Towns and Cities within 2 Hours

The town that gave the country (and port wine) its very name, Porto is Portugal’s second-largest metropolis after Lisbon. Sometimes called Oporto, it's an age-old city that has one foot firmly in the industrial present. 

The old town, centered at Ribeira, was built on the hills overlooking the Douro River, and today is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

The 14th-century São Francisco church is a main attraction, as are the local port wine cellars, mostly located across the river at Vila Nova de Gaia.

Portugal’s third-largest city is an elegant town laced with ancient narrow lanes closed to vehicles, strewn with plazas and a splendid array of baroque churches. 

The constant chiming of bells is a reminder of Braga’s age-old devotion to the spiritual world. Its religious festivals – particularly the elaborately staged Semana Santa (Holy Week) – are famous throughout Portugal. But don’t come expecting piety alone: Braga’s upscale old centre is packed with lively cafes and trim boutiques, some excellent restaurants and low-key bars catering to students from the Universidade do Minho.  

Climbing dramatically to the hilltop pilgrimage site of Bom Jesus do Monte, 5km east of Braga, is this extraordinary staircase, with allegorical fountains, chapels and a superb view. City bus 2 runs frequently from Braga to the site, where you can climb the 580 steps (pilgrims sometimes do this on their knees) or ascend by funicular

Guimaraes is considered the birthplace of Portugal because of Afonso Henriques, who went on to be the first king of Portugal, was born here.

The historical centre in the area that was within the Guimarães city walls, is associated with the formation and identity of Portugal, and was classified a World Heritage site based on the originality and authenticity applied in its restoration. The city still has a harmonious, well-preserved heritage that is evident in the graceful iron verandas, granite balconies and porticos, mansions, arches connecting the narrow streets, paving slabs smoothed by time, towers and cloisters. For a moment you might imagine yourself to be in a mediaeval setting, where the nobility built their houses over time, such as the Mota Prego house, the Vila Flor and Toural palaces, and the many others that give Guimarães its unique atmosphere.

The town’s impressive bridge was the scene of heroic resistance in 1809 during the Peninsular War by the people of Amarante, who fought off French Marshall Soult’s advance for fourteen days before his army advanced and burnt down their houses. 

Taking place on the first Saturday and Sunday in June, the annual Festa de São Gonçalo is among the most colourful fairs in Portugal. Traditionally, and somewhat interestingly, it is the time for unmarried people to exchange phallus-shaped cakes as tokens of their love.

Ponte de Lima is without doubt one of the loveliest and best-preserved medieval towns in the whole of Portugal.

The low multi-arched stone bridge that lent this charming medieval town its name was built by the Romans as they advanced through the Iberian Peninsula, and a fair portion of it still stands today.

Standing on the banks of the River Tâmega and close to the border with Spain, Chaves has always been very important from the military and strategic point of view. The city heroically withstood annexation by Castile in the sixteenth century, and later, in the nineteenth century, it was here that the invading Napoleonic troops suffered their first defeat on Portuguese soil. Remaining as a testimony to the city´s defensive importance are the castle and its keep, as well as the mediaeval quarter contained within the city walls.

Chaves is also famous for its richly varied cuisine, and particularly for its sausages and smoked ham.

In northern Portugal, Vila Real is a town in a hilly landscape, clinging to a headland far above the Corgo River. The Corgo is a tributary of the Douro and meanders down to the main stream through an epic landscape of terraced vineyards.

Around the town you can visit a noble family’s palace, which was decked out in Baroque decoration by the Italian master Nicolau Nasoni in the 1700s. He also worked on the finest church in Vila Real, one of a selection of distinguished granite buildings in the old centre. And out in the countryside are mountain ranges, a village that has pottery listed by UNECO and the eerie ruins of a Roman sacrificial altar.

Situated in the far northeast of Portugal, Bragança is a city whose old castle still maintains a mediaeval urban core within its walls.

Entering the citadel or the bailey by the Porta da Vila (Town Gate), you will find yourself at the Pelourinho (Pillory), standing on a Lusitanian hog that recalls the Celtic origins of the region. In the massive Keep, which in the Middle Ages guarded the borders, the military museum also tells the history of the castle, built by King João I on the foundations of the earlier fortress that the 1st King of Portugal, Afonso Henriques, had built.