Portugal is the right size to do by train. The country is long and narrow, the main line runs straight up its spine, and the flagship Alfa Pendular — a tilting 200-something-seat train that leans into the curves — connects the two great cities in under three hours. The mistake is to treat that fast train as the trip. It is the connective tissue. The trip is everything you hang off it: the palaces above Lisbon, the oldest university in the country, and a branch line up the Douro that is one of the most beautiful stretches of railway in Europe.

I did it in mid-May, when the jacaranda was out in Lisbon and the Douro terraces had greened up. Seven days, Lisbon to Porto, on the rails the whole way.

Days 1–2: Lisbon

Two full days in Lisbon to start, because the city does not give itself up quickly. The historic core is Alfama, the tangle of lanes below the Castelo de São Jorge, best reached on the No. 28 tram — the yellow streetcar that grinds up the hills past the cathedral. Spend a morning in Belém, west along the river, for the Mosteiro dos Jerónimos and the Torre de Belém, both UNESCO-listed Manueline landmarks, and the original Pastéis de Belém custard tarts from the café that has guarded the recipe since 1837.

Eat in the Time Out Market in Cais do Sodré or, better, in the small tascas of Bairro Alto and Príncipe Real. Stay central — the Avenida da Liberdade end if you want grand, the Chiado if you want walkable. Nights in Lisbon run late; the fado houses of Alfama do not really start until after dinner.

Day 3: Day trip to Sintra by train

Sintra is the day trip every Lisbon visitor should take and it is pure rail: the suburban line from Rossio station runs out to Sintra in about 40 minutes. The hilltop town is a UNESCO Cultural Landscape stacked with romantic-era palaces — the candy-coloured Palácio da Pena on its crag, the Quinta da Regaleira with its initiation well spiralling into the ground, and the Palácio Nacional with its conical kitchen chimneys in the centre of town.

Buy palace tickets online ahead, ride the local bus or a tuk-tuk up the hill rather than walking the steep road, and go early — Sintra is small and gets overwhelmed by midday. Back to Lisbon for a third night.

Day 4: Lisbon to Coimbra

Break the journey north at Coimbra, roughly halfway, on the same main line the Alfa Pendular runs. The city is the home of the University of Coimbra, founded in 1290 and among the oldest in continuous operation in Europe, its Biblioteca Joanina a gilded Baroque library that is one of the most beautiful rooms in the country — book a timed entry, as numbers are capped to protect the books and the resident bats that eat the insects.

Walk the steep medieval streets down to the river, hear the local style of fado (sung here by men, traditionally students in their black capes, and distinct from Lisbon’s), and stay the night. Coimbra is a real working university city, not a museum piece, and it has the cheap good food to prove it.

For a memorable overnight, the Quinta das Lágrimas sits across the river in an 18th-century palace set in twelve hectares of historic gardens — the grounds are tied to the doomed 14th-century love story of Prince Pedro and Inês de Castro, and the Duke of Wellington once slept in the palace rooms. It runs around fifty-five rooms with a spa and two pools. In the centre, plenty of small guesthouses near the university keep the night cheap if the palace is beyond the budget.

Days 5–6: Porto and the Douro

Take the train up to Porto — from Coimbra it is a little over an hour. Arrive at Campanhã and connect in to the centre, or arrive at the beautiful São Bento station, whose entrance hall is lined with 20,000 azulejo tiles depicting Portuguese history. Porto is the better-value of the two big cities and, to my taste, the more characterful: the Ribeira waterfront, the Dom Luís I iron bridge, the Livraria Lello bookshop, and across the river in Vila Nova de Gaia the port lodges where the wine ages — Taylor’s, Graham’s, Sandeman — most offering tastings and tours.

Give Porto a full first day. Use the second for the Douro Valley: the Linha do Douro branch line leaves Porto and follows the river upstream, and the stretch from Régua to Pinhão runs right at the water’s edge through the terraced vineyards that produce port. Pinhão’s little station is itself tiled with azulejos of the harvest. Many people do this as a day return by train, or pair the train up with a river cruise back down; either way you are in the wine country by rail, no car needed. Sit on the right going up from Régua for the river views, and time your return so the late-afternoon light is on the terraces.

