Portugal Travel Guide
Lisbon Hotels / Gwyneth Paltrow / Portugal Hotels / Celebrity Hotels / Hotel WiFi / Hotel News / → All Tags
Once Again, Gwyneth Paltrow is Gooping Out Hotel Recommendations
Where does Gwyneth Paltrow rest her head when she heads to Lisbon? Subscribers to Paltrow's weekly guide to detoxes and cleansing lifestyle newsletter found out when a guide to Lisbon hit their Inboxes on Thursday. As you might expect, the hotels which received the G.P. Stamp of Approval are grand in stature, with the requisite clean living retreat included in the roundup.
Boozy B and Bs / B and Bs / Portugal Hotels / VIneyard Hotels / Hotel Wines / Gourmet Hotels / → All Tags
Boozy B&B's: Portugal Edition
For the latest update in our Boozy B&B’s we traveled to the sunny climes of Portugal to visit the UNESCO World Heritage city of Oporto, and the ridiculously picturesque hills of the Douro River Valley where we tasted the famous fortified Port wines as well as Douro DOC wines (we’re talking Touriga here) as well as to sample the local hotel scene.
Bathroom Tuesdays / Hotel Bathrooms / Lisbon Hotels / Four Seasons Hotels / → All Tags
Four Seasons Hotel Ritz Lisbon Has Odd Bathrooms But We Kinda Like Them
During a recent visit to Portugal’s capital city, we stayed at the iconic Four Seasons Hotel Ritz Lisbon and got a chance to check out its fancy all-marble bathrooms, which sort of blew our minds on a couple levels.
Hotel Openings / Hotel Spas / Portugal Hotels / Wine-Tasting Hotels / → All Tags
A Wine Spa and a Decanter-Shaped Pool: The Yeatman in Porto Sounds Fun
Will your eye be drawn to the apple-colored walls or the UNESCO-rated view outside? The choice is yours
We love hotels and we love wine here at HotelChatter, so a wine hotel is a pretty much guaranteed win for us. So we’re hoping that The Yeatman – which opens July 15 in the port-making district of Oporto, Portugal – will live up to our hopes.
It's sounding solid: for a start, there’s a 25,000 bottle-strong wine cellar (including, of course, a mammoth selection of port) with a restaurant run by a Michelin-starred chef to sop up the alcohol.
But perhaps most exciting is the vinotherapy (or vinotherapie, seeing as it’s French) spa, which is going to be run by Caudalie. We’ve heard fantastic things about their spas before (there are only a few dotted round the wine-beats of Europe, and we’ve never got to try one) but we’ve tried and liked the products, and there’s nothing we’re liking more than the idea of being wrapped up in vine leaves and having red wine drizzled over our dry bits.
Cubicle Dreamin' / Madeira Hotels / Portugal Hotels / Orient-Express Hotels / Hotel Restaurants / → All Tags
Relaxing at Reid’s Palace in Madeira
Cubicle Dreamin' is a feature in which we ask the hotel mavens to take some time out of their busy work day, surf the Internet, and tell us what hotel they wish they could beam themselves to right that very second--all on the slave driving companies dime, of course. Oh, like these people aren't surfing aimlessly anyway--at least now their purposeless clicking will be cobbled together into useful hotel stories--we hope. Have a destination hotel you are just dying to leave your cube for? Send the story our way.
In this episode, Hotel Maven Eric Rosen visits Madeira...in his mind. Enjoy.
I’ve always been intrigued by the emerald isle of Madeira, a strange whalers’ haven that also produces such fine fortified wines, and one day, as I happened upon the web site of Reid’s Palace, a sprawling 19th century hotel that perches on a cliff 150 feet above the azure Atlantic in the island’s capital city of Funchal, that first opened in 1891. The resort is equal parts Riviera redoubt, tropical forest lodge, and seaside getaway. With 128 rooms and 35 suites, surely there was an accommodation for me there.
Portugal Hotels / Funky Spa Treatments / Hotel Spas / → All Tags
Drink and De-Stress With The Vine's Wine-Spiked Spa Treatments
Astute winos of the sniff, swirl and spit (during marathon tasting sessions) family might snub their noses at splashing about in a Cabernet-spiked bath. Thankfully, that's not what Madeira's The Vine hotel is suggesting. The hotel is taking a favorite alcoholic beverage and using it in unexpected ways, namely in spa services that make use of wine's many antioxidant properties.
Hotel Openings / Unusual Hotels / Island Hotels / → All Tags
A 'Lost Island' Gets a Hotel (And No Reality TV is Involved)
In our inbox, we received a press release that started with, "Imagine an island, just a few hours from the U.S. eastern seaboard, with windmills, hot springs, a mild year-round climate..." and, as we read through it, we prepared ourselves for some sort of a reality show pitch a la "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here" (the Heidi and Spencer disaster that we have yet to successfully wipe from memory) or "30 Rock"'s "MILF Island."
