For those staying in Lisbon looking for a convenient day trip option, Sintra is usually no more than an hour away, depending on traffic, which is often bumper to bumper during rush hour and other peak travel times.

Sintra is one of the country’s architectural wonders and is also known for its friendly people, vibrant food and art scenes, and stunning natural beauty.

Below are 15 of the best tours of Sintra that previous visitors have ranked highly.

1. Sintra Walking Tour with Palace, Castle, and Old Town Visit

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After meeting their guide at a central location and getting an overview of the day’s events, guests of this Sintra walking tour will set out to visit many of the city’s most iconic attractions.

Especially for those who’ve never been, the city is an alluring mix of historical and contemporary sites. Depending on the interests of guests, tour stops can be personalized to ensure maximum value.

Of course, the tour’s centerpieces are palaces, castles, and the Old Town area, but there are also natural and cultural attractions.

Tours last four hours, start mid-morning and have a relatively casual pace.

2. 3 ½-Hour Rock Climbing Experience

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For those who’ve never tried it, rock climbing is among the most exhilarating full-body workouts you’re ever likely to have.

Eager climbers will meet their guide either in the morning or the afternoon, after which they’ll get an intro to rock climbing, all the gear they’ll need, and a safety briefing before heading into nature to put their newfound mountaineering skills to the test.

Within sight of the Moorish Castle, Palacio da Pena, and the majestic Sintra Mountains, participants will experience a unique blend of exercise, nature, and history that their tour bus bound counterparts can only dream of.

3. Sintra Heritage Hike

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Sintra-Cascais Natural Park is just a short drive from the city center. It is crisscrossed with a network of hiking trails that are appropriate for a wide range of ages and levels of physical activity.

On this full-day tour, nature-loving hikers will leave the city’s hustle and bustle in the rearview mirror and delve into an idyllic setting characterized by towering cliffs, rocky coastlines, otherworldly sand dunes, and quiet forests dotted with lakes and streams.

You’ll get up close and personal with the 8th century Moorish Castle and Pena Palace, which looks like it leaped from the pages of a fairytale.

4. Portuguese Beaches and Colares Private Jeep Tour

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Sintra’s coastal location gives lovers of sun, sand, and surf easy access to many of the country’s most amazing beaches.

This seven-hour private beach and Jeep tour includes morning pick-up at your accommodation and a brief meet and greet with your guide before the adventure gets underway.

After boarding their trusty 4×4 Jeep, guests will set out to explore not only several beaches and stretches of undisturbed coastline but the region’s mountainous interior as well.

Make sure to charge your camera because the views will be nothing short of breathtaking; you’ll get up close to Monserrate Palace, Pena Palace, and the Moorish Castle.

5. A Taste of Pena Palace Food Tour

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Whether you’re staying in Sintra, Lisbon, Ericeira, or Cascais, this tour has you covered. It includes either hotel pick-up or a convenient meeting point at an easy to reach central location.

Once in Sintra, guests will head to Pena Palace.

It’s the perfect place to start, as it’s considered one of the most impressive and historically significant attractions in the entire country.

Guests will learn about its history and take in its impressive architecture before heading off to experience other sites and sample some of the country’s most flavorful cuisine.

Plan on enjoying everything from Portuguese coffee and fresh pastries to port wine and queijadas.

6. Pena Palace, Cascais, and Natural Park Day Tour

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Tours that offer multiple options are popular with travelers who prefer to focus their energies on the attractions that interest them the most.

On this six-hour morning tour, guests can opt to explore a number of the city’s most prominent symbols, like the Moorish Castle, the National Palace, or the Convent of the Capuchos before heading into the hinterlands.

The Sintra Natural Park offers a variety of scenic gems that include impressive boulder fields, sweeping ocean views from the continent’s westernmost location, and the rugged landscape of Cabo da Roca.

Tours begin and end in Sintra and include a relaxing lunch in a traditional restaurant.

7. The Inquisition’s Hand Private Walking Tour at Night

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The Inquisition was a particularly dark time in the history of Spain, and according to historians, thousands of residents lost their lives in purges designed to uphold the country’s Catholic traditions.

Thankfully, those days are long gone, but there are a number of attractions in Sintra that are tied to events from the 15th century.

This private night walking tour begins in Sintra’s historic center and includes the services of a local guide-historian, who’ll take guests to relatively obscure corners of the city and regale them with fascinating tales of life back then.

Highlights include the Pena, Royal, and Seteais palaces.

8. All Monuments and Cabo da Roca Self-Drive Tour

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Regardless of whether you’ve got just a few hours or a whole day to spare, this self-drive tour from Sintra would be a great way to see the Portuguese countryside at your own speed.

