Figueira da Foz

The resort city at the mouth of the Mondego, with its great seafront and beaches.

Figueira da Foz opens to the Atlantic at the mouth of the Mondego, where the river meets the ocean in a wide bay of sand. A resort city since the nineteenth century, it has one of the longest seafronts of Portugal, with the beach of Claridade at its heart, the pine hills of the Serra da Boa Viagem behind, and the river, the salt pans and the rice fields of the Mondego all around.

The city

Figueira grew with the river trade and the fishing, and became a fashionable bathing resort in the age of the railways, when families came for the season to the seafront of Claridade. Today the city keeps the wide avenues and the architecture of that time, between the beach, the casino and the estuary — a place of holidays that is also a working city of the river and the sea.

What to see

The seafront and the beach of Claridade, at the mouth of the Mondego.
The Serra da Boa Viagem and its viewpoints over the coast.
The river, the salt pans and the marshlands of the Mondego.
The historic architecture of the seafront and the city centre.

Visiting

Figueira da Foz is reached by road and train, around forty minutes from Coimbra. The ocean beach is supervised in the bathing season and demands care outside it, with strong currents by the river mouth; the programmes of the city and the conditions of the beaches follow the official information of the municipality.