Picked by our team
Towns worth discovering along the Camino de Santiago, chosen by our team. Open one to see its history and sights, and where to stay.
21 towns on the Fátima: Caminho do Norte
View on the mapÁgueda is a classic stage end on the Camino Portugués Central, 295.3 kilometres from Lisbon after a flat day through the Bairrada. In summer, colourful umbrellas hang over the lanes; the rest of the year it is a quiet riverside town. Tomorrow brings one of the prettiest stages before Porto.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteAlbergaria-a-Velha carries a pilgrim hostel in its name: in 1117 Countess Teresa, mother of Portugal's first king, had a house for the poor and for pilgrims set up here. Today it is a small town after a short, pretty stage, with a good municipal hostel. Tomorrow will be long.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteAnadia calls itself the capital of Espumante: in the middle of the Bairrada it lies 8.7 km beyond Mealhada, with a wine museum and the spa town of Curia right next door. A break is enough, for a coffee and some shopping, because it is still 16.6 km to Águeda, and the next pilgrim bed is just beyond the town.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteAnsião lies on the Nabão, and the town likes to explain its name with a legend: the holy Queen Isabel is said to have given alms here to an old man, an "ancião". After 13 short kilometres from Alvaiázere, an afternoon is enough for the bridge, the pillory and the church. A pilgrim bed is only to be found north of the town.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteBalugães is the halfway point between Barcelos and Ponte de Lima: 15.3 kilometres are behind you, 17.7 still ahead. Just before the village you cross the old Ponte das Tábuas down to the Rio Neiva, then climb to the church of São Martinho, with its rest area and fountain. A break is enough, then it's on into the Lima valley.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteBarcelos is the town of the rooster that crowed for a pilgrim: over a fourteenth-century bridge you enter the old seat of the counts, where the stone cross of the legend stands in the palace ruins. Every Thursday since 1412 the market has filled the Campo da Feira. An afternoon is enough, because tomorrow brings 33 kilometres.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteCoimbra is the city of the pilgrim queen: in 1325 Isabel left a crown in Santiago and came back with a pilgrim staff that lay on her coffin in 1612. 246.6 kilometres out of Lisbon, a short stage brings you to a university city with a cathedral, royal tombs and a monastery the Mondego flooded. Worth a rest day.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteCondeixa-a-Nova is the town that Masséna set on fire in March 1811 as he retreated: church, town hall palace and houses burned, and only the palace where the marshal slept was left standing. Today a museum here tells the Roman story of the ruins next door. An afternoon is enough, then it is 15.5 kilometres to Coimbra.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteGrijó is the mother house: from this Augustinian monastery of 922 the monks set out in 1537 who founded the Serra do Pilar monastery above Porto. In the cloister lies a king's son who fell in 1245. The parish hostel has 14 beds, and it is only 15.3 km to Porto.
Camino Portugués CentralFátima: Caminho do NorteTop rated
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