Car Hire in Lisbon - Getting to Lisbon

Many airlines have scheduled international services to and from Lisbon airport, often as stopovers en-route to Asian or Middle Eastern destinations. It is also Portugal's main international gateway. There are also regular domestic connections to Faro, Oporto and other cities.

By car you need to pass through Spain, there are man border crossings, and the road network is good but Portugal has a woeful road safety record. Portugal is part of the schengen visa arrangement, so border crossings are a mere formality from Spain. The main border crossings include;

There are two main rail routes, one from Paris, via San Sebastien) and one from Madrid. No rail route connects the Algarve with southern Spain. The journey`s can be long and crowded in season, Portugal doesn`t have the high speed trains enjoyed elsewhere in Europe.

Buses are plentiful from almost any destination and cheap - although budget flights and rail passes are closing the gap. From the UK you also have the choice of a ferry to northern Spain, and then driving south. Lisbon's transport showpiece is the intermodal (bus, train, metro) Gare do Oriente hub, built for the World Expo in 1998. A gleaming, futuristic-looking structure, unfortunately it doesn't function quite as well as its striking architecture might suggest.