Pena Palace

Pena Palace sits atop the Serra de Sintra at 500 metres elevation, its vivid yellow and red towers visible from Lisbon on clear days. Commissioned by King Ferdinand II and completed in 1854 on the ruins of a 16th-century monastery, the palace is Portugal's supreme example of Romantic historicist architecture — a fantastical blend of Moorish arches, Gothic towers, Manueline stone detail, and Renaissance domes, the whole painted in ochre, scarlet, and terracotta. The exterior is the main event: battlements walk around the perimeter, and every façade yields a different architectural style and colour palette. The interior, preserved largely as it was in 1910 when the royal family fled the republic, contains original Meissen porcelain, hunting trophies, Arab Room tilework, and the queen's neo-Rococo bedroom. From the upper terraces, views extend over the Atlantic, Cascais, and on clear days as far as Lisbon's 25 de Abril bridge. The palace is surrounded by the Pena Park, 200 hectares of woodland containing exotic species collected by Ferdinand II from across the Portuguese empire. The upper park can be walked in 30 to 40 minutes; the full circuit with the palace takes 2.5 to 3 hours. Bus 434 runs from Sintra station; the bus stops at the palace entrance. Queue early — coaches arrive from Lisbon from 10am onwards and the palace can feel crowded by 11am. A combined ticket for palace and park is available, or a park-only ticket for those visiting the exterior only.