I was in Portugal in the summer of 2009.  Landed in Lisbon and stayed there for a few days before going to North about 2 hours to the ocean.  I booked the resort online and while it was nice and had potential, it was very new and I don't think they had a big advertising budget because the place was practically deserted. 

From there I went back to Lisbon and decided to forego my plans to head to the South of Spain and took a night train to Madrid where I caught a connection to Barcelona.

When I got back to Portugal after Barcelona and Ibiza, I stayed outside Lisbon in Estoril which was much better than Lisbon.  It was only about 20 minutes by train out of Portugal and had a great beach, a casino and a lot more to do - much more lively.