Before the tour begins, guests can plan their route and the things that they want to see, so when they get their electric car, they can set out without wasting valuable time.

From historic villages and impressive monuments to castles, palaces, and large tracts of undeveloped coastline along Cabo da Roca, there are options for participants of nearly all stripes.

Tours meet at a central location and include an overview of local driving laws and a tutorial on how to operate their e-car.

9. Sintra Half-Day Trekking Tour

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There’s definitely no shortage of activity options in and around Sintra for those who value physical exertion as much as they do sightseeing and cultural immersion.

This half-day trekking tour begins at the National Palace, where guests will rendezvous with their guide and get an overview of the day’s events.

After a casual walk around the park, trekkers will pass several key attractions, like the Palacio da Pena, Sintra Castle, and the National Palace.

Along the way, you’ll benefit from your guide’s interesting insights and have ample time to take photos, ask questions, and relax at a café with a traditional pastry and cup of coffee.

10. Private Half Day-Tour of Key Highlights

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The stretch of coastline between Sintra and Cascais is one of the most scenic areas on the coast and features an impressive array of historic attractions and amazing views of rivers, the ocean, and the cliffs just inland.

Guincho Beach is popular with wind, kite, and body surfers. It is just a hop, skip, and a jump from Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, where the bulk of the tour will take place.

Along with their guide, guests will visit palaces, castles, and a number of vista points, as well as sample traditional Portuguese food in a quaint village.

Tours can begin and end in either Sintra or Lisbon and include round-trip transportation.

11. Sintra Full-Day Road Bike Tour

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The hills and winding roads leading out of Sintra along the coast are perfect for bikers intent on seeing things from a street-level perspective.

After meeting their guide at the train station in central Sintra, energetic bikers will head toward Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, where they’ll get up close and personal with Pena Palace, the Moorish Castle, and some of the most stunning scenery in the region.

Tours include a nice mix of hilly and flat terrain, picturesque villages, undeveloped natural areas, and a visit to Cape Roca—the westernmost tip of the European continent.

Click the link below for important booking details.

12. Guided Sightseeing Tour by Tuk-Tuk

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Sintra’s designation as a UNESCO World Heritage Site means that lovers of history and culture can spend days exploring and never run out of new attractions to see.

Though walking, biking, and bus tours are plentiful, many guests agree that seeing the city by tuk-tuk is definitely the way to go.

Tours meet at a convenient central location and include stops at many of Sintra’s most impressive historic sites that include castles and palaces featuring Egyptian, Moorish, and Renaissance architectural influences.

Two-hour tuk-tuk tours include the services of a local guide and are available in multiple start times and four languages.

13. Legends and Medieval Stories Private Walking Tour

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Not every tour of Sintra includes the services of a guide who’s also a historian; that’s exactly what makes this legends and medieval stories private walking excursion such great value.

Starting in the city’s historic center, participants will set out to explore Sintra’s history and culture while hearing interesting and obscure tales of intrigue, war, corruption, and long-standing family feuds from their chaperone.

Sintra Castle is one of the tour’s most impressive and historically significant highlights. Those who choose to trek to the top will have impressive panoramic views of the city and countryside far below.

14. 2-Hour Private Surf Lesson at Praia Grande

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For those who’ve never climbed onto a board and hit the waves, learning to surf may seem a bit intimidating.

Though it’s not something that can be mastered in just a few hours, this private surf lesson experience offers participants of most ages and levels of physical ability the chance to get up to speed relatively quickly.

Everyone will get a board and wetsuit and be paired with an experienced and patient instructor, who’ll give them an overview of basic safety and surfing techniques before taking to the water.

Tours meet at a convenient location, take place at Praia Grande, and are laid back and stress-free.

15. Sintra Life and Death at the Capuchos Convent Guided Tour

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For those who prefer to sleep in and spend the morning relaxing before taking in Sintra’s sites, this early afternoon guided tour of the Capuchos Convent would be a great fit.

Located in the Sintra Mountains, the convent is steeped in history, legend, and lore, and many guests are surprised to learn that it was far from an idyllic setting where dedicated monks prayed, mediated, and worked for the good of the common man.

The convent’s history stretches back centuries, and the tour features both in and outdoor portions.

Tours last about five hours in total, three of which will be spent on-site before guests are returned to the original starting point in town.

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Another is the enigmatic Quinta da Regaleira, the playground of a wealthy eccentric, or the Pena Palace and its fairytale muddle of towers atop a high peak. You can trek through woodland planted with giant exotic trees in the 19th century. Or carry on to the coast for beaches beneath sky-scraping cliffs, ot Cabo da Roca, at the very edge of mainland Europe.

