# Is Penha de França a Good Area to Stay in Lisbon? Map & Verdict

Verdict: Mixed. Fine for some travellers, wrong for others.

Interactive map: https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/penha-de-franca
Every Lisbon district: https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon.md

The hill behind Graça: 1930s apartment blocks, the best free viewpoints in Lisbon and a climb home that beats most people.

Facts: 25 min walk to the Baixa; 15 min to the airport; 45 min to the beach; price €€; best for budget, longer stays, sights; lines 12E, 28E.

Penha de França is the parish above and east of São Vicente, running up from the Alfama's back edge to the Alto da Eira. Most of it was built between the wars, and it is where a lot of the flats advertised as "Graça" actually are - the boundary runs between them and the difference is about eighty vertical metres.

What it gets you is price and view. The Miradouro da Senhora do Monte and the Graça terraces sit on this ridge, tram 28 runs along the western edge, and the Baixa is twenty-five minutes down. A flat here costs meaningfully less than the same flat in Alfama, and the streets are ordinary residential Lisbon rather than a queue.

The two problems are the hill and the isolation. There is no metro in the parish, the walk back from dinner is a genuine climb whichever way you take it, and past the ridge the district turns into 1970s social housing towers with nothing for a visitor. Book the western slope near Graça; anything advertised as Penha de França proper is further out and further up than the photographs suggest.

What works:
- Cheaper than Alfama and Graça for the same view and the same tram
- Senhora do Monte and the Graça miradouros are on this ridge
- Ordinary residential streets - shops and cafés at local prices
- About 25 minutes down into the Baixa, past the castle

What does not:
- A serious climb home, every time, in any direction
- No metro station in the parish; tram 28 and buses only
- The eastern half is 1970s tower blocks with nothing to walk to
- "Graça" in a listing often means here, several hundred metres higher

Hotels in Penha de França: https://www.stay22.com/allez/booking?aid=stayzones&link=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.booking.com%2Fsearchresults.html%3Fss%3DPenha%2520de%2520Fran%25C3%25A7a%252C%2520Lisbon%26latitude%3D38.72782430645162%26longitude%3D-9.126192138709676%26nflt%3Ddistance%253D1000%26group_adults%3D2%26no_rooms%3D1

## Other districts in Lisbon

- [Santa Maria Maior](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/santa-maria-maior): Recommended. The Baixa grid, lower Alfama and the castle hill in one freguesia. You will not buy a metro ticket for three days, and you will pay for the privilege.
- [Misericórdia](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/misericordia): Mixed. Chiado by day, Bairro Alto by night. They share a freguesia and about two hundred metres of hill, which is the entire problem with booking here.
- [Santo António](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/santo-antonio): Recommended. Avenida da Liberdade and the hotels along it. Flat, quiet after 23:00, and fifteen minutes downhill into the Baixa with the metro to bring you back up.
- [São Vicente](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/sao-vicente): Mixed. Graça and the top of Alfama. The best free views in Lisbon, and you earn every one of them again on the walk back from dinner.
- [Estrela](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/estrela): Mixed. Lapa's embassies, the Estrela garden and the Santos bars down by the river. Handsome, residential, and the nearest metro is in somebody else's district.
- [Avenidas Novas](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/avenidas-novas): Mixed. Saldanha, the Gulbenkian and the office blocks. Two metro lines, honest prices, and no reason at all to walk anywhere after dinner.
- [Arroios](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/arroios): Mixed. Anjos, Pena and Intendente, up Almirante Reis from Martim Moniz. The most-lived-in central parish in Lisbon, and the one the guides tell you to be careful in.
- [Campo de Ourique](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/campo-de-ourique): Recommended. A flat grid on the hill above Estrela, at the far end of tram 28. Lisbon's most liveable central parish, with the fewest visitors in it.
- [Areeiro](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/areeiro): Mixed. Big 1940s flats around Alameda and the Areeiro roundabout. Twelve minutes from the airport, two metro lines, and no reason to walk out of the door.
- [Alcântara](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/alcantara): Mixed. LX Factory, the docks under the bridge, and a great deal of traffic. The most photographed district in Lisbon and the one nobody thinks to sleep in.
- [Belém](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/belem): Avoid. Two UNESCO sites, the best custard tarts in Portugal, and seven kilometres between you and dinner. Come for a morning, sleep somewhere else.
- [Parque das Nações](https://stayzones.com/where-to-stay-in-lisbon/parque-das-nacoes): Avoid. A 1998 world's fair site with a shopping centre and an aquarium. Clean, modern, well connected, and not the city you bought the flight to see.