When the Knights Templar were suppressed across Europe in 1312, their members arrested and in France burned, the Portuguese king did something different. He petitioned the Pope, and the order was dissolved and immediately reconstituted in Portugal as the Order of Christ, keeping its property and much of its membership. Its headquarters was Tomar, and the Order of Christ went on to fund the voyages of discovery. Vasco da Gama's sails carried its cross.
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What survives is the Convento de Cristo, a UNESCO site on a hill above the town, and it is genuinely extraordinary: a twelfth century round church, the charola, modelled on the Holy Sepulchre, where knights are said to have heard mass on horseback, with four centuries of building wrapped around it in every style Portugal passed through. Attached to it is the Manueline window of the chapter house, the most photographed carved window in the country, a riot of ropes, coral, seaweed and cork floats celebrating the sea.
What Makes Tomar Different to Pack For
The convent is cold and enormous
Eight cloisters, dormitories, kitchens and a church, all in stone, unheated, sitting at around 13°C to 16°C inside even in a 35°C August. You will be there two to three hours and you will get cold.
Carry a layer, every visit. A merino wool base layer for women is the right one, and it covers the cool evenings inland too.
Inland central Portugal gets hot
With no coast to moderate it, Tomar runs 30°C to 36°C in July and August and can exceed 38°C, while winters are 10°C to 14°C, damp and grey. Spring and autumn are much the better seasons.
It is uphill to everything worth seeing
The convent sits on a hill above the town, reached by a steep road or a footpath through the Sete Montes park, and inside it you climb between levels and cloisters constantly.
The festival that only happens every four years
The Festa dos Tabuleiros, in which women carry towering headdresses of bread and flowers as tall as they are through the streets, is held roughly every four years. If your visit coincides, book everything far ahead. If it does not, the town is quiet.
Recommended Tours and Experiences
The Tomar Packing List
Footwear
Flat shoes with grip. The convent floors are worn stone, often uneven and sometimes wet, the spiral stairs between cloisters are tight, and the climb up from the town is steep.
For the walk up through the Mata dos Sete Montes, along the aqueduct, or out to the Almourol castle and the Nabao valley, waterproof hiking shoes are the right tool.
Clothing
Light summer clothing with a warm layer carried every day for the convent, plus covered shoulders and knees, which the convent and the churches expect and which also solves the sun.
A packable rain jacket for October through March. Tomar is a small inland Portuguese town and dresses plainly; nothing here is formal.
For sun
A wide brim sun hat, high factor sunscreen and sunglasses. The convent's outer terraces and the aqueduct walk have no shade at all, and inland central Portugal in August is punishing.
Practical
Cash for the smaller places and the market. A refillable bottle. The train from Lisbon takes about two hours and the station is a short walk from the centre, which makes Tomar one of the easier inland towns to reach without a car. Check convent opening hours, which change seasonally and close for lunch in some months.
What to Wear at Key Sites
The Convento de Cristo
The charola, the sixteen sided round church at the heart of it, painted and gilded, where the altar sits in the middle. Around it, the Manueline nave, eight cloisters including the two storey Joao III cloister, the dormitory corridor, the kitchens and the chapter house window.
Practically: allow three hours and take a layer, because the stone holds cold in a way that is hard to believe in summer. The famous window is best seen from the small terrace below and to the side, which many visitors walk past without finding. Floors are uneven, some stairs are tight spirals, and the site is large enough that you should eat before you go up.
The aqueduct
The Aqueduto dos Pegoes, built around 1600 to supply the convent, runs six kilometres with 180 arches and a double tier across a valley, and you can walk along the top of it.
Practically: the channel along the top is narrow with no railing and a substantial drop on both sides. It is not fenced off and people do walk it. It is genuinely exposed and not for anyone uneasy with heights. Viewing it from below is free and safe.
The old town and the synagogue
A grid below the hill with the Praca da Republica, the church of Sao Joao Baptista, and on Rua Doutor Joaquim Jacinto one of the oldest surviving synagogue buildings in Portugal, from the fifteenth century, now a small museum.
Practically: the synagogue is free, tiny and quietly moving; it survived because it was used as a prison, a chapel and a warehouse after the expulsion. Covered shoulders for the churches.
The Mata dos Sete Montes
A walled wood of thirty nine hectares between the town and the convent, planted by the Order, with paths, a lake and a small Renaissance pavilion.
Practically: the pleasant way up to the convent on foot, shaded, and about twenty five minutes uphill. Free.
Almourol
A Templar castle on an island in the middle of the Tagus, eighteen kilometres southwest, reached by a small boat.
