Boutique Hotels in Sintra

Sintra's wonders are scattered across a wooded hillside, and seeing them is a matter of choosing well rather than trying to do everything. The Pena Palace, a riotous nineteenth-century Romantic fantasy in yellow and red, is the unmissable one, its terraces giving huge views; below it the ruined Castelo dos Mouros runs along the ridge. In the town itself, the Palácio Nacional de Sintra, with its two great conical chimneys, has been the royal palace since medieval times. And the Quinta da Regaleira, with its spiral initiation well, tunnels and esoteric gardens, is the most atmospheric of all.

Beyond the headline sights are quieter pleasures: the Monserrate palace and its botanical garden, the convent of the Capuchos, and the gardens that gave Sintra its camellias. The historic town is small and walkable, full of cafés and the local queijadas and travesseiros pastries, though it fills quickly by day. Sintra also makes a base for the wild Atlantic coast just beyond — Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point of mainland Europe, and the surf beaches around Praia das Maçãs.

The secret of Sintra is to stay the night. By day the town and the great palaces fill with coach parties up from Lisbon; by early evening they thin out, the mist settles into the hills, and the place returns to the dreamlike calm that made its name. An overnight also lets you reach the palaces early, before the crowds, and gives time for the quieter corners — Monserrate, the coast, a long dinner in town — that day-trippers never see.

For where to stay, the club's choice in Sintra is the Sintra Marmòris Palace, a nineteenth-century palacete of just nine rooms on the edge of town, restored by a Portuguese marble family and set in fourteen thousand square metres of gardens with a heated pool and views up to the Moorish castle — an intimate, grand little house a short walk from the historic centre, and the kind of base that makes the case for staying over.

Sintra has its own microclimate, cooler, greener and noticeably wetter than Lisbon, and that shapes the timing. Late spring and early autumn — May, June, September — are the sweet spot: warm but not hot, the gardens at their best, the worst of the crowds either side. High summer is busiest and the palaces can be uncomfortably crowded by midday, though the hill stays cooler than the city; come early in the day if you visit then. Winter is misty, atmospheric and quiet, often damp, with the camellias in flower from autumn through to spring and the town at its most romantic and least crowded. Whenever you come, arrive early at the palaces — Sintra's crowds are the one thing that can break the spell.