Located approximately 28 kilometers or 17 miles northwest of the Portuguese capital of Lisbon, the historic coastal town of Sintra is a popular day trip destination both for the Portuguese and visitors to the country for the picturesque views of bright Romantic palaces peeking out from the lush forest of Sintra-Cascais Natural Park.
While the municipality of Sintra has a permanent resident population of just under 400,000 people, local authorities recorded 3.1 million visitors to the city in 2025. As part of new measures to combat overtourism and congestion for the summer season, the local council tightened existing restrictions on private cars and tour buses driving up to mountain monuments like Pena Palace and Moorish Castle.
With the new laws passed at the last minute given rising traffic during the peak summer travel period, Royal Caribbean has had to issue new guidance for tourists who booked a day excursion to Sintra on the Liberty of the Seas port stop on July 27 as well as future stops in September.
Royal Caribbean tells guests who booked Sintra port stop excursion to take a bus
The email sent to guests who booked the Sintra tour said that they would not be able to start the excursion by tour bus as initially planned and instead would need to take a local bus to the city’s historic center where they will be met by their guide and then taken along the Sintra coast.
Royal Caribbean is covering the cost of the bus ride as part of the excursion while, due to the longer time it will take to reach the palace with multiple stops along the public bus route, the tour length was raised from four to five hours.
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“Due to new regulations not allowing commercial buses into the center of Sintra, guests will now need to take a public bus between the parking lot and the city center,” the email sent to passengers aboard Liberty of the Seas read. “A guide will pay for the bus directly and this extra fee is included in the rate of the tour.”
The current Liberty of the Seas itinerary is set to make port stops in Spain’s La Coruña and Bilbao before returning back to Southampton on Aug. 2. The next port stop in Lisbon on the 4,960-passenger cruise ship is scheduled for Sept. 12 on the nine-day sailing through Spain and Portugal.
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Norwegian, other cruise lines also affected by the Sintra car ban in 2026
Norwegian, Celebrity and MSC are some of the other cruise line that will be making port stops in Lisbon as part of their sailing itinerary this summer.
Sintra is a popular excursion option offered by almost every cruise line to guests looking to book ground activities.
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The next major cruise ship scheduled to make a port stop in Lisbon is, meanwhile, the 2,900-passenger Celebrity Apex on Aug. 4.
“You’ll travel to Sintra, the favorite summer residence of the kings of Portugal,” Celebrity writes in marketing the five-hour Sintra tour to cruisers on ships making Lisbon stops. “Lord Byron and Hans Christian Andersen also immortalized Sintra’s stunning beauty.”
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