Moorish Castle

What the castle is

The Moorish Castle, Castelo dos Mouros in Portuguese, is a line of granite walls along the ridge above Sintra, built in the 10th century when this coast was part of Muslim Iberia. There was never much of a castle in the sense of a building. It was a fortified lookout, a ring of walls around a hilltop that watched the sea and the road to Lisbon, and that is still what it is. You come for the walls, the two towers, and the view.

The view is the reason. From the Royal Tower you see the town straight below and the Atlantic to the west. To the south is the whole plain towards Lisbon, and on the next peak east sits Pena Palace, looking exactly like the postcard. On a clear day I’d put the ramparts above the terraces of Pena, and the ticket is €12 to Pena’s €20.

A short history

The walls went up under Moorish rule in the 900s, as one of a chain of hilltop posts guarding the approaches to Lisbon. Afonso Henriques, Portugal’s first king, took Sintra in 1147, the same year he took Lisbon. The castle passed to a Christian garrison, which built the small church of São Pedro de Canaferrim just inside the outer wall. By the 1500s it had no military use and was left to the weather; the 1755 earthquake brought down what was still standing.

What you walk on today is largely the work of Ferdinand II, the same king who built Pena. In the 1840s he bought the ruin, rebuilt the walls and battlements in the Romantic taste of the time, and planted the trees. The whole hill became a garden with a fortress in it. Excavations since 2009 have uncovered the Islamic village inside the walls, the silos where its grain was stored, and a medieval Christian cemetery beside the church. The finds are marked along the path.

The wall walk towards the Royal Tower in May, when the broom is out. Photo: Wikimedia Commons, CC.

The walls and the towers

The circuit runs about 450 metres of rampart with a parapet walk on top, five towers spaced along it, and a considerable number of steps. I do it clockwise from the entrance. The path climbs through the Islamic settlement and past the cistern, a vaulted Moorish water tank you can walk into, then up onto the wall itself. The Royal Tower at the far end is the high point and the place everyone stops. The second tower, the keep, is on the opposite side and usually has nobody on it, which is where I take people for the photograph of Pena.

The steps are uneven, the parapet is low in places, and there is no shade on the wall. Wear shoes you can climb in and carry water, because the café is down at the entrance rather than anywhere on the ramparts. The Door of Betrayal is a small arched gate on the north side. The story goes that the castle was betrayed to the Christians through it. I can’t vouch for the story, but it’s a good spot to get out of the wind for a minute.

Tickets

Prices updated Aug 29, 2026?

Buy online at the Parques de Sintra ticket office or at the gate; unlike Pena there are no timed slots and the castle rarely sells out. The ticket office at the gate closes from 12:00 to 13:00, but the ticket machine next to it works through lunch. If you’re doing Pena the same day, the combined ticket for both saves a few euros and one queue.

Opening hours

Hours checked Aug 29, 2026?

The castle closes in strong wind, and this is not a formality: the official notices page lists closures on Dec 16, 2025 and on Jan 23 and 24, 2026. On a day with a gale forecast, check the notices before you take the bus up, and have Regaleira in reserve.

How to get there

Private cars are not allowed up to the castle, so it’s the bus or your feet.

Bus 434. The Scotturb loop from Sintra station stops at the castle gate before it goes on to Pena. Count about 15 minutes from the station. The 24 hour pass for lines 434 and 435 costs €13.50.

The Santa Maria trail. A marked path from the Parques de Sintra information point in São Pedro de Sintra: 1,770 metres and about an hour uphill through the forest, past the ruined church of Santa Maria. It’s steep and shaded. On a weekend morning I find it faster than the bus queue.

From Pena. The castle gate is 10 minutes downhill from the Pena entrance on the same road, which is why most people do the two together.

When to go

Go up early or late. The wall walk is best before 11:00, when the first tour buses arrive at the gate. It is good again after 16:00, when the light comes in from the sea and the view towards Lisbon sharpens. Midday in summer is hot, exposed and crowded on the narrow parapet.

Fog is the other variable. The castle sits in cloud on many mornings when the town is sunny, and inside the cloud you see nothing but wet granite. If the hill is grey when you arrive at the station, do Regaleira first and come up after lunch, when the nevoeiro usually lifts.