Let’s explore the best things to do in Sintra:

1. Quinta da Regaleira

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António Augusto Carvalho Monteiro was born in 1848 to wealthy Portuguese emigrants in Brazil and augmented his fortune in the coffee and precious stone businesses.

That wealth was funnelled into the bewildering Quinta da Regaleira, which is crammed with small monuments reflecting his fascination with the Masons, Knights Templar and Divination.

His Romantic palace is out of a dream and bursts with Manueline-style masonry, but it’s in the palace park where Monteiro’s eccentric personality comes through:  Underground there’s a system of tunnels and grottoes, all intended to confuse and delight.

Above are ornate gazebos, benches with sculptures and two “initiation wells”, deep shafts lined with spiral stairways leading down to sanctums for tarot ceremonies.

2. Pena Palace

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Recently named one of Portugal’s “Seven Wonders”, Pena Palace was ordered by King Ferdinand II in 1838 on the lofty ruins of an old monastery.

The ostentatious Disney-esque architecture and high setting call to mind Ludwig II’s Neuschwanstein Castle, but Pena Palace is actually a couple of decades older.

As was the fashion at the time, the palace rolls together many historical styles, from Moorish to Renaissance.

It was built as a summer residence and has spellbinding stuccowork and trompe l’oeil painting inside, and views that will blow you away in the park.

You have to spend time outside as Ferdinand II planted trees from around the world like sequoias, tree ferns, ginkgos and Lawson cypresses that rise to astonishing heights.

3. Cruz Alta

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The most rewarding of all the walks you can do in the Pena Park is the trail weaving through magical forest to the highest point in the Serra de Sintra.

At 528 metres, this prominence is marked with a Manueline-esque stone cross and is strewn with granite boulders.

At this height there’s a beautiful perspective of the Pena Palace’s colourful assortment of towers, as well as the green tones of the Sintra mountains.

On clear days you can see parts of Lisbon and the Tagus Estuary.

4. Cabo da Roca

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Sintra’s boundaries go all the way to the coast, and the westernmost point of continental Europe.

Cabo da Roca is the point where the Serra de Sintra sinks dramatically into the ocean.

The cape is 140 metres at the top of a granite cliff and with powerful boulders and outcrops pounded by the ocean far below.

There’s a lighthouse up here, as well as a stone monolith with a cross to mark this headland, which was a famous seamark from Roman times to the Age of Discovery.

The ground up here is a carpet of evergreen ice plants, an invasive plant native to South Africa.

5. Castle of the Moors

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Hoisted on one of Sintra’s northernmost peaks are the ruins of a mighty castle, built by the Moors and enlarged after the Reconquista.

The walls have four square towers and snake with the contours of the mountain at the top of a sheer cliff, so it’s a sight to behold from below and is an amazing vantage point from above.

Up between the merlons you can look over the peaks, bluffs and rocky spurs, out to the Atlantic and over Sintra.

Historians can investigate the ruins for some exciting vestiges like the large Moorish cistern that you can enter via a stairway, and the ruins of a Romanesque chapel with frescos in its chancel.

6. Park and Palace of Monserrate

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Monserrate is deep in the mountain range, slightly removed from Sintra’s other palaces, and so isn’t quite as crowded.

But that doesn’t mean you can pass it by, because both the Moorish Revival palace and grounds are glorious.

It was all landscaped in the mid-19th century for Sir Francis Cook, an English aristocrat who was given the title Viscount of Monserrate by King Luís I. The parkland has bamboo plantations, grottoes, man-made waterfalls, ponds, exotic cedars and Oceanic tree ferns.

And as for the residence, the Islamic influence is undeniable, in the latticework in its arches, the arabesque stucco patterns on the stairway and the ceiling of the radiant music room, which hosts concerts to this day.

7. Palace of Sintra

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You’ll know this palace right away for its pair of white conical towers above a mishmash of halls and annexes.

The Palace of Sintra is the oldest palace in the town, and no royal medieval residence is in a better state of preservation in Portugal.

Royalty lived here on and off from the 1400s to the 1700s, and each successive occupant added a bit of their own personality.

One, King Manuel I was responsible for a lot of the interior decoration, cladding the walls with eye-catching Seville azulejos.

These are in the Mudéjar style (Moorish revival) and have geometric, carpet-like patterns.

Another of his works was the magnificent Sala dos Brasões (Coats of Arms Hall), where the coffered ceiling sports the 72 coats of arms of the Portuguese royalty and nobility.

8. Palácio Nacional e Jardins de Queluz

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Queluz is a city east of Sintra, but in the same municipality.

