Travel companions, welcome to the Venice of Portugal, welcome to Aveiro!!

Aveiro is chosen by many as a visit from Porto as it is only about 76 kilometers away. We stayed in the city, one night is a good idea to enjoy this quiet and charming atmosphere.

Although if you only have time to visit during the day, the compactness of the place will allow you to enjoy it as well.

University city and fishing district, we will begin to discover what we have to see there. As always, at the end we will leave you with practical information such as accommodation, dinners and ways to get there.

Costa Nova

We will start with a place that appears a lot in photos, and that you have surely already seen, the houses with colored stripes. Costa Nova

10 kilometers from the center of Aveiro we find this summer resort, beaches and houses with colorful stripes will make this visit very picturesque.

How to get from Aveiro to Costa Nova?We went by car but you can take the bus, which leaves from the centre and in a few minutes you will be in Costa Nova. Another option is to take an Uber since as we said it is relatively close.

With a privileged location between the Ria de Aveiro and the Atlantic Ocean, these striped houses make many of us come closer to photograph them and enjoy their charm.

These houses began as warehouses for fishermen’s items and were painted with red stripes. Over the years they fell into disuse but were converted into summer houses, keeping the stripes now in various colours and unwittingly becoming the symbol of Costa Nova.

You can take a free tour of its streets here.

Salt flats of Aveiro

And now we return to Aveiro to stroll through its streets and canals. Before that, we will visit the Aveiro salt flats. The artisanal harvesting of this very good quality sea salt is one of the economic drivers of the area and a different landscape that we may not be so used to seeing.

Although activity has somewhat decreased in recent years and only a few salt ponds remain, a walk through the area can be interesting.

And returning now to the center of Aveiro we walk through its streets and canals.

Walk in Moliceiro

The tour I recommend the most is the Moliceiro. These colourful boats, very similar to gondolas, sail through the city’s canals, formerly transporting molico, a seaweed fertilizer, and today serving as tourist boats.

The walk as I told you is very worthwhile, the duration is about 45 minutes.

Book the Moliceiro Tour of Aveiro

It is guided in several languages, we had a magnificent guide, who with the typical warmth of the Portuguese made this tour a tour to learn, marvel at the images and laugh a lot since it was done in a very pleasant way.

BUGA (bicycles free to use in Aveiro)

They say that Aveiro can be explored in three ways, on foot, by boat or… by bicycle.

The next recommendation is to explore the centre of Aveiro by bike for free. By simply showing identification and completing a simple form, you will get a free bike for two hours. This will be the perfect time for a ride through the historic centre.

You will see the name Buga (free bicycles in Aveiro), they have about 300 bicycles to borrow, they are very central, close to the canals. They have acquired new bicycles and these are now paid for, you can reserve them in the app, but they keep these for free.

What else to see in Aveiro?

Surrounding the canals we will find the Forum Shopping Center, from where you can get some beautiful panoramic views.

The bridge of Friendship, with the colored ribbons that give it that photogenic appearance.

The Cathedral of Aveiro, the Museum of Aveiro, the Republic Square, the Art Nuveau Museum, the Manuel Firmino Market, are other places to visit.

As I always tell you in this type of picturesque cities, you will have several things noted but walking and discovering is always the best plan.

Discovering Art Nuveau facades during the tour will increase the charm of the route, as Aveiro is distinguished as the museum city of modernism in Portugal.

Trying the Ovos Moles is another of the things to do in Aveiro, this typical sweet of the city cannot be missed on this tour. Of which there is a sculpture on the bank of the canal.

Beira Mar

A walk through Beira Mar, the historic center of the city, a fishermen’s quarter, will make you magically immerse yourself in buildings and colors.

A free tour of the city can also be an option, they have one during the day and one in the afternoon.

As I was saying, without being the first two visits, everything else is very close to each other, so it is done in not so much time.

How to get to Aveiro from Porto

As we said, the visit can be done for the day from Porto, you can go by train from Sao Bento station and in one hour you will be at your destination. The trains leave every half hour, anyway I leave you the website so you can check the schedules and prices.

They can also make the journey by Flixbus and generally at a very good price.

If you don’t want to go on your own, you have excursions from Porto.

Book a day trip to Aveiro from Porto

In our case we booked a car for the whole tour of Portugal.

Find a car in Portugal at a good price

Lodging

Our chosen hotel was the Hotel do Mercado, a simple hotel but with a very good location. The price of the double room with breakfast in October was 80 euros per night.

The car can be parked on the street in front or in the parking lot of the Market, the cost of it was 5 euros full day.

Map of Aveiro

NOTE: The information in this article is based on our own experience, being totally objective. This article contains affiliate links

La entrada Aveiro, the Portuguese Venice se publicó primero en Europa acompañada.