Vale D'oliveiras Quinta Resort & Spa

“Second time here, and booking a third!”

Second time here, this time with extended family. Some illnesses in the family and staff couldn’t have looked after us all better. Lots of choice at the breakfast buffet. You can order any sort of eggs you want so you don’t just have to have the scrambled eggs. Other food is hit and miss. The eve… more

Second time here, this time with extended family. Some illnesses in the family and staff couldn’t have looked after us all better. Lots of choice at the breakfast buffet. You can order any sort of eggs you want so you don’t just have to have the scrambled eggs. Other food is hit and miss. The evening restaurant food is blah. The bar snacks are better. We had different types of rooms for our group. The deluxe two bedroom apartments are great… really big, comfy. The first time we were here our apartment was a little bit better taken care of. This time the space was a little more rundown. The fridge in the kitchen didn’t work but they did have a standalone installed so we were sorted. The hotel rooms felt a bit small and the ones at the very end of the hotel, near the gym/indoor pool, on the ground floor, were a bit dark and dingy. A bit minimalist on topping up amenities and you need to buy coffee pods (for a nepresso machine) from the reception at €1 after you’ve used the two provided ones. I think that’s a bit cheap, to be honest. You don’t have to have a car to get around if you’re happy to stay local. Taxis are cheap and quick. Overall, again, a great stay and we’re already talking dates for our next trip.

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“Could do so much better.”

We stayed at the Vale d'Oliveiras Quinta Resort and Spa from 13th to 20th September. This was our second visit. So the plus points first. The accommodation is in a beautiful location surrounded by countryside, and has well-kept grounds and gardens that are spacious and well-designed. The pool is … more

We stayed at the Vale d'Oliveiras Quinta Resort and Spa from 13th to 20th September. This was our second visit. So the plus points first. The accommodation is in a beautiful location surrounded by countryside, and has well-kept grounds and gardens that are spacious and well-designed. The pool is large and the water crystal clear. In fact one of the nicest pools we have experienced. Our stay included breakfast, which is buffet style and offers plenty of choice. There is a large atrium-style dining area with two outside verandas. The rooms (we were 'upgraded' to a two-bed apartment from a one-bed) are spacious, generally comfortable and clean. They include a fairly large kitchen, separate bathroom, and with a two-bed apartment a separate shower and second smaller bathroom. The lounge area is large with two comfortable sofas and a tv with a number of English channels. There is an outdoor patio area with table and chairs. The flats have air con, which worked perfectly. We had a massage in the spa area which was first class. There is plenty of car parking, and realistically you will need a car at this location. Now the not-so-good points. Sunbed Cushions. Whilst the pool and pool area is lovely and there are lots of sunbeds, the cushions for those sunbeds are awful and insufficient for the number of beds. A number had come apart or were split, and they were dirty and stained. You needed to cover them with two towels to make them useable. Some beds are on a grassed area around the main pool, and people will leave the sunbed cushions on the beds at the end of the day. There is a young member of staff assigned to give out cushions and towels (although in theory you are only allowed one) and who takes down the umbrellas etc. He does not take in the cushions from the sunbeds on the grass, and they then get soaked overnight, rendering them unusable the next day as they get soaked by the overnight sprinklers! This further reduces the number available. Such an easy issue to address through proper management. Pool Bar Food. We decided to eat at the pool bar one evening rather than go out to eat (we didn't have dinner included). The food was frankly very poor. I had a club sandwich, and the bread was virtually inedible, and the food poorly presented, whilst my partner quinoa salad was pretty tasteless. I would add that we were not the only ones to comment on the poor quality of the food. Accommodation. Whilst our apartment was clean and comfortable it looked very 'tired' and dated, a comment we made last year. There was a broken cupboard door and evidence of water damage to a dresser in the lounge; the fitted door for the washing machine in the kitchen was missing; some of the veneer was peeling off the kitchen units. Whilst we had a small outside space, it was untidy with no real planting and no sun loungers (we did have two loungers with our one-bed apartment last year). Bar. The bar offers a small range of cocktails, but when we were told that they had no white rum to make pina coladas. This seems a really small point, and rather pedantic, but we were told the same thing last year! Surely not to difficult to keep up the bar stock! The resort is listed as 5 Star. It is certainly not that. Between 3 and 4 perhaps. It could do so much better.

