A Weekend in Nazaré, Portugal
A couple of weeks ago we took a weekend trip up the coast from Lisbon to Nazaré, the historic fishing village turned big wave surf mecca. While there weren’t any big waves while we were there, we were still completely charmed by the picturesque town and friendly locals. It’s the first place in Portugal we’ve visited outside of Lisbon where we said to ourselves, ‘yeah I could live here.’
Despite being a popular tourist destination, Nazaré still feels like it is holding on to its local heritage as a real, breathing, livable, uniquely Portuguese place. Contrast that to some of the spots in the Algarve that we’ve visited which, while beautiful, gave us the jarring feeling of stepping outside of Portugal into ‘wee Britain.’ Despite our Portuguese language skills still being at a beginner level we would much rather go into a local place and do our best to bumble through in Portuguese rather than be treated like a tourist and spoken to in English (and much gratitude to the Portuguese folks who kindly and patiently tolerate our terrible pronunciation as we practice!).
The town is situated down along a huge expanse of curved beach surrounded by lush hills (some of the vegetation even gave us Hawaii vibes). Narrow cobblestone lanes offer peekaboo glimpses of the mighty Atlantic and have that quintessential Portuguese mix of renovated building next door to decay, with plenty of laundry rustling in the breeze. We enjoyed walking through this historic part of town and had a truly excellent lunch (seafood stew for us, and the usual bitoque for the kid) at A Tasquinha, which, like most excellent meals, we picked based on having walked by while it was closed and noting that it looked like a legit old school joint. I didn’t take any pictures, but the food was excellent and the atmosphere warm and convivial. The owner even shook our hands and wished us a Feliz Natal when we left.
Along the beach you’ll also find reminders of the town’s fishing heritage-beautifully colored wooden boats and fish drying in the sun. And of course, there are still plenty of tourist shops along the esplanade, including one where we bought the kid a ridiculous Pikachu hat (way to choose a local souvenir, ha).
Up the cliff from the main town, accessible by a hiking path (as well as a funicular which I believe only runs in the summer) is the neighborhood of Sitio. This is where we stayed. Our Airbnb was maybe the only downside of our trip. We’ve heard many times how freezing cold Portuguese homes can be—stone walls, no insulation, no heater—and I can confidently say we’ve now experienced exactly what people mean! It was so cold I didn’t even want to shower in the morning, and it was a relief to get outside into the sun even though the outside temps were still in the 40s.
Along the hiking path we just had to make a ‘doing it for the gram’ stop at the famous swing. Definitely do this in the morning if that’s your thing as you’ll be waiting out influencers in the afternoon.
Up in Sitio is the other big beach, Praia do Norte, the main surfing area. If you’ve seen the “100 Foot Wave” on Netflix this is where you’ll find the wind-whipped lighthouse on the cliff (which is now a museum housing surfboards from many of the surfing legends who’ve passed through here) as well as the big wave surfing competition, which is called in the winter when the waves are forecasted to be, well, massive (which they weren’t when we were there).
Sitio itself also has a plaza with a church and a stunning view from the cliff down to the town below. There’s also a bull-fighting ring that we passed on our way to town. Like in Spain, it still exists in some parts of Portugal. There are also vendors, usually older local women dressed in traditional garb, selling various dried fruits and roasted nuts.
We really enjoyed our time in Nazaré and will definitely be back someday when the waves are rocking, though we appreciated having a quieter weekend on our first visit.
Tchau,
Megan