Boticas Hotel Art & SPA

After a weeks stay in this hotel all I can say is that I wouldn’t book again. Since we obviously weren’t locals and depend on english to communicate, this hotel is sub-par. The staff is friendly but its hard to communicate. Often they needed to call someone else that was more proficient in english. Also they were understaffed it seemed. Breakfast was okay-ish though no real cold drinks, bread and pastry got old quickly, or sometimes it seemed like it was a day old. Fruit was fresh and good, honey was good. No marmelade or jam available. Coffe was good, orange juice was fresh and tasty. Understaffed with only one staffmember attending and taking care of refilling the buffet. The rooms are spatious enough styling is not bad, the beds are hard. My wife didn’t sleep well on them. Airco was good, shower was modern but the drain got clogged in our first room so we had to move to another room. Daily cleaning was good. Amenities were okay and got restocked every day. The pool is a whole different story. The pool itself is okay but the staff was sparsely around. That included the poolbar that opened around 12, then for about ten minutes you could order, but after 10-15 mins staff left?? in order to stay away for hours after which this cycle repeated itself. They prefer cash or card, but no possibility to charge f&b to the room.. it was quiet in the hotel and for several hours a day we were the only guests but still you’d expect some service at a pool bar while you’re there! Again friendly staff I must add (when they finally got back). The beds dont get cleaned and after a night of rain no-one felt reaponsible to dry the beds which had some water on them. The wellness area was hot and much smaller than it seemed on the pictures. Turkish steamcabin, sauna and jacuzzi are available besides the indoor pool. We didn’t use any of it. Towels were provided in the hotel. Also, massages can be booked, reservation in advance is neccessary. The town is quiet. It became obviously clear we were possibly the only non-portugese guests in the whole village wich seemed abandoned although its mid-end of july. Not much to do, not much to see. We took to Chaves for some more livelyhood. We’ve stayed in Chaves before and liked it quite much! Since it was only a 25 minute drive we went for dinner there more than once. Parking was good, with possibility to recharge electric cars in one of 5 current outlets (220V-16A) wich was free of charge and a big plus! To summarize: All in all friendly staff but communication was so so, room was okay but could improve. Pool was okay but lack of service was stunning. Parking excellent ;) Won’t book again because better hotels are available at 25 minutes drive.

We made an appointment to have dinner at the hotel, 20.15/20.30 for 9 persons. We arrived at 20.15 had in the lobby, the lady who received us was unpleasant. She had to ask us for the time and then went to check for what time our reservation was. She told us it was 20.30 and we had to wait in the lobby. There was nobody in the restaurant, but still we couldn’t go to the table to have a drink while waiting. We had to wait in the lobby and didn’t get anything to drink. When at 20.25 we asked if we could go to the table, the lady told us; our reservation was at 20.30 and we couldn’t go. The way she spoke to us, was reason enough for us to leave. We have went to many restaurants and never, never have been spoken to like this.

We booked 4 rooms with children expecting to use the swimming pool. We were told only at check in it would need to be booked at check in. There are no slots for us to book, for today and tomorrow. Utter disappointment. We were not informed when we booked the rooms otherwise we'd have booked elsewhere.