Stansted to Porto Flight Time, and the 00:50 Problem
2h 25m flight, a 09:10 departure and 7.5 hours in Porto for £101.75. Lovely day, but you land back at 00:50.
The Stansted to Porto flight time is about 2h 25m, and on paper that makes it one of the better long-ish day trips going, 7.5 hours in the city for £101.75 all in. Then you look at the time you get home, which is 00:50, and the whole thing becomes a different question.
How the day actually runs
You leave Stansted at 09:10, which is civilised by day-trip standards, no 04:30 alarm. You land at 11:35, lose 20 minutes to immigration and half an hour getting in from OPO, and you're standing in Porto at 12:25 with the afternoon in front of you.
Then it unwinds slowly. You leave the city at 19:55, the flight doesn't go until 22:25, and you touch down at Stansted at ten to one in the morning. If you're driving home from there you want to think about that properly rather than find out at midnight.
What the late start buys you
More than you'd think. Daylight on 7 Dec runs 9.3 hours, sunrise 07:47 and sunset 17:06, so a 12:25 arrival still leaves you nearly five hours of light, and Porto in the low winter sun off the Douro is as good as that city gets. You get the Ribeira, the azulejos at Sao Bento, a walk over the bridge to the cellars, and you're eating dinner before you leave rather than a sandwich at a gate.
Compare that with Berlin out of the same airport, where you're up at five, you get 6.1 hours and you pay £147.60. Porto is the better day by a distance, it just finishes in the small hours.
The cheapest dates
November fares out of Stansted are all over the place on this route. Thu 19 Nov is the one at £78.00, then Mon 30 Nov at £92.00 and Mon 23 Nov at £106.00. Thu 12 and Mon 16 Nov are both £123.00, so the spread between the best and the worst date is about £45 for exactly the same flight.
Fares checked 8 Nov. The £101.75 whole-day figure is for Mon 7 Dec, flights plus what you'll spend once you're there.
So should you do it?
Do it if you can sleep in the next morning, or if you're on a day off rather than squeezing it round work. Don't do it if you've got to be anywhere before nine the following day, because you'll be in bed at two and you'll hate the whole idea of day trips by Tuesday lunchtime. It's a good day with a bad ending, and knowing that in advance is most of the trick.
We've written up Porto in November as a day trip from London in more detail if you want the stops, and the live prices sit on the Stansted day trips board.
Day trips in this article
The cheapest day trips of the week, by email
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