Serra da Estrela Long Weekend
A 334 km loop
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Why this ride
A rider’s loop: clean exit, memorable middle, calm return. A 334 km loop that starts and ends near Poceirão, about 6 h 05 of riding. The stops in between: Óbidos, São Pedro da Cadeira, Monte Estoril and Charneca de Caparica. The climb of the day is Comporta.
Roadbook
- Fuel stop near Poceirão
fuel
Fuel at 0 km.
- Near Óbidos, on the way back
swim
Óbidos is a walled village so well preserved that it looks arranged for the camera, which does not make it any less lovely. White houses trimmed with blue and yellow climb a hill inside the medieval walls, and a castle on the summit has been turned into a hotel. The story goes that in the thirteenth century King Dinis gave the town to his queen Isabel as a wedding present, and for centuries afterwards it belonged to the queens of Portugal. The tradition made it a place of royal favour, and it kept its walls and its charm through the centuries.
The best thing to do is walk the walls, a narrow ledge with no railing and a long drop, and look out over a patchwork of vineyards, orchards and the glimmer of the lagoon to the west. The Lagoa de Óbidos, a shallow tidal inlet separated from the sea by a sandbar, was once a harbour for the town and silted up over the centuries. Now it is a haven for birds, kitesurfers and weekend swimmers, and the beach at Foz do Arelho, at its mouth, is a pleasant place to end a day.
The local drink is ginja, a sour cherry liqueur served in a small chocolate cup, which you drink and then eat. It is sold from little stalls near the gate and is sweeter than most riders would choose, but it is part of the ritual. Also look for the town's bookshops, which have been set up in a former market and a church, since Óbidos was named a UNESCO City of Literature.
Practicalities are straightforward. The town is a magnet for coach parties, so aim for early morning or late afternoon, and park outside the walls. Fuel is available at stations on the main road just below the village, and the nearby Caldas da Rainha, a spa town with a ceramic tradition, has a wider choice. The cobbled streets inside the walls are steep and slippery, so leave the motorcycle outside.
The surrounding roads are rolling, wooded and quiet, leading south toward the Atlantic coast and the surf towns. With the lagoon on one side and the vineyards on the other, it is an easy and varied half day.
- São Pedro da Cadeira
food
Out in the rolling country of the Oeste, north of Lisbon, São Pedro da Cadeira is a farming parish in the municipality of Torres Vedras, a scatter of villages, vineyards, orchards and greenhouses on the hills that run down to the Atlantic. It is not a destination in its own right. It is a place where people work the land, and that is exactly why it makes a good, honest lunch stop on the way north to the mountains.
The landscape is soft and generous: low ridges, small valleys, windmills old and new, and the sea glinting a few kilometres to the west. This is one of Portugal's most productive agricultural regions, known for vegetables, wine and especially the Rocha pear, a firm, sweet pear grown in the Oeste with protected status, which you will see in orchards along the roads. The vineyards produce large quantities of Lisboa regional wine, much of it simple and good value. The coastal resort of Santa Cruz, with its sandy beaches and dramatic rocks, is just a short ride away.
History runs deep here too. In 1809 and 1810, during the Peninsular War, the Duke of Wellington ordered the construction of the Lines of Torres Vedras, a chain of forts, redoubts and trenches across these hills from the Tagus to the sea, built in secret by Portuguese labourers to protect Lisbon from Napoleon's army. When the French arrived in 1810, they found the hills fortified and turned back after a hungry winter. Many of the old forts survive on hilltops around Torres Vedras and have been restored.
The roads around São Pedro da Cadeira are narrow and winding, rising and falling over the hills between the villages, with a mix of good tarmac and rougher patches. Watch for tractors, slow farm vans and loose gravel at junctions, and sea mist that can roll in from the coast on summer mornings. It is easy, pleasant riding, the kind where you slow down because there is something to look at.
For lunch, the small village restaurants and cafes in the area serve the honest food of the region: grilled meat and fish, soup, bread and local wine at modest prices. Silveira, a few kilometres away, and Torres Vedras, the main town, have fuel and shops, so you can top up before continuing north towards Serra da Estrela and the long climb into Portugal's highest mountains.
- Monte Estoril
photo
Faded grandeur and Atlantic light define Monte Estoril. The district rises from the coast between Estoril and Cascais, west of Lisbon, with villas, gardens and old hotels on the slopes above the sea, and a long promenade along the beach below. This was once one of Europe's most fashionable resorts, and some of that elegance survives in the palm-lined avenues and the houses with their tiled facades.
Estoril's golden age came in the early twentieth century, when the casino and grand hotels were built, and during the Second World War, when neutral Portugal became a refuge for exiled royals, refugees and spies of every nationality. Ian Fleming, who worked in naval intelligence, spent time here, and the casino is often said to have inspired Casino Royale. After the war, deposed kings and their families settled along this coast, giving it the nickname the Coast of Kings.
For motorcyclists, Estoril has another association: the Autódromo do Estoril, the racing circuit in the hills behind the town, which hosted the Portuguese Formula One Grand Prix for many years and later the MotoGP championship. Its corners are a reminder that this coast has a long love affair with speed.
The coast road, the Marginal, runs along the sea from Lisbon to Cascais, a pleasant if busy route with views of the ocean and the mouth of the Tagus. Beyond Cascais, the road continues to the wild cliffs of Boca do Inferno and Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point of mainland Europe, with strong winds and spectacular views. The roads through the Serra de Sintra, a range of forested hills dotted with palaces, are narrow and twisty, with damp, mossy surfaces in places.
The rides from here head far north, to the Serra da Estrela, the highest mountains of mainland Portugal, with long climbs and wide views, and to the Douro valley, where vineyards cling to steep terraces above the river. Both are long journeys, so start early. Fuel, food and every service are easy to find around Estoril and Cascais, and the seafront cafés make a good stop for a coffee and a pastel de nata. Traffic on the Marginal and around Lisbon can be heavy, especially on summer weekends, so plan your departure and return accordingly.
- Charneca de Caparica
finish
Charneca de Caparica sits on the high, sandy plateau behind the beaches of the Costa da Caparica, on the south side of the Tagus across from Lisbon. It is part of Almada and mostly residential, a sprawl of villas, small streets and umbrella pines spread over land that was once heath and scrub, which is what charneca means. To the west the plateau ends abruptly at a line of tall, golden cliffs, and below them lies one of the longest unbroken beaches near any European capital.
Those cliffs are the Arriba Fóssil da Costa da Caparica, a protected landscape of ancient sea cliffs stranded inland when the shoreline moved out. They are made of layered sands and clays packed with fossil shells, and the colours change through the day from cream to ochre to deep rust at sunset. Pine woods planted centuries ago to hold the sand still cover much of the top, including the Mata dos Medos, a forest once tended to stop dunes burying the farmland, and the smell of warm resin on a summer afternoon is part of the place.
For a finish, the riding is short and suburban. You arrive on busy roads through roundabouts and housing, and on summer weekends the routes down to the beaches jam with Lisbon traffic heading for the sea. Cobbles and patched tarmac appear in the older streets, and sand blows onto the roads near the coast, so take the last corners gently. The views improve the closer you get to the cliff edge, where small roads drop down to the beach, and a clear evening shows Cabo Espichel to the south and the hills of Sintra across the water.
Everything you need is close. Charneca itself has fuel, supermarkets and cafes, and Costa da Caparica, a few kilometres away, is the beach town proper, with a long promenade and seafood restaurants that grill sardines and fish outside on charcoal. If you have energy left, the beach bars strung along the sand south of the town are where Lisbon goes to watch the sun go down into the Atlantic.
Across the river the city is close but feels far. The 25 de Abril bridge, with its red towers, and the Cristo Rei statue on the Almada side are visible from many corners of this side of the river, a reminder that you are only half an hour from the capital, traffic allowing.
- Comporta
pass
Rice is not what most people expect in southern Portugal, but here at Comporta the land flattens into wide green paddies laid out along the Sado estuary, with herons and white storks standing in the water and the smell of mud and salt on the wind. Comporta is a small village of whitewashed houses and reed-thatched cottages on the edge of these fields, set between the estuary to the east and a huge Atlantic beach to the west, on the long sandy peninsula that runs south from Tróia.
For a long time this was a poor, quiet farming and fishing area, owned for decades by a single large estate that grew rice, pine and cork. Because development was held back, the coast stayed largely empty, and in recent years Comporta has become a favourite of designers, architects and well-off Lisbon families, who have built discreet houses among the dunes and pines. The village has kept a low-key feel, but it is no longer the sleepy place it once was, and in August it can feel crowded with sunglasses.
