Roughly rectangular in shape and with a population of around ten million people, Portugal has much to offer the modern visitor – young and old alike. It’s a land of fine wine, fairy-tale castles and palaces and long sandy beaches … Read more
The green and pleasant north of Portugal is a place of traditional merry-making where annual festivals are ablaze with colourful costumes, lively processions and frenetic folk-dancing followed by a feast of fireworks.
One of Portugal’s lesser-known but much-savoured wines is vinho verde, so called because the grapes are picked young and the wine is mostly drunk just a year or two after bottling.
Visitors to the picturesque Douro Valley region in the north of Portugal can enjoy a very large dose of nostalgia on one of the great railways journeys of the world along the Douro line.
A unique concentration of rock etchings and settlement sites in the Douro Valley region represents some of the world’s earliest evidence of recurrent human occupation.
For independent visitors travelling under their own steam, there are several routes to the Portuguese capital from the Spanish frontier and other outlying areas of the country, each offering a wide variety of sightseeing opportunities along the way.
Although Portuguese architecture is said to have officially commenced with the start of the monarchy, there was already a large scattering of ancient buildings in existence all over the country, most notably the Visigoth temple of Balsemão, the Mozarab church of … Read more