Vinha Boutique Hotel — Hotel in Vila Nova de Gaia

Fine if you’re part of a wedding party. Avoid if you are a couple/family looking for a relaxing break.

We were originally “upgraded” to a worse room (no balcony and no natural light) - when we asked to have the room (with a balcony) that we had originally booked the hotel told us it was at full capacity (so essentially the room we booked had been double booked).

We moved the next night and were given an “adjoining” room (where there is a door between two separately sold rooms, locked on both sides). The sound proofing was non-existent as we were woken up by people having sex in the room next door at 6am.

The next night (at 3am), two drunk men came back making a racket (shouting, drinking) - it was as if they were in our room - and then 30 mins later tried repeatedly to force their way into our room through the adjoining door! Luckily the door was locked on our side but this was a foot away from the bed and a very unsettling experience. When we called the nighttime reception they called the “noisy neighbours” and the sound insulation is so bad we could hear their phone ring so clearly as well as the conversation asking them to keep the noise down. Sound insulation non-existent.

The hotel would have completely ignored what happened and we were forced to go to reception ourselves to raise again, which we didn’t want to do (at a five star hotel I would have thought there would be an apology the next morning and an offer to find a room away from people that tried to force their way into our room at 3.30am). When we raised the situation the receptionist tried to pass this off as “some noise in the night” and initially insisted we keep the room despite confirming these two men would be attending a wedding the coming night (and so would inevitably be returning late, drunk and noisy!). He told us they would likely be in bed by 5pm - I can’t believe he could say it with a straight face. We eventually moved again (but only at 6pm despite being told it would be ready at 1.30pm, which ruined the day as all our things were packed up to move).

Other issues were large groups of wedding guests dominating the limited pool and sun lounger area and wedding guests laughing about the fact they’d slept on the sunbeds overnight.

A large American group and a large Italian group complained loudly (on two separate mornings) at breakfast that the service was not very good (they were right, but it is unpleasant having large unhappy wedding groups).

I had to request to speak to the manager at checkout (no proactive step from the hotel at any point to address the issues we’d had) and was only offered two drinks off of our total bill. Seeing I wasn’t that impressed by this the manager took a meal at the pool restaurant off of our bill instead. Whilst this was a nice gesture, this was a drop in the ocean compared to the total amount we spent during our stay on the rooms, massages, tasting menu meals etc.

I was unimpressed with our experience but even more unimpressed by the poor way issues were handled by the hotel. Definitely a long, lonny way from a five star service...

Close but no cigar. This is an incredible hotel in many ways but very disappointing on some important fundamentals.

First, we were unable to sleep as our room was very hot with a faulty aircon for two out of three nights. Someone was called to the room but was unable to resolve the issue. They offered to move us to another room, but then they advised that the other room was experiencing the same issue. They called in a technician the next day who was able to resolve the issue; however, the issue was back on our third night. This led to a highly disruptive stay and prevented us from getting adequate rest. Based on other reviews, cooling seems to be a known issue so it’s quite disappointing that a hotel of this calibre hasn’t done anything to appropriately address the problem.

Second, the hotel has a gated entrance and they do not always answer the intercom. The gate is located a decent walk down a steep slope to the lobby so it’s really quite inconvenient to be stuck at the top.

Third, they offer coffee and tea facilities in the room but tried to charge 10 euros for us to get any milk or cream. Two phone calls and a visit to reception later and there was still no budging on this insanity. Worth noting too that the lady we were speaking with was extremely rude. I believe the manager overheard some of these discussions and later called to apologise and offered to resolve the issue, which was most appreciated, but the whole ordeal was very odd.

Fourth, there is a lack of basic customer care and focus that you’d expect from a 5 star hotel. Given our poor experience, you might expect they’d be interested in hearing out our concerns. Many hotels might comp something off our F&B bill as a gesture given we came to a hotel to sleep and weren’t able to do so. They offered us a free cocktail at their bar during a FUTURE stay. Thought this was quite poor form given they had given us no reason to return. I sent a private message to them to further express our concerns on the naive assumption they’re keen to continuously improve on the customer experience, but they never responded, which must be representative of how they feel about customers.

Now the good….the building and setting is stunning, design inside and out is beautiful, and several very nice staff. We didn’t get a chance to eat at the main restaurant as they were fully booked but we ate at the bar which served fantastic food and had an amazing bartender. Various small details that they’ve nailed, from Reidