Portugal
 

Hi All,

planning a nice vacation with the Landrover, doing as much camping as possible, in Portugal in September.
Any suggestions about things not to be missed ?
We'll be there for about 3 weeks.
Greetz,

Joey

lots of portugal is really lovely if u stay away from the big tourist resorts on the south coast, its covered in moorish castles and 16th/17th century villages
pace of life ouside of the cities has not changed much in centuries. I love the people too. learn a few words of portuguese and they will love you and fall over themselves to help you, most ppl under 30 speak a bit of english and you can often get by with a bit of spanish and italian too

there are many camp sites but in a country as under populated as portugal i doubt you would have many problems pitching up in the wild

in the the north, the Minho is lush and green, and the douro valley up stream from porto is amazing all the way to the border
Porto old town is very special too

dont know so much in the middle

nazere old town is quirky place and nice very family beach resort
the river tegus (tejo) upstream from lisbon into the candieros mountian range in the ribetejo is cool too,

lisbon is brilliant but no place for a land rover,
north west of it the sintra national park is great, lots to see and do and great place to crusie around

for me the little known the jewell in the south is the Alentejo. inland is rural, miles of rolling pastures of cork oaks, olives, vines and wheat, amazing medieval towns like evora
but particularly the coast north of the aljezuer south of sines is amazing. most of its is national park and therefore compeletley undeveloped and wild. amazing.
as you hit the algrave you reach alzejur which is a lovely sleepy seaside town(except in high season when its mobbed) and the town of monchique and the surrounding mountains are worth a look

as you get closer to the algrave south coast it gets a bit more package holiday so its harder to find nice bits, but all the way down to the south west coast to the tip @ sagres is lovely,

Aveiro is also a place not to miss, have a look at the Chanel's, preferably by a traditional boat and see how salt is produced.

camping
 

hi, i was touring the rural Northern half of Portugal in late June and found many of the campsites closed. i also beleive that wild camping is not stricktly legal in portugal. Andy

In July and August due to the high risk of fire wild camping could be a problem but it's ok the rest of the year, just leave the place as clean as it was and take your garbage.

Joe