Mafra

I visited the palacio nacional de Mafra and its royal basilica and the adjacent park jardim do cerco on the 9th of oct.2024.

There are frequent buses between Lisboa's Campo Grande bus station and Mafra.

There are no toilets in the huge palace...there is a free one near the palace entrance.
The palace itself is large and tiring with its endless corridors and junk from bygone times...it felt like you were in a huge closet full of things that were simply put together in different rooms. Everything seemed disharmonious,...there was no consistent line...everything felt randomly arranged. Underwhelming world heritage site. The adjacent garden do Cerco with its aviaries was also relatively unimportant. The basilica is mildly interesting. I like palaces,but this one was surprisingly boring and underwhelming. 

Just one recomendation: try to visit the Queluz palace in Lisboa's outskirts........fantastic....one of the most beautiful ones I have seen in my life. Mafra cant hold a candle to Queluz IMO.

October 2020, the evening before our flight back to Germany we parked our camper beside this gigantic building. The last night and visit of the last Whs of this trip. We had dinner in a small restaurant opposite the Palace.
In the Morning we were the first and only tourists who aimed at visiting the palaces inside. It seems to be one of Europe’s biggest buildings with hundreds of rooms. One more pompous than the next one. You could wander between the floors, marvel at old paintings, furniture, the old library. No two rooms are the same and everyone has something to offer. 
Most stunning were the hunting trophies and a huge pool table. It is remarkable how wealthy Portugal must have been once that their royals could allow for such a megalomania. Too bad we did not get to see the Tapada! Next time.
A worthy finish of this trip through Portugal with 14 Whs and at least 10 more tentative Sites.

I visited this WHS in July 2020. It is actually made up of 4 components, the Tapada hunting grounds some 7km away from the Mafra Palace-Convent, the Cerco garden and the Basilica which are next to each other.

The Jardim do Cerco is a Baroque garden just next to Mafra Palace and is open everyday. There is an aviary containing a variety of birds, a fountain, a herb garden and a children’s playground but nothing really special or world heritage material. It is a pleasant garden to keep in mind just after visiting the Mafra Palace and going back to the paid parking area.

The Basilica and the Mafra Palace-Convent are open every day except Tuesdays. The basilica is free to visit while a visit inside the palace and convent will cost you 6 euros (with the possibility of paying 5 euros to only visit the courtyard terrace which really doesn't make any sense). Since I slept over in Mafra, I was the first and only visitor at 9am and had the enormous place to myself (apart from the huge amount of cleaners needed to keep this huge palace spotless).

After passing through the infirmary, the kitchens and the convent cells, I went through a never ending list of rooms. Unlike other palaces on the WH list such as Caserta or Versailles, this one is more like a less opulent huge mansion than a proper palace. The throne room or audience room is one of the most …

Mafra Palace, Convent and Royal Hunting Park became my first ‘new’ WHS post-Covid! I had planned to go and pick up the 2 recently inscribed Portuguese WHS in April already but had to cancel at the time. After things started opening up again within the EU, this trip quickly got back to the top of my list as Portugal was welcoming tourists with open arms. I wouldn’t normally visit Portugal in mid-summer (it was 36 degrees Celsius!), but the good feeling of being able to travel again overcame any disadvantages.

Mafra hasn’t received the best of reviews, “another run-of-the-mill Baroque palace/monastery” sums it up I guess. All previous reviewers ‘only’ visited the Palace, so I planned to focus on the Tapada: the hunting park. I just did a photo stop at the palace, which seems way too big for its surroundings. There’s a convenient large, free parking next to it and I also enjoyed a 1.60 EUR fish soup for lunch at a bakery in the street across.

The Mafra WHS comprises only 1 location (it’s a large area), but still, the entrance to the Tapada lies 7 km away from the Palace. I drove there in my rental car, via narrow and winding roads. It is signposted well, also with UNESCO signs. At the entrance, I found out that, as an anti-Covid measure, visits to the park have to be pre-booked via their website. Fortunately, I could do that via my phone and be able to secure …

Mafra Palace is pleasant enough, but like other visitors I wonder where is the OUV? Sure, it seems like most of us did not opt to visit Cerco Garden and the Hunting Park (Tapada). Perhaps these components are rewarding and differentiate the site from other royal palaces. Nevertheless, time is also somewhat important to me and it would have been hard to justify the extra time considering our already fairly busy drive to Coimbra.

The basilica was a highlight in part because of the atmosphere. I entered as it opened, no lights. The vast space was very dark, silent, and therefore a bit different than previous experiences in large religious buildings. 

The library is certainly impressive and we had a nice chat with some enthusiastic and well-versed employees about the collection. It is possible to reserve time in the library to do research, from our understanding this includes anyone. This might be worthwhile for anyone with linguistic skills. The collection houses books in Portuguese, Latin, Spanish, Arabic, and English to name just a few.

While roaming the vast halls, I kept thinking that a bike would have come in handy. Yes, completely ridiculous, but the hallways do seem to go on forever and most rooms are fairly bland. 

The Palacio Nacional de Mafra is nominated for inscription in 2019, reason enough to include Mafra in my itinerary for my Portugal Trip in May 2018. The palace is huge, the front is 220 meters long, it seems completely oversized for the small town. The Palace-Convent complex was built in the 18th century and was paid with the gold from the colony of Brazil. When visiting the palace, you have to walk through an endless number of rather uninteresting rooms, worth mentioning are only the hospital and the library (photo). The library is certainly impressive, but you can not properly visit, only the first meters are accessible.
The nomination also includes the Cerco Garden behind the palace, not outstanding, and the hunting grounds, the Tapada Nacional de Mafra. There are several marked trails and even guided tours that start from an information centre about 8 km northwest of the palace. However, I did not visit the Tapada, I thought I had enough hiking the days before at Sintra.
Mafra is certainly of national importance, it is considered the most important baroque building in Portugal, but not enough to justify a WHS in my opinion. What I will remember from Mafra is mainly the long indoor hike.

Mafra is a huge baroque palace complex North of Lisbon. When I arrived the sheer size of the site was impressive. Situated on a hill overlooking the coast, this is a clear statement of absolutism and the wealth generated in the Brazilian colony.

However, when you move in or around the palace it feels like being built for size and show, not quality. The backside of the palace is pretty mundane as is the attached park. And in the interior the hallways are vast, but there is an emptiness to it. Some of it may be due to the French invasion and the best art pieces being moved to Brazil. But the prime inhabitants, the Royals, also seem to have felt the same way as they didn't move in permanently either.

[Update July 2019] Another run of the mill Baroque palace/monastery, what more is there to say? I have seen plenty of these (and better ones at that). Compared to nearby Sintra it lacks the special Portuguese touch, Sintra's rich history, and Sintra's great park. Consequently, I don't feel this merited inscription.

Logistics

A bus runs more or less hourly from Lisbon to Mafra. Check the schedules.