Sintra's palaces charge €15 and up, but the UNESCO landscape around them is free. Public trails climb to the castle walls, the town's art museum costs nothing, and a €3 heritage tram reaches the Atlantic — three days for less than one palace ticket.
A free cobbled zigzag path from Rua Dr. Alfredo Costa climbs past the 1890s Vila Sassetti villa to the Moorish Castle gate, open daily 09:30–18:00. Ferns, granite boulders and terrace viewpoints replace the €7.60 tourist bus 434.
The 1922 neo-Moorish drinking fountain by Norte Júnior sits on the shaded Volta do Duche walkway linking the station to the old town. Free potable spring water — fill bottles here instead of paying €1.50 a litre in the village shops.
Housed in the 1920s Casino Sintrense on Avenida Heliodoro Salgado, MU.SA shows contemporary Portuguese painting and urban-art collections across three floors. Admission is free, Tuesday to Sunday 10:00–18:00, with free wifi and toilets.
A municipal park below the town hall with shaded picnic tables, a stream, a bandstand and steep wooded paths, free and open until 20:00 in summer. Locals bring bread and cheese here rather than pay village terrace prices.
Sintra's open-air fair fills Largo Adelino Costa in São Pedro on the 2nd and 4th Sunday of each month, 08:00–17:00. Entry is free; stalls sell chouriço, farm cheese, olives and second-hand goods at a third of village prices.
A petiscos tasca on the Escadinhas da Fonte da Pipa steps serving small plates — alheira croquettes, octopus salad, pica-pau — for €4–8, with house wine at about €2 a glass. Two people eat well for under €20 on the terrace.
The narrow lane behind the National Palace holds Casa Piriquita (travesseiros about €1.50) and Piriquita Dois, while Fábrica das Verdadeiras Queijadas da Sapa on Volta do Duche sells six queijadas for roughly €4.50.
A canteen-style dining room on Travessa do Município where the daily menu — soup, main, bread and drink — runs about €10–12. Grilled sardines, bacalhau à Brás and feijoada rotate, in Portuguese full portions that split easily.
Continental Europe's westernmost point: a 140 m cliff with a 1772 lighthouse and the Camões stone marker. Entry and parking are free, and Carris Metropolitana bus 1624 from Sintra station costs about €4.40 each way.
A cove beach below sandstone cliffs and sea arches, reached by a single road down from Almoçageme. No entrance fee, free clifftop parking and a summer lifeguard; the rock pools at the northern end fill at low tide.
The 1904 wooden tram runs 13 km from Ribeira de Sintra through the Colares pine woods to Praia das Maçãs for €3 one way, Thursday to Sunday between April and October. It is the cheapest scenic transport in the Serra.
White houses stacked on a cliff above a seawater tidal pool, 2 km along the coast from Praia das Maçãs. The clifftop viewpoint is free and faces due west, and the pool costs nothing to swim in when the Atlantic is calm.