Practically: the boat runs seasonally and depends on the river level. The castle is small and the setting is the point. Take a hat; there is no shade on the island.
The Nabao and the town wheel
The river runs through the town with a park on the island in the middle of it, and a restored water wheel and mills along the bank.
Practically: the island park is the local evening spot and has swimming in the river in summer, which is supervised at times and not at others. The water is cold and the current is real where the channels narrow.
What Not to Bring
Leave the assumption that a stone convent in August is warm. Leave heels for worn stone and spiral stairs.
Leave a plan to rush the convent in an hour. Leave any intention of walking the top of the aqueduct if heights bother you, because there is nothing to stop you and nothing to hold. And leave a summer afternoon for the indoors, because the walk up the hill at three o'clock in August is genuinely unpleasant.
Essential Resources for Women in Tomar
Emergency numbers in Portugal: 112 is the national emergency number for police, ambulance and fire, with English speaking operators. The GNR polices the town and the surrounding district.
Tourist support: there is no tourist police unit in Tomar. The GNR station takes reports and the municipal tourist office on the Praca da Republica is helpful. A theft needs a police report before an insurance claim or a replacement passport.
US Embassy: the embassy is in Lisbon at Avenida das Forcas Armadas, telephone +351 21 727 3300, at pt.usembassy.gov, about two hours away by road or train. Enrol in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program at step.state.gov before you travel.
Main hospital or clinic: the Hospital de Nossa Senhora da Graca in Tomar handles urgent care, with the Centro Hospitalar de Leiria and Coimbra's university hospital as the larger referral centres about an hour and ninety minutes away respectively. EU and UK visitors should carry the European Health Insurance Card or the UK Global Health Insurance Card; everyone else needs travel insurance.
Official health authority: the Portuguese Directorate General of Health at dgs.pt, which issues the summer heat warnings that apply to inland central Portugal.
US State Department travel advisory for Portugal: current advisory level and detail. Read it directly rather than relying on this page.
UK FCDO travel advice for Portugal: entry requirements, safety and health guidance, including the wildfire advice, which matters a great deal in central Portugal in summer and has closed roads in this district.
Official tourism authority: Visit Portugal at visitportugal.com, with the Tomar municipal tourist office for convent opening hours and the Almourol boat, and the Direcao Geral do Patrimonio Cultural for the Convento de Cristo itself.
Solo women safety assessment: Tomar is an exceptionally safe and easy town for a woman travelling alone. It is a small inland Portuguese town of about twenty thousand people with a modest number of visitors, almost no crime against travellers, no street harassment to speak of, and a riverside park where the whole town walks in the evening. Portugal ranks among the safest countries in the world and this is one of its quieter corners. Eating alone anywhere is completely unremarkable, and the town is small enough to cross on foot at any hour. English is less widely spoken than on the coast, so a translation app helps, and the tourist office is genuinely useful. Petty theft is minimal and mostly limited to the convent car park and the market crowd. The realistic risks here are physical. The aqueduct is the one that deserves a clear warning: the walkway along the top is narrow, unrailed, has a long drop on both sides, and is not closed off, and walking it is a real fall risk rather than a scenic option. Inside the convent, the stone floors are uneven and worn smooth, the spiral stairs are tight and dim, and the site is large enough that people tire and then trip. The climb from the town in summer heat causes more problems than anything else; go early, carry water and use the shaded park path. The Nabao looks placid and has currents where the channels narrow, and river swimming is supervised only at certain times. Finally, central Portugal burns in dry summers, so check for wildfire warnings before walking in the hills or driving out to Almourol in July and August.
Reading On
Tomar is two hours from Lisbon by train and holds one of the great buildings of Europe with a fraction of the crowd it would draw anywhere else. The Portugal travel guide for women is the parent for the country and the Portugal packing list for women covers a multi region trip. South, the Lisbon travel guide for women covers the capital, with the Sintra packing list for women and the Cascais packing list for women beside it and the Obidos packing list for women and Nazare packing list for women on the coast west. North, the Coimbra packing list for women is the nearest city of size and the Serra da Estrela packing list for women covers the mountains beyond it, with the Porto travel guide for women further on. The travel packing guide for women is the parent for all destinations. For why a thin wool layer is the right thing to carry into a 14°C cloister on a 36°C day, the best merino wool base layers for women explains the fibre, and the Roman Trail collection is where the tops themselves live.
If the outer journey is calling you, the inner one usually is too. Explore SoulMap at romantrail.com/blogs/soulmap.