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“Don’t book half board!”

There are many good points to this hotel. The accommodation was spacious and clean, beds comfortable, plenty of hot water and air conditioning worked well. Grounds and pool area were mostly well maintained and the pool wasn’t too cold! We had no issues with getting a sunbed at any time of the day… more

There are many good points to this hotel. The accommodation was spacious and clean, beds comfortable, plenty of hot water and air conditioning worked well. Grounds and pool area were mostly well maintained and the pool wasn’t too cold! We had no issues with getting a sunbed at any time of the day, unlike some of the other reviews. The description of the hotel we thought was somewhat misleading by our holiday company ‘the resort's ecological gardens are ideal for a romantic scenic walk in the morning or for a leisurely bike ride in the afternoon.’ Yes you can hire bikes and walk, but there is no cycle route or really any walking route except for round the perimeter of the property . Walking around you can also see where it’s in need of a little TLC or finishing off, and it almost feels like they ran out of funds somewhere along the line. There is an organic garden near the entrance which was once probably amazing but has been left to go to ruin and looks quite sad… which brings me on to the worst aspect of our stay - the food. Dinner was awful, breakfast less than average, not sure how they manage a five star rating. We persevered for four nights before complaining : food is very plain, cheap and tasteless, lukewarm even when we were often the first diners in the restaurant. Limited selection all round, sometimes we were in and out in 15 minutes, there was barely anything we could eat. Even basics like fruit and vegetables were not always available. Not sure whether it was due to low budget or lack of skills, but we were motivated to raise the issue with Guest Relations. She acknowledged it wasn’t the first time she had heard this complaint. Having also noted this in other reviews below, we can only assume the hotel is aware and is doing nothing about it. On that basis, we gave the restaurant one last chance. With no improvement we decided to eat out for the rest of our stay. Restaurants are not really in walking distance but ubers plentiful and not expensive. Overall we did enjoy our holiday but don’t recommend booking here half board.

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“2 adults, 2 children”

This was our second stay. Our first was five years ago. Overall we enjoyed our stay. Our favourite thing about this hotel is the size of the apartments and the lovely garden at the back of our property. It really is like a villa rather than an apartment and the fully equipped kitchen makes self cat… more

This was our second stay. Our first was five years ago. Overall we enjoyed our stay. Our favourite thing about this hotel is the size of the apartments and the lovely garden at the back of our property. It really is like a villa rather than an apartment and the fully equipped kitchen makes self catering very easy. Our daughter had her 10th birthday during our stay and we were very surprised when someone knocked on our door with a card and cake for her. This was a lovely touch and really added to our daughter’s birthday. Thank you. There were some disappointments however. There were hardly ever any free sun beds by the pool. We ended up with our towels on the grass most days. There were some inconsiderate. People playing very loud music from their phones by the pool and it was also not really music we wanted our daughters hear! The pool bar was dissappointing this time. I had been dreaming of the delicious smoothies that I’d had daily on our first visit so I was sad to find they no longer make them. There was also a very small selection of Icecreams available compared to before. We were also dissappointed to find the pool bar closed at 6pm. It used to be 9pm and we ate dinner there a couple of times previously. The kids club never seemed to be actually doing the activities which were on the timetable and there were hardly any children using it. Such a shame. The playground could also be better for a five star hotel. A circus show was advertised one evening. We ate in our apartment and came down to watch the show to find it was just two guys going around the restaurant! Not quite what we expected! We had a lovely holiday and loved our accommodation but I don’t think we will return to this hotel.

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