Portugal self drive holiday, Porto to Lisbon

Planet

This itinerary focuses on exploring the highlights of mainland Portugal by foot, local transport and rental car. Wherever possible, we use hand-picked eco-friendly accommodation that have their own environmentally-friendly policies and encourage their guests to behave in an environmentally-friendly manner to limit energy usage.

Visiting local places we encourage our travellers to report anything which doesn’t seem right during their trip so that we can act upon it.
Before departing on this trip, our customers will always receive an informative document called 'Be a responsible traveller', which provides useful advice on how they are able to travel in an environmentally-friendly way such as using reusable water bottles and limiting the amount of energy that they use.

We are very passionate about recycling, beginning in our Brighton office where we use a local company to ensure we all know where our waste is going, we encourage a no wastage policy, by asking staff to take leftover food home. We also have a largely ‘paperless’ office, refraining from publishing brochures and other marketing collateral, and instead of producing electronic documentation to ensure we use as little paper as possible.

People

Throughout this itinerary, we have arranged lots of excursions that are all run by local guides. During our stay in Lisbon, we organise a walking tour with a local guide, who takes you to the hidden gems of the city and local eateries. Not only does this benefit the local community, it is also carbon neutral, so helps to preserve it as well. If you need a local guide for any other part of your trip, we are happy to source those for you and explore like a local, benefiting the community.

Wherever possible, we work with independently owned accommodation so that more of our travellers’ money stays in the local communities they are visiting. In Sintra, we have hand selected locally-run bed and breakfasts that are situated in some of the quieter villages outside of town. These places see fewer tourists than elsewhere in the country and they directly benefit from the income supplied when you stay here.

In our documentation that we send out prior to their departure, we inform all of our travellers on the appropriate customs and etiquette when travelling in Portugal.