Hotel Casino Chaves — Hotel in Chaves

Located at the outskirts of Chaves at at Exit 21 of the A24 Tollway, this is a splendid option for a stopover in a chic, modern hotel. The Tollway is “electronic toll only”, so discuss your options with you rental car company, if you are not from Portugal. A car seems to be essential for both accessing the hotel and exploring the area.||||We stayed there for three midweek nights in early April, which translates to “off/off-season, so the hotel was very quiet. Nevertheless all relevant facilities were operational (restaurant, fitness center/indoor pool, casino, etc.). Rooms are modern with all the usual facilities, including a mini bar and come with a large balcony, which is always nice. WIFI was free and reliable. While it’s a casino hotel with a midsize casino that seems to cater primarily to a Spanish clientele north of the nearby border, the casino part is well separated from the hotel, so unless you actually head to the casino, you will not feel it. We did use the restaurant once for dinner, which again was very quiet, but with attentive service. Food was good with various local options, but not outstanding. Prices were in line what one would expect from a 4 star hotel restaurant. As for breakfast, which is included in the rate, we found it to be very good with a very nice and high quality cold buffet (again with various local choices) and some limited warm choices. However, coffee was terrible, but not really a problem, as good espressos were served on request with a smile.||||The only real problem came at check-out, as the hotel did not accept the credit card that we also used as a guarantee during the booking process and at check-in. While this might not have been entirely the hotel’s fault, as we booked through booking.com, also the employees did not seem to be aware which credit cards to accept and which not, as he tried several times in different ways to charge the card, before finally admitting, that the hotel obviously does not have a contract for this card type. However, the whole process was fairly relaxed and friendly with none of the arrogant attitude that I have experienced at other hotels on previous occasions (outside of Portugal), when they cannot immediately process the payment for technical reasons. We could have used another credit card, but finally decided to pay cash to speed up the process.||||Chaves itself has a nice historic center along the river for a pleasant stroll, but is not as spectacular as other Portuguese town. You will probably find everything you need there (nice restaurants, supermarkets (Continente, Pingo Doce, etc.), but the streets are not straight forward and traffic patterns are designed as a maze, so a SatNav might be very helpful. Otherwise, we found the larger surrounding area really beautiful and probably the real reason to visit this part Portugal.||||A visit to this lesser known, but beautiful area of Portugal is highly recommended, as well as a stay at this hotel. We will...

Not sure about this place, ratings look ok but I feel like maybe I might just be picky. The room was ok, the shower ran down the tub onto the floor. We had dinner and both times they were buffet. Do yourself a favor don’t waste you time. It says this is a four star restaurant, no way not if you count the food. We ate there twice because it was late and we didn’t feel like driving into town. The first nigh I can’t even remember what we had but the second night it was Italian night. Not sure what about dinner was Italian, it seemed the the food had been prepared and it just sat there for quite some time. Everything was dry. Fish lasagna? I married a New York Italian so I know a little about Italian food. I Al dabble a little in the kitchen. Thus dish didn’t even deserve a rating if 1. It was very fish and pungent. The pork and potatoes had great tasting potatoes. Was trying to figure out where in Italy did this dish come from. The entire meal was horrible and at 30 eu it was wayyyyyyyyy over priced. We were here visiting family and really spent no time at the hotel until we came back at the end of the day. We purchased our own drinks and chips for snacks out in town and brought them to the hotel. At checkout they tried to charged us for mini fridge. We took nothing from the mini fridge, we put a few cokes in and...

We had booked ahead for this meal at the hotel. Despite the language barrier the serving staff were pleasant and attentive, but our meal was a disaster. "Crunchy chicken, with tagliatelle arrived first under-cooked (chicken raw inside) then over-cooked. Even cooked correctly, it made McDonalds nuggets look good. Tabbouleth salad consisted of a few bits of carrot and courgette in bland and unappetising couscous. Cod and straw potatoes with shell fish was luke warm, probably because dishes were mistimed or forgotten. One dish arrived, when queried, after everyone else had finished. Staff were embarrassed and apologetic, but there seemed no management presence to respond to our concerns, which took an eternity to deal with, and then we were still left feeling unhappy, although we did get the cost of the two worst meals deducted. Unfortunately, we cannot recommend this restaurant in a hotel that seems to wish to attract...