The riding through here is flat, open and easy, along the N261 and the roads that link Comporta to Tróia, Carrasqueira and Alcácer do Sal. The surface is generally fine, with long straights broken by gentle bends through cork oak, stone pine and rice. The wind off the Atlantic can be strong and gusty in the afternoon, and sand drifts onto the edges of the road near the coast. If you come from Setúbal, the ferry across the mouth of the Sado to Tróia takes vehicles and makes a lovely short crossing, often with dolphins, since a resident group lives in the estuary.
Just south of the village, at Carrasqueira, fishermen built a harbour on wooden stilts in the mud flats, a maze of crooked walkways and huts reaching out into the estuary. It is one of the most photographed sights on the coast and worth a short detour, especially at low tide in the late afternoon light.
Comporta has cafes and a few restaurants serving rice dishes with seafood or duck, which is the obvious thing to eat here. For fuel, the nearest reliable stations are towards Alcácer do Sal or back towards Setúbal, about eighteen kilometres away across the water, so check the tank before setting off on the long, empty roads south.
- Scenic stretch near Setúbal
scenic
Setúbal is a working port city at the mouth of the Sado estuary, the sort of place that tourists tend to skip and locals quietly love. Fishing boats, ferries and cargo ships share the water, and across the estuary the long, flat sand spit of Tróia stretches out. Out in the water lives a small resident community of bottlenose dolphins, which you can sometimes see from boat trips leaving the harbour. Behind the city rises the Serra da Arrábida, a steep ridge of limestone covered in Mediterranean scrub.
The city is proud of its food. Choco frito, fried cuttlefish strips, is the local dish, and grilled fish is usually fresh and simply cooked. The sweet fortified Moscatel de Setúbal is made from grapes grown on the slopes nearby and is a good drink to end the meal with. The poet Bocage, famous for his satire and wit, was born in the city in the eighteenth century. Another highlight is the Convento de Jesus, where the church has remarkable twisted stone columns that look like rope, a very early example of Manueline style.
On the bike, Setúbal is the gateway to the best coastal road south of Lisbon. From the city, the road climbs along the northern flank of the Arrábida range, passing through pine and holm oak, with views of the sea and the Tróia peninsula. The bends are fairly frequent, the road is narrow in places, and the surface is generally good, though sand and pine needles can gather on the corners. On weekends in summer the beaches and viewpoints attract a lot of traffic, so go early or on a weekday. In winter the days can be damp and windy, but when the sun is out the sea is a vivid blue and the hills are green.
The city has well over a hundred thousand people in the wider area, so all the practicalities are easy: fuel, supermarkets, repair shops and a lot of places to eat. The market near the centre is a great place to see what the local fishermen bring in. Before leaving, take a coffee on the main square and enjoy the comparative peace of a city that has not been remade for visitors.
- Back to Serra
finish
There is nothing glamorous about this spot, and that is its charm. It lies on the flat lands south of the Tagus, in the region between Alcochete and the town of Poceirão, a country of cork oaks, pine plantations, sandy soil and straight roads. After a long day in the mountains of the Serra da Estrela, this is where the Lisbon area starts to wrap itself around you again.
The area belongs to the Setúbal Peninsula, an unglamorous but fascinating piece of Portugal. It is low, sandy and wooded, with sections of old cork forest, shepherds' tracks and agricultural fields, and the Tagus estuary glints a few kilometres to the north. Alcochete, the closest sizeable town, is an old fishing and salt-working settlement on the river's edge, and its saltpans still draw flamingos and other waders. The town also has a bullfighting tradition in the surrounding fields, and local horses and cattle are an everyday sight.
The most striking feature of the neighbourhood is the Vasco da Gama Bridge, which crosses the Tagus nearby. At around seventeen kilometres in total length including the viaducts, it was opened in 1998 and counts among the longest bridges in Europe. Crossing it, especially on a bike with a tailwind, gives you a sense of vast water on both sides and the Lisbon skyline growing in the distance. There is a toll in the direction of Lisbon, so keep a little money or a payment device ready.
The riding here is not about corners. It is about straight, fast, flat carriageways, roundabouts and some rather ordinary industrial edges, so pay attention to traffic merging, particularly in the afternoon rush. For those who like a gentler end to the day, quieter lanes thread through the cork oaks and the vineyards of the nearby wine area. Fuel is plentiful in Alcochete, Samora Correia and along the main roads, and there are good simple restaurants serving grilled fish, bread, and the sweet pastries Portugal does so well.
Look for the evening light over the estuary, when the water turns pink and the bridge lights come on. It is a gentle way to end a big ride.