Best Day Trips from Lisbon (Ranked, with How to Get There)

By the Klemio team · Updated June 3, 2026

Not many cities let you pick between a hilltop palace, an Atlantic beach, a walled town, and a Roman temple, all without packing a bag. Lisbon does, and most of it is a cheap train or a bus ride away. Below is what is actually worth your day, with plain directions for getting to each.

What I love about basing in Lisbon is that no two of these days feel alike. One morning you are climbing through mist to a fairy tale palace, the next you are swimming off a beach town or standing inside a Roman temple. The coastal trips run on the suburban train lines, which cost almost nothing and leave every 20 minutes or so. The inland ones lean on buses or intercity trains, and even the slowest keeps you under two hours each way. Times and directions are below so you can weigh a short hop against a longer haul.

1. 1

   Sintra

   About 40 minutes each way by direct train

   Sintra is a hill town stuffed with palaces, and that sounds like hyperbole until you are standing in front of the candy colored Pena Palace or working out the well shaft at Quinta da Regaleira. The ruined Moorish walls fill the gaps between them. It gets mobbed by late morning, so the early train is not optional if you want any room to breathe.

   Getting there: Take the direct CP train from Lisbon's Rossio station to Sintra, about 40 minutes, with departures roughly every 20 to 30 minutes. From Sintra station, local buses or tuk tuks climb to the hilltop sites.

   Best for: Your one free day, when you are willing to wake up before you want to and pack a lot into it.

   Sintra guide
   
2. 2

   Cascais

   About 40 minutes each way by direct train

   Cascais is a tidy seaside town with sandy coves, a marina, and a center small enough to wander on foot between coffees. The train shadows the river and then the open Atlantic the whole way, so you are already enjoying yourself before you arrive. Easy to fold into a half day of beach time.

   Getting there: Take the direct CP train from Lisbon's Cais do Sodre station along the coast to Cascais, around 40 minutes, with trains roughly every 20 minutes throughout the day.

   Best for: An afternoon when you want to swim, sit by the water, and not think too hard about logistics.

   

3. 3

   Obidos

   About 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes each way by bus

   Obidos is a whitewashed town inside medieval walls, draped in bougainvillea, and you can walk the ramparts the whole way around. It is genuinely tiny, a few hours and you have seen it, but those few hours are spent in one of the best kept old cores in Portugal. The slightly longer ride is the price of admission.

   Getting there: The bus is the easier option: a regional bus toward Caldas da Rainha that stops at Obidos. A slow train does run on the Oeste line (about 2.5 hours, and the station sits roughly a kilometer below the walls), so the bus is usually the better choice. Buses run frequently from Lisbon and take about an hour to an hour and twenty minutes. Confirm the schedule before you set out.

   Best for: Anyone who has a soft spot for old walls and cobbles and does not mind sitting on a bus to find them.

   

4. 4

   Evora

   About 1 hour 20 minutes to 1 hour 35 minutes each way by bus or train

   Evora is the walled capital of the Alentejo, and it crams a startling amount into its golden stone center: a Roman temple still standing, a Gothic cathedral, and the Chapel of Bones, which is exactly as unsettling as it sounds. If you want a real sense of inland Portugal in a single day, this is the trip that delivers it.

   Getting there: Take a Rede Expressos bus from Sete Rios, about 1 hour 20 minutes with frequent departures, or a CP train from Oriente station, about 1 hour 33 minutes but only a few times a day. The bus usually has more departures.

   Best for: Someone who would rather poke around a Roman temple and a working Alentejo town than chase another beach.

   

5. 5

   Arrabida coast and Sesimbra

   About 1 hour each way by bus to Sesimbra

   Cross the river and the Arrabida hills tumble down to clear turquoise coves and Sesimbra, an unfussy fishing town. The protected park holds some of the prettiest and least developed beaches anywhere near Lisbon. Fair warning: the best coves are awkward to reach on your own, so this takes a bit of planning the others do not.

   Getting there: Take a Carris Metropolitana bus toward Sesimbra, roughly an hour and running hourly. The Arrabida park beaches themselves are tricky on public transport, so many visitors base a beach day in Sesimbra or join a guided drive.

   Best for: A beach day where you would trade convenience for wilder, emptier sand.

   

6. 6

   Fatima

   About 1 hour 20 minutes to 1 hour 40 minutes each way by bus

   Fatima is one of the great Catholic pilgrimage sites, built around a huge sanctuary and basilica that pull visitors from all over the world. This is a quiet, reflective place rather than a scenic one, so be honest about why you are going. For the right traveler it carries real weight.

   Getting there: Take a Rede Expressos bus from the Sete Rios bus station, reached on the blue metro line at Jardim Zoologico. The ride is about 1 hour 20 minutes to 1 hour 40 minutes with roughly hourly departures.

   Best for: Pilgrims, and anyone who travels to understand a place's faith rather than to tick off sights.

   

Thumbnail photos by Singa Hitam (CC BY 2.0), Jorge Franganillo (CC BY 2.0), Berthold Werner (CC BY-SA 4.0), François Philipp from Darmstadt, Germany (CC BY 2.0), No machine-readable author provided. Sacavem assumed (based on copyright claims). (CC0), Berthold Werner (CC BY-SA 4.0), via Wikimedia Commons.

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