A word on Porto’s two main stations, because it confuses first-timers: long-distance and Douro-line trains use Campanhã, a little outside the centre, while the beautiful tiled São Bento is the in-town terminus for shorter regional services, a short hop from Campanhã on a connecting train. Arrive at Campanhã off the Alfa Pendular, ride two minutes in to São Bento, and you step out into the heart of the old city. For where to sleep, the historic centre around the Ribeira and the Aliados avenue keeps everything walkable; across the river in Gaia, several hotels look back at the Porto skyline from among the port lodges.

Day 7: Porto, slowly, and the fast train home

Spend the last morning in Porto unhurried — a coffee in the Ribeira, the climb up the Clérigos tower for the rooftop view, a last francesinha (the city’s outrageous layered sandwich) if your arteries are willing. Then ride the Alfa Pendular straight back down to Lisbon in under three hours, which after a week of branch lines and suburban trains feels like teleportation. Book a Conforto seat for the return if you want the wider chair, the power socket, and the calmer carriage; standard is perfectly comfortable and noticeably cheaper. You arrive having seen the country end to end without ever touching a steering wheel.

A note on the stations and the seasons

Lisbon confuses first-time rail travellers because it has several stations and they do different jobs. Long-distance Alfa Pendular and Intercidades trains north to Coimbra and Porto leave from Santa Apolónia (the riverside terminus) and Oriente (the modern hub by the old Expo site); the Sintra day trip leaves from Rossio, the ornate horseshoe-arched station in the centre; and Cascais and the coast run from Cais do Sodré. Read your ticket for the departure station and leave time to find it. Booking online ahead through CP unlocks the cheaper promotional fares on the Porto run, which can roughly halve the walk-up price.

On timing, Portugal is a year-round country but the shoulder seasons reward you most. Spring (April–June) and autumn (September–October) give you warm days, long evenings, and the festival calendar without the July–August crush and heat, when Lisbon and the Algarve fill with European holidaymakers. The Douro is at its most beautiful in autumn, during and just after the September harvest, when the terraces turn and the cellars are working — though that is also when the valley is busiest, so book the branch-line seats and the riverside rooms ahead.

What it costs, roughly

Rail is the bargain here. The Lisbon–Porto Alfa Pendular runs around €34 standard or €47 Conforto, less if you book the cheaper early-bird fares; the Sintra and Coimbra legs are a few euros each, and the Douro branch is similarly cheap. Six nights of accommodation is the real spend, and both Coimbra and Porto run well below Lisbon prices. Food is inexpensive by Western European standards — a tasca lunch with wine is genuinely cheap — and the fixed costs are palace and library tickets in Sintra and Coimbra and a port tasting or two in Gaia.

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Frequently asked questions

How long is the train from Lisbon to Porto?
The Alfa Pendular, CP's flagship tilting train, runs Lisbon (Santa Apolónia or Oriente) to Porto Campanhã in about 2 hours 46 minutes to 3 hours. The slower Intercidades takes around 3h10. Conforto (first class) runs roughly €47, standard around €34, cheaper if booked early.
Do I need a car for this trip?
No. The whole spine — Lisbon, Sintra, Coimbra, Porto — is rail-connected, and the Douro Valley has its own scenic branch line from Porto. A car only helps if you want to roam the higher Douro vineyards independently, which most people do as a day cruise or tour instead.
Is the Douro Valley reachable by train?
Yes. The Linha do Douro runs from Porto's São Bento and Campanhã stations up the river to Pocinho, and the stretch from Régua to Pinhão hugs the water through the terraced wine country. It is one of Europe's great branch lines.
Which station do trains to Porto leave from in Lisbon?
Long-distance Alfa Pendular and Intercidades services use Lisboa Santa Apolónia and Lisboa Oriente. Sintra and other suburban lines run from Rossio and other terminals — check your ticket, as Lisbon has several stations.