We’ve already declared that we find Lisbon to be one of Europe’s most romantic cities, right up there with Paris. In this post, we share our top things to do in the city and how we found each activity romantic.
Top tip: The 48 hour Lisboa card is excellent value and easily covers its 31.50 EUR price tag if you’ve visiting multiple attractions. Highly recommended!!
The city is beautiful even on a wet & windy day
So many vantage points are littered across the city
Top 5 romantic things to do
- Belem attractions
- Getting lost in the city
- Tile museum
- Take a day trip
- See Lisbon from an elevated viewpoint
- Bonus: Eat your way through Lisbon
- Practical tips: Getting around & Lisboa card details
Visit the Manueline attractions of Belem
Both the Jeronimo Monastery & the Tower of Belem deserve their place at the top of the TripAdvisor rankings. They are architectural masterpieces with so much detail engraved into every corner, literally! The cathedral at Jeronimos monastery has free entry and is a must-visit (the high ceiling and pillars are really something). However, we highly recommend visiting the cloisters (pictured below). Climbing the Belem tower’s narrow & winding staircases enroute to some spectacular views is an experience onto itself!
Belem tower with a natural frame
The Cloisters courtyard
Perfect for sweeping walks & sweet nothings
Getting lost walking in the city
Lisbon is probably the most colourful city we have been to. We can attribute that mostly to the seemingly infinite types of tiles adorning the city’s houses. The colour combines with the historic neighbourhoods (such as Alfama & Bairro Alto) to create the perfect city to walk aimlessly through. If you’re short on time, we highly encourage walking detours, especially in the Alfama area (one end of the tram 28 line). Its great content for your Instagram accounts 😉
The party district of Bairro Alto in the daytime
One of our favourite pictures taken at Alfama
Even the birds seem to enjoy the Lisbon scenery
Visit the national tile museum
Even if you are the kind of person that does not like museum, we’d still ask that you consider visiting the National Tile Museum which is a short bus ride from the old town. Not only does it showcase a wide range of tiles spanning centuries, it is also home to a beautiful chapel adorned with gold and flaunting paintings that look like they’re painted on canvas but are actually tiles! We find experiencing new cultures together romantic and the tile museum is a great place to learn about Portugal.
Time & tile wait for no one
The paintings on the two sides are actually tiles!
A picturesque courtyard inside the museum
Tip: Though not a museum, also visit the world’s most expensive chapel at Sao Roque church.
Take a daytrip to Sintra / Cascais
As the weather was not the sunniest, we chose to take a daytrip to Sintra, home to 4 major palaces / castles. We went to the Pena Palace to round off our Valentine’s day weekend in a Romanticist castle. The palace & the grounds were a wonderful place to walk around in and even the museum gave us a taste of what it was to live here. Highly recommended as a daytrip (we spent 4 hours there).
The opulent dining room
See Lisbon from an elevated viewpoint
We saw Lisbon from 3 elevated viewpoints: the Arco Triunfal da Rua Augusta, the Elevador de Santa Justa (at night) and the Sao Jorge castle (in the day). Our favourite viewpoint has to be the Rua Augusta arch, it is half the price of the elevator and you get to see a mechanical clock as well as detailed statues from up close as a bonus. The castle view was also really nice (featured at the top). We took a lot of views together, it was great ❤
A Lisbon dusk from the top of the Rua Augusta arch
Rossio square seen from the elevator at night
Eating your way through Lisbon
We had some spectacular meals / food items across Lisbon which we’ll enumerate (with prices) along with pictures. And as a (wo)man’s heart is through their stomach, these meals were essentially dates.
- Best meal: Black pork with tomato rice at Restaurante Cantinho Do Bem Estar (20 EUR for 2 people).
- Shellfish including giant tiger shrimp, scarlet shrimp & barnacles at Cervejaria Ramiro (90 EUR for 2 people with wine)
- Mirandesa steak and Azeitão Cheese with pumpkin & walnut jam at Carvoaria Jacto (30 EUR for 2 people)
- Port wine from the Duoro region of Porto with dark chocolate at Solar do Vinho do Porto (25 EUR for 4 glasses of fancy port and a bar of chocolate).
- Egg tar at Pasteis de Belem (< 2 EUR per tart)
- Cod fish cake (1 EUR), available in snack bars across the city
Getting around & Lisboa card details
As mentioned before, the Lisboa card is great value for money and allows free entry into many Lisbon attractions and discounted entry at others. We used our Lisboa cards to travel across the city by bus, metro & tram. Here are some notes.
- The tram is surprisingly fast and the best mode of transport in Lisbon. If your journey can be done in a tram, pick that over a bus (which is slower).
- Cost of attractions without using Lisboa card worth €31.50 = €36 (€12.30 for 2x day passes + €2.20 for one-way Sintra + €2.5 Rue Augusta arch + €5 Tile Museum + €12 Belem attractions + €2 castle discount)
- Take the tram 15 from Praca de Comercio to get to Belem.
- The metro is a great way to get to the city centre from the airport. Beware of reduced frequency (one train in 15 minutes) on the weekends.
- Take the tram 28 atleast once! Also take the Gloria funicular atleast once, it drops you off in front of the Port Wine bar. 🙂
Recommended reading (Amazon UK)
*Affiliate links, no extra cost to the buyer, supports this blog
© 2017 Beyond Our Horizons
FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA
Blog header created by Syamantak Gupta
Beyond our horizons 
Great post for visiting Lisbon really useful! Beautiful city to visit, only had one day when we were on a cruise so would love to go back!
LikeLiked by 1 person
As you can probably tell, we highly recommend it. Lisbon is truly one of Europe’s most spectacular cities! Thanks for checking us out. ☺
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you for the detailed post! We are heading to Lisbon in June and can’t wait to check it all out! Do you have recommendations on which areas to stay in?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hey Sunny thanks for taking the time to read this post. Our amazing AirBnb was next to Intendente metro station and that area is the best for foodies (we booked the flat based on nearby restaurants). The link for that flat is in this post : https://beyondourhorizons.wordpress.com/2017/02/28/lisbon-one-of-europes-most-romantic-cities-day-1/
If you want to be in the very heart of the city, find a flat near the Rossio station. If you want to be in the party area, pick Baixa. If you want to be steeped in history pick Alfama. Finally, we haven’t lived in a hotel for years now 🙂 If you haven’t tried AirBnb before and would like to, here is our referral link for $35 off your 1st booking : http://www.airbnb.co.uk/c/adastidar1
LikeLike