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.
A pleasant town on Madeira‘s southern shoreline, Calheta (also known as Estreito da Calheta) is the island’s main centre of banana plantations, vineyards and sugar-cane production.
Largely unspoilt by the effects of modern development, Nordeste is a small outpost situated at the north-eastern tip of São Miguel island in the Azores, a nine-island archipelago located west of mainland Portugal in the North Atlantic.
The Baía da Barca aparthotel in the small town of Madalena on Pico island promises the warmest of welcomes for travellers in the Azores.
There’s no better place for a relaxing meal – alfresco style – than along the sun-baked shores of the Algarve in the south of Portugal.
Manueline is the style that marks the Portuguese artistic and architectural shift away from the late Gothic during the reign of King Manuel I (1469-1521).
Elegant and restrained, the former royal summer palace of Queluz to the west of Lisbon is a popular stopover for visitors en route to the ancient village of Sintra.
There’s no place in Portugal quite as remote as Corvo, a single volcanic crater island set bold as brass in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
When the Portuguese voted for their favourite land and seascapes as part of the 7 Natural Wonders opinion poll, the outcome was a genuine showcase of the country’s most magnificent and much-loved vistas.
Birthplace of six kings and the seat of Portugal’s first university, Coimbra is one of the most celebrated cities in southern Europe.
Europe’s south-westernmost country, Portugal, is synonymous with bird-watching – the two go hand-in-hand.
A very popular form of artistic expression in the 19th century, scrimshaw is largely synonymous with the whaling heritage of the Azores islands, but the tradition has all but disappeared due to the diminishing supply of whales’ teeth.
Lisbon’s state-of-the-art Oceanário is not only the city’s top attraction but also the largest of its kind in Europe. Built as the centrepiece of the Expo ‘98 World Exposition, its aquariums represent the eco-systems of Antarctica, the Indian Ocean, Atlantic and … Read more
Lawrence’s has a history like no other place in Portugal. Arguably the second-oldest hotel establishment in Europe, and without doubt the most ancient in all the Iberian Peninsula, it is intimate enough for guests to quickly absorb its exquisite 18th-century … Read more