Lisbon in One Day

Be at the Praça da Figueira stop by 08:30 with a navegante card already loaded (€0.50 for the card at any metro machine, then zapping credit or the €7.25 24-hour Carris and Metro ticket). Tram 15E is the modern articulated line, not the yellow 28, and runs along the river to Belém in about 25 minutes, our estimate; cash is not accepted on board the articulated cars, and a paper ticket from the driver on a bus is €2.30. Get off at Mosteiro dos Jerónimos, the stop after the Coach Museum, and cross the gardens.

The cloister door on Praça do Império opens at 09:30, Tuesday to Sunday, and the queue at that hour is a few dozen people; by 11:00 it stretches across the square. The regular ticket is €18 for the cloister and the upper choir, with a 50% reduction for over-65s, 13 to 24s and families, free under 12; the reserved cloister ticket is the same €18 with a fixed date and no ticket-office line. Two storeys of Manueline stone carved with ropes, armillary spheres and sea creatures, an hour at a fair pace.

The church is a separate door and separate hours, so do not leave the cloister expecting to walk through.

The church opens to visitors at 10:30 Tuesday to Saturday (14:00 on Sundays, after mass), through the west portal on the square, and costs nothing. Vasco da Gama and Camões lie in the tombs just inside the door, and the six columns of the nave carry the vault the 1755 earthquake did not bring down. Twenty minutes; the line here moves faster than the cloister's because there is no ticket.

Three minutes along Rua de Belém to number 84–92, the blue-tiled shop that has baked the custard tarts since 1837. Open every day 08:00–21:00, to 22:00 from 1 July to 30 September. The takeaway counter line and the sit-down line are different lines, and the sit-down rooms at the back are bigger than the street suggests; at 11:00 the wait is minutes rather than the half-hour it becomes after lunch.

The shop prints no prices anywhere on its website, so we do not either.

Cross under the railway and the road by the pedestrian tunnel to the riverside and walk west along the water to the 1960 monument, the prow of stone with Henry the Navigator at the point. The compass rose in the pavement behind it is the photo. The viewpoint at the top is €10, daily 10:00–19:00 from March to September, and it is the one stop we would drop on a one-day plan: the view from the Belém Tower's terrace is the same river.

Keep walking west.

The tower reopened on 27 May 2026 after conservation works with a slot-based entry system, €15 adult with the same 50% reductions as the monastery, booked on the official Museus e Monumentos site. Book the slot before the cloister ticket, because it is the only fixed time in the day; a 11:30 or 12:00 slot fits this plan. The official English page says 09:00 opening and the Portuguese page 09:30, which is why we do not start the day here.

Inside it is a spiral stair to the terraces and the king's room; allow 45 minutes including the wait at the footbridge. If the calendar is sold out, the Belém walking tour with the monastery ticket sees the tower from the outside with a guide who explains it.

The Belém stop on Avenida de Brasília is across the road from the tower's garden. Eastbound trams from here are fuller than the morning ones and mostly standing by the Coach Museum; ride to Praça do Comércio, about 20 minutes, our estimate. If the Coach Museum is on your list, it is the stop before Jerónimos and open Tuesday to Sunday 10:00–18:00 at €15, but it costs the afternoon; the two-day plan has room for it.

The square is the old palace yard, open to the river on one side and closed by yellow arcades on the other three, with the Rua Augusta arch in the middle of the north side. Lunch off the square rather than on it: two streets into Baixa the menus lose the six languages and gain a daily dish. The arch viewpoint is €5, daily 10:00–19:00 with last entry 18:30, a lift and 74 steps; free with the Lisboa Card.

Twenty minutes if you take it, and the square-side view is the better one. The Ask Me Lisboa desk in the square, open daily 10:00–19:00, is where a Lisboa Card is collected if you bought one.

About 8 minutes up Rua da Madalena and Rua de Santo António da Sé, the first slope of the day. The twelfth-century fortress-church charges €7 for the tourist circuit, which covers the naves, the high choir, the bell-tower balcony and the treasury museum in one ticket; €5 with the Lisboa Card, free under 6, and a reserved prayer space stays free. From May to October it is open 09:30–19:00 on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday and 10:00–18:00 on Wednesday and Saturday; closed on Sundays and holy days, so a Sunday itinerary looks at the rose window from the outside.

