Portuguese culture, traditions, events, food, and lifestyle stories.
Espinho's animation festival opens its 50th edition on 6 November and runs to 22 November: 167 competition films from about 2,400 entries, a poster exhibition, family sessions and an 8 euro orchestra concert. Here are the key dates, the 60 euro pass and how to get there.
Archaeologists at the Côa Valley's Penascosa site found hundreds of ochre and other pigment fragments in a layer over 27,000 years old, suggesting the Palaeolithic engravers may also have painted. Penascosa is open for guided visits from 18 euros.
From 30 October to 22 November, the Aldeias de Montanha villages of the Serra da Estrela and Gardunha hold chestnut festivals and magustos, a medronho fair, the Míscaros mushroom festival and beech forest walks in Manteigas. Here are the dates, the bookings and how to get there.
The 2026 budget added bookshops, theatre, music, dance, venues, libraries, museums and monuments to the IRS invoice deduction. It is worth 15 percent of the VAT, within a 250 euro household cap, and only if the invoice carries your NIF.
A Council of Ministers resolution pushes spending on the future headquarters of Museus e Monumentos de Portugal to 2030, citing a building in worse shape than first diagnosed. The design competition for the main works only got under way this year.
The last neighbourhood cinema on the Cascais line shut in May 2024. The council signed the deed on 23 September, but how the space will run, and when it reopens, are still to be decided.
Património Cultural has inscribed the Feira da Golegã in Portugal's National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage, published in the Diário da República on 12 October. The council now wants a UNESCO bid; this year's fair runs from 6 to 15 November.
