Monserrate Palace and Park

Monserrate is the Sintra palace that people discover last and love most. It sits a few kilometres west of the town along the winding road past Quinta da Regaleira, in a valley that catches the Atlantic mists, and it has a long romantic pedigree. In the late eighteenth century the English writer William Beckford rented the estate and laid out the first garden; a few decades later Lord Byron visited and wrote about the ruined house in Childe Harold. The palace you see today was built in the mid-nineteenth century for Francis Cook, a wealthy English textile merchant who bought the property, was given the title Viscount of Monserrate by the Portuguese king, and turned it into a summer residence. His architect, James Knowles, produced an eclectic building that mixes Gothic, Moorish and Indian influences: a long, pale façade between domed towers, and inside, rooms of extraordinarily fine carved stucco and stone tracery, light-filled corridors and a domed music room with remarkable acoustics. The real star, though, is the park. Cook and his gardeners collected plants from every continent, and the estate climbs and dips through themed areas: a valley of towering tree ferns, a Mexican garden of agaves and palms, a Japanese garden, a rose garden, great lawns sloping down from the palace, waterfalls, lakes and a mock ruined chapel draped in roots. Parques de Sintra has restored both palace and garden over recent years, and the result is one of the most beautiful historic gardens in Europe, with far fewer crowds than the hilltop monuments.

Why choose it: if Pena is Sintra's showpiece, Monserrate is its connoisseur's choice. It is quieter, greener and more relaxed; you can sit on the lawn in front of the palace with almost nobody around, which is unthinkable at Pena in summer. The palace interior is a lesson in Victorian exoticism, a reminder of how the British imagined the East, and its carved arches and domes photograph beautifully in morning light. For garden lovers it is essential: the collection includes giant trees and rare species planted in the nineteenth century, and the microclimate of the Sintra hills, mild and damp, lets subtropical plants thrive beside northern European ones.

Working the visit: give it more time than you think. The palace takes about forty-five minutes; the park deserves at least another hour and a half, longer if you follow the paths down to the lakes and the ferns. Paths are mostly gentle compared with the Moorish Castle, though there are slopes and steps. The Tiqets venue page lists an entry ticket and a skip-the-line guided tour, which is a good option if you want the story of the Cook family and the garden explained. There is a café on site, but bring water on warm days.

Getting there and planning: Monserrate is too far from the town centre for most people to walk comfortably, so take the circular tourist bus that serves the Sintra monuments, a taxi or a tuk-tuk; the walk is pleasant but long and partly along a narrow road. A good Sintra day puts Pena and the Moorish Castle in the morning, when the hills are clearest, and Regaleira and Monserrate in the afternoon, or devotes a second, slower day to Monserrate alone. It is especially lovely in spring and autumn. Like the other Sintra hill sites, it can close for safety during severe storms or extreme fire risk.