Forty minutes.

About 12 minutes uphill from the cathedral by Rua do Limoeiro and Rua de Santa Cruz do Castelo, the one real climb of the day; bus 737 from Praça da Figueira does the same hill for anyone saving their legs. The castle is €17 adult, €8.50 for 13 to 25s and €14 over 65, free under 12 and free with the Lisboa Card, open daily 09:00–21:00 from March to October with last admission at 20:30, and to 18:00 from November to February. The e-ticket with audio guide skips the ticket window.

The ramparts and the eleven towers are the point, and the view from the west terrace takes in everything you saw this morning; the archaeological site and the camera obscura are for a second visit. An hour and a quarter.

Five minutes down from the castle gate to the two terraces that hang over Alfama: Santa Luzia with its tiled panels and bougainvillea, Portas do Sol a few steps further with the wider view to the Pantheon dome and the river. Tram 28 stops between them, which is why they are crowded; the kiosk at Portas do Sol sells a coffee for the sunset if you would rather wait here than walk. The Alfama guide names the third viewpoint, up at Graça, that the tram does not reach.

Take the stairs below Portas do Sol into the lanes: Rua Norberto de Araújo, Largo de São Miguel, Rua de São Pedro to the little square at Largo do Chafariz de Dentro, about 12 minutes downhill and the part of the day that needs no ticket. The National Pantheon, €10 and open Tuesday to Sunday to 18:00 from April to September, is ten minutes east if you have the legs and the hour; on a one-day plan it is the stop to skip in favour of arriving at the fado house before it fills. The street of small tabernas along Rua dos Remédios is where a glass of wine and a plate of chouriço costs what it should.

Fado is the end of the day, not the middle of it, and Alfama is where the small houses are. The 50-minute fado show with a glass of wine, rated 4.8 by 6,715 travellers, runs several sittings an evening inside a medieval room, which is what you want after 7 km on foot; the Lisboa em Fado show with port is the €14 version. Dinner afterwards on Rua dos Remédios or back down at the river.

The walk to Praça do Comércio from the Chafariz de Dentro is about 10 minutes, flat; the metro at Terreiro do Paço runs until 01:00.

Start at the top instead. The castle opens at 09:00 every day and the first hour has the ramparts nearly empty; with the e-ticket you go straight to the gate. An hour and a quarter, then down to the cathedral by the same lanes the afternoon plan climbs.

Open on Mondays 09:30–19:00 from May to October and 10:00–18:00 the rest of the year, €7 for the full circuit. Forty minutes, then down Rua da Conceição and across Baixa to the Chiado slope.

The roofless Gothic church on Largo do Carmo is the earthquake's monument, open Monday to Saturday 10:00–19:00 from May to October and to 18:00 in winter, €7 adult and €5 for students, over-65s and Lisboa Card holders, no booking. Half an hour under the open arches, then Rua Garrett and the Chiado cafés for lunch. The Santa Justa lift beside the square is closed; the way down to Baixa is Rua do Carmo on foot.

From Praça do Comércio, after lunch, about 25 minutes west. The afternoon tram is the crowded one, but the Monday crowd is thinner because the cloister is shut.

The church's Monday hours are not stated on the official page, so look in if the west door is open and do not plan on it. The tarts are open every day, and the riverside walk past the Padrão to the Belém Tower's garden costs nothing; the tower is admired from the footbridge. MAAT, the museum with the curved roof you can walk on, is open Monday 10:00–19:00 at €16 for non-residents and is the Monday museum of Belém, 15 minutes east along the water.

Tram back to Praça do Comércio, up through Chiado on foot (the Glória funicular that used to do this hill is closed; bus 51E replaces it from Restauradores) to the terrace at the top of Calçada da Glória, which faces the castle you started the day in. The Fado in Chiado show at €23 is five minutes away and runs at 19:00; Bairro Alto's restaurants open around you afterwards. The Bairro Alto guide has the streets.