But, alas, this is actually a "lost"(ish) island, and now it has a hotel. And no reality show — as far as we can tell.
The teensy island of Graciosa, one of the Azorean islands (and one of the smaller ones, in fact — it's about 8 by 12 km with a population of just over 4600), was without any hotels for a long time — and now it has one: the Graciosa Resort & Business Hotel in Santa Cruz da Graciosa. Graciosa is just north of Sao Jorge and is known for the unique style of windmills that pepper the island's landscape, thanks to some of its first inhabitants, Flemish settlers. According to the press materials, the hotel is "part of a series of investments to build infrastructure connected to the tourist economy on Graciosa," such as the Carapacho thermal baths (which are said to cure bone and skin ailments).
Michael Phelps / Hotel News / Celebrity Scoop / Page Six / Hotel Pools / → All Tags
Michael Phelps is Now Chillin' in Portugal
While Michelle Obama may be the Michael Phelps-ish celebrity being talked about relentlessly this week, our superhero swimmer has fallen off the radar a little bit (compared to the last few weeks, at least).
So where'd our Mikey-Mike run off to? Well, if we were him, we'd come back to the U.S. triumphantly, do a tour of the country and expect a parade everywhere we went, but instead Page Six tells us he's in Portugal with friends living the good life.
He's supposedly chillin' at the Hilton Vilamoura As Cascatas Golf Resort & Spa, playing golf and laying low -- hopefully relaxing and basking in the golden glow of all those medals he picked up in Beijing.
Go stalk all over him. Check out that pool, too.
Lisbon Hotel Scene / Monica Guy / Where to Stay in Lisbon / Portugal Hotels / → All Tags
Where to Stay in Lisbon: A Beginner's Guide
Monica Guy has been dutifully rounding up the best boutique hotels in Lisbon for the past two weeks. Now, she's telling you where to stay in the city. Like actual neighborhoods. Enjoy.
Lisbon is such as spangbankingly excellent place that you're unlikely to spend much time inside your hotel. But it does matter where your hotel is - the city is built over seven hills and if you choose a hotel on the wrong side of one, you'll have a long, hard, trek home.
A hotel's location also matters in Lisbon because each area has its own personality. If you're a hardcore clubber, you'll want to crawl (a short way) back to your bed in the early hours of the morning. If you're a tranquil book-lover, you'll want to escape the clubbers crawling back in the early hours. If you're a culture vulture, you'll want to be close to the museums. Etc.
After the jump, our beginner's guide to choosing a hotel in Lisbon
Lisbon Hotel Scene / Design Hotels / Monica Guy / → All Tags
Lisbon Hotel Guide :: Lisboa Tejo Attempts a Design Hotel
Okay, so Lisbon ain't yet the place to find a whole load of design hotels. The first one was Jerónimos 8, right outside the city centre. Following suit, but this time slap bang in the heart of Lisbon's downtown area, is the Lisboa Tejo.
First confession: The Lisboa Tejo is more a brave attempt at a design hotel than a design hotel proper. A hotel de charme, let's say.
But it's a damn fine brave attempt. Stepping in is a surprise - running water, curvy wood, deep blues and yellows and tiled mosaics everywhere. There's a bar also, open to the public, which adds a kind of cosmo touch to the place.
Lisbon Hotel Scene / Hotel Spas / Luxury Hotels / Monica Guy / Orient-Express Hotels / → All Tags
Lisbon Hotel Guide :: The Exclusive Elusive Lapa Palace
We can't talk about the Lisbon Hotel Scene without mentioning Lisbon's most decadent address, Lapa Palace.
Yet anyone not rich enough to stay there will almost certainly never see it - the Lapa Palace hides its gaily painted face in a little-visited area of Lisbon (Lapa), miles from the tourist sights, main roads and nightlife.
This is probably done to discourage the riff-raff from poking their noses in as prices range from €425 ($630) to €575 ($850) for a night in a superior room, all the way up to €1650 ($2435) for a deluxe room.
Lisbon Hotel Scene / Heritage Hotels / Luxury Hotels / Monica Guy / → All Tags
Lisbon Hotel Guide :: The Lisboa Plaza vs. The Heritage Av Liberdade
Two sister hotels from the small Heritage Hotel family in Lisbon illustrate just how much difference a street name can make to the price of a hotel room.
The big sister Lisboa Plaza (above) opened 50 years ago on a quiet side street just 20m from the busy Avenida da Liberdade - Lisbon's Champs Élysées.
It's a beautiful classic 4-star hotel, run by the same family since its opening, and with little designer touches by well-known Portuguese designer Graça Viterbo. 94 rooms over six floors, with all the bells and whistles including free Wi-Fi. Prices for a double room start around €165 ($243).
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