The thing to see is the Palace of Queluz, which took shape in the middle of the 18th century and has exuberant Rococo architecture.

It was the summer retreat of Dom Pedro of Braganza, who would become King Consort to his own niece, Queen Maria I. The interiors are sublime, festooned with gilded stuccowork and resplendent frescos on the ceiling in the Music Room and the Queen’s Boudoir where there’s a dainty trellis pattern.

Outside you can savour the Baroque grandeur of French architect Jean-Baptiste Robillon’s facades, and the 100-metre canal, which is walled by blue and white tile panels.

9. Convento dos Capuchos

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A short but very picturesque drive or tuk-tuk ride from Sintra will bring you to the remnants of a 16th-century monastery.

The Franciscan monks who lived in this brotherhood chose an extraordinarily austere life, contrasting with Sintra’s luxury.

They lived in tiny cells bored from the rock and adorned with cork, and survived on vegetables grown at the kitchen garden.

This is still visible below the main courtyard, the Pátio do Tanque where there’s a pretty octagonal fountain.

You’ll be equipped with an audioguide to tour the cells, monastic buildings and chapel, which have been abandoned since the monasteries were dissolved in Portugal in 1834.

10. Old Centre of Sintra

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If you arrive in Sintra early in the morning the first thing you should do is treat yourself to a walking tour of the old centre.

You need to get this done early, when the town is still waking up, as by late morning the streets are overrun with tourists.

The compact core winds up a precipitous valley, and has twisting cobblestone streets, narrow stairways, churches and beautiful mansions and townhouses.

Some of these contain museums, like the Museu Anjos Texeira and the Museu de História Natural, and others you can only admire and photograph from the outside.

Later, if you can brave the crowds, make sure to call at a pastelaria for one of Sintra’s sweet pastries.

11. Praia da Ursa

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On the road to Cabo da Roca, you can follow the signs beckoning you down a dirt track to this beach.

Praia da Ursa may be one of the most spectacular beaches you’ll ever visit, and is on that indented shoreline you can see from the cape.

The beach is almost boxed in by tall, jagged cliffs and outcrops, which help to calm the surf, so it’s a rare beach on the Atlantic coast where non-swimmers can paddle in safety.

Getting there isn’t easy, as you have to inch down a cliff-side trail, but it’s a small price to pay for such astounding scenery.

12. Museu do Ar

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For a change of pace from palaces and mountains there’s an aviation museum for Portugal’s Air Force at Sintra Air Base.

The museum is coming up for its 50th birthday, and in 2010 the fleet of aircraft was moved from Alverca to this massive hangar.

You can run the rule over a big fleet of planes, helicopters, propellers, navigation equipment, instrument panels and tons of other paraphernalia.

The exhibition begins with a timeline of early aviation experiments in Renaissance times,  advancing through primitive biplanes like Tiger Moths to Second World War aircraft like spitfires and then into the jet age.

A highlight is the Douglas C-47A Dakota, which you can board, but only accompanied by Força Aérea personnel.

13. Praia da Adraga

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It’s a sign of the high standard of the beaches in Sintra that the second best beach in the town is still held as one of the best in all of Portugal.

Adraga is the next one up from Praia da Ursa, and has the same sharp rocks and intimidating wall of cliffs behind.

The good news is that you can drive down, and there’s a restaurant by the car park next to the beach.

If you go carefully it’s a fun place to explore, adventuring over the rocks to find caves and tunnels.

The surf is a bit more vigorous at this beach than its neighbour, but there is a lifeguard all summer.

14. Sintra Tram

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Touring palaces and parks may leave younger children feeling left out so they might have more fun on this tram ride from the centre of Sintra out to Praia das Maçãs on the coast.

Trams have been clattering along this 11.7-kilometre route since 1904. If you’re holidaying without a car it’s a convenient if bumpy way to see both Sintra’s wooded mountainscapes and the rugged coast.

Tickets are reasonable at just €3 for a single and it takes around 40 minutes to get out to the coast.

As ever in Sintra, get on board early if you want to avoid the crowds.

15. Sintra’s Delicacies

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There are a couple of treats that are almost exclusive to Sintra.

One is the queijada, a small circular cake made with eggs, milk, sugar and cheese.

Yes, cheese, as a mild, soft cheese similar to ricotta is used in place of butter.

This lends the cake a smooth texture and sweet-savoury flavour that can’t easily be described, but is definitely moreish.

Another sweet to try with a coffee is a travesseiro, a cylindrical puff pastry filled with an almond and egg cream.

Order one at the Casa Piriquita in the old centre.

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