Plan your beach day in Porto Covo
Tell us when you want to leave and this works out where to go: the tide and the wind at the hour you would actually arrive, which beaches those rule out, and, for the one cove that cuts off at high water, the time to be walking back.
The planner
What time do you want to leave?
Porto Covo has thirteen beaches within half an hour on foot, and on any given afternoon they are not equally good. One cove is reached along the sand and closes at high water. Several sit behind cliffs that block the summer north-westerly, while the main beach takes it full on. Pick your departure time and this works out the rest.
A mixed afternoon
Overcast, 25°
Go to
Praia dos Pescadores
4 min from the door · there by 14:47
Sheltered from the NW wind blowing then.
- Feels like
- 25°
- Water
- 18°Atlantic cold
- Wind
- 16 km/hnortada
- UV
- 7high
Sun
UV 7, high. Be under something between 14:00 and 16:00. 3 hours here is roughly 6 times the dose that reddens pale skin, uncovered.
With children
Keep them out of direct sun between 11:00 and 18:00. Shade, a hat and a rash vest do more than cream does. A child burns before an adult does, and will not tell you.
Babies under six months should not be in direct sun at all, at any hour.
Tide · 14:47-17:47
-0.1 mrising
High water 17:21+0.8mLow water 11:07-1.7m
Also good
- Praia das Gaivotas7 min
Sheltered from the NW wind blowing then.
Be walking back by 15:51
- Praia do Banho10 min
Sheltered from the NW wind blowing then.
- Praia da Cerca Nova18 min
Sheltered from the NW wind blowing then.
Not at that hour
- Praia Grande6 min
16 km/h from the NW, the nortada, and this beach is open to it.
- Praia da Vieirinha15 min
16 km/h from the NW, the nortada, and this beach is open to it.
- Praia do Espingardeiro12 min
The sand goes near high water at 17:21, and the way back narrows. Fine if you are sure-footed; think twice with a pushchair, small children or anyone unsteady on wet rock.
- Praia Pequena4 min
The sand goes near high water at 17:21, and the way back narrows. Fine if you are sure-footed; think twice with a pushchair, small children or anyone unsteady on wet rock.
- Praia do Pessegueiro15 min
The sand goes near high water at 17:21, and the way back narrows. Fine if you are sure-footed; think twice with a pushchair, small children or anyone unsteady on wet rock.
- Praia do Salto22 min
The sand goes near high water at 17:21, and the way back narrows. Fine if you are sure-footed; think twice with a pushchair, small children or anyone unsteady on wet rock.
- Praia do Cerro da Águia25 min
The sand goes near high water at 17:21, and the way back narrows. Fine if you are sure-footed; think twice with a pushchair, small children or anyone unsteady on wet rock.
- Praia de Porto Covinho28 min
The sand goes near high water at 17:21, and the way back narrows. Fine if you are sure-footed; think twice with a pushchair, small children or anyone unsteady on wet rock.
Nothing against these either
Praia dos Buizinhos (13 min) · Praia da Samoqueira (30 min)
Model forecast for the water off Porto Covo, not a port tide table. Fine for planning an afternoon; check an official table if a cut-off cove is the plan.
How it decides
What is behind the answer
Two things drive it. The tide, taken at the hour you would actually arrive rather than the hour you set off, because a fifteen-minute walk matters when the water is moving. The wind, from the same hour, matched against which beaches are sheltered and which are open.
Where a beach is not recommended, it is because something rules it out, not because it scored poorly. And where we have not checked a beach on the ground, it says so and stays out of the ranking. That gap is deliberate: guessing which cove cuts off is the one mistake here that could strand somebody, so an honest blank beats a confident invention.
Questions
Tides and wind in Porto Covo
Which Porto Covo beaches are cut off at high tide?
Which beaches are sheltered from the wind?
What is the nortada?
How accurate is the tide shown here?
What we have learned here
Things worth passing on
Read them allWe live with this village for part of every year, and some of what that teaches you is not written down anywhere. This is the useful half.
Eating cheaply in Porto Covo
Two places, one number that matters, and a Sunday problem. What the price symbols on a listing site will not tell you.
The day to avoid eating out in Porto Covo
Five places shut on a Tuesday, including two of the best-known tables. Both of the cheap options shut on a Sunday. And for nine of them nobody publishes a closing day at all.
Why we built Blue Cove in Porto Covo
A Portuguese family, a long time away, and a village that keeps pulling us home. What we tried to fix, and the one thing we will not take credit for.
Your base in Porto Covo
Stay at Blue Cove
A 3-bedroom apartment with 3 bathrooms and a private heated pool, sleeping 6, 500 m from Praia Grande and 15 minutes from the Rota Vicentina trailhead. Booked directly with Ivy, who confirms every reservation herself.
Keep exploring
More Porto Covo guides
Beaches
All thirteen beaches sorted by swimming, surf, sunset and seclusion.
Tides today
High and low water today, and which beaches that rules out.
With kids
Calm beaches, rock pools, lifeguards and the family day trips.
Surf
The breaks, the seasons, the wetsuit you need and where to learn.
Checked
Eat and buy
Going further
All of it