Kent to Portugal
Removals from Kent to Portugal
The far corner of the road network, reached through the whole of France and Spain. Worth doing properly, because the last road at this end is the most varied in Europe: polished calçada in Lisbon, a one-in-five lane in the north, an unmade track in the Alentejo.
Calçada is beautiful, and under a loaded sack truck in the rain it is a skating rink.
Who moves this way from Kent
- Households leaving Kent for the Algarve, the Silver Coast or the Lisbon area.
- People restoring a rural property in the Alentejo or the interior, delivering into building work.
- Anybody making the move in stages, with goods held here between loads.
The road out
Folkestone or Dover as usual, and then the longest continuous drive this site plans. It is routine work and it is planned as a proper long-distance run — driving hours, rest and the route through Spain settled before the vehicle loads, not en route.
Down through France to Irún, then across northern Spain on the AP-8 and A-8 or inland via Burgos and Salamanca. For Porto and the north, the A-62 and the A25 cross at Vilar Formoso; for Lisbon and the centre, the A-5 and the IP7; for the Algarve, south through Seville and across at the Guadiana bridge onto the A22.
Where we deliver
Customs, and who obtains what
Portugal grants relief on used household effects on a change of residence, claimed against an inventory and evidence of both ends of the move. The certificate of change of residence is the piece people underestimate: it comes from the Portuguese consular or municipal route rather than from us, and it is worth starting as early as the NIF.
The file, split in two
| Document | Obtained by | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Valued inventory in Portuguese | Us | Prepared and translated here, with contents described rather than counted. |
| NIF (fiscal number) | You | Needed for almost everything in Portugal including the relief claim. |
| Certificate of change of residence | You | Obtained through the consular or municipal route. The commonest cause of delay on this corridor. |
| Proof of the Portuguese address | You | Deed or lease at the new address. |
| Proof of leaving the UK | You | Closing council tax, tenancy end or completion statement. |
| Export and import entries | Us | Lodged against the inventory before the vehicle reaches the terminal. |
Rows marked You are attached to you as a person and take real time to obtain, so start them before you have a moving date. Rows marked Us are built here from the inventory taken at the survey.
Calçada, gradient and the unmade approach
Portuguese towns are paved in calçada — small cut limestone blocks laid by hand. It is the most attractive street surface in Europe and the worst one to move a household across. Polished smooth by use, it is slippery dry and genuinely treacherous wet, and it does not take a loaded sack truck the way a pavement does. Crews carry rather than wheel, which is slower and is costed as such.
Then the gradients. Lisbon and Porto are built on hills steep enough that streets become steps without warning, and a vehicle that can reach an address may not be able to stand on the slope outside it. The standing point is chosen for the gradient as much as the width.
Rural Portugal is the third pattern and the one nearest to home. An unmade track across a few hundred metres of Alentejo, a gate at the end, and ground that behaves entirely differently in February from how it behaves in August. It is the same survey question we ask about a Kent farm, and it gets the same answer: measure the gateway, judge the surface wet rather than dry, and plan a shuttle where there is doubt.
And a great many Portuguese purchases are restorations. Delivering a household into a house with the floors up is worse here than anywhere, because the distances mean nobody is coming back next week. Hold the goods until the work stops — that is what the storage page exists for.
Kent to Portugal
Questions on this route
01 Why does the paving matter?
Calçada is polished stone. It is slippery, it does not take a loaded sack truck, and crews carry instead of wheeling — which is slower and is reflected in the plan rather than absorbed on the day.
02 Our lane is steep.
Then tell us how steep and where a vehicle could stand level. In Porto and Lisbon the gradient decides the standing point more often than the width does.
03 We are in the Alentejo at the end of a track.
Same survey as a Kent farm: the gateway gap, what the surface does wet, and where a vehicle can turn. Send photographs from the road looking in.
04 The house is being restored.
Then store rather than deliver into it. On a run this long nobody is coming back next week to move things out of the plasterers' way.
05 What delays the paperwork most?
The certificate of change of residence, consistently. It comes through the consular or municipal route rather than from us, so begin it as early as the NIF.
06 Can we move in stages?
Yes, and on restorations it is the sensible pattern. Goods are collected and held here, then delivered in loads as the building allows.
Moving from Kent to Portugal?
Both addresses, roughly what is going, and anything you know about the approach at the far end — the gateway, the street width, the archway, the gradient. Photographs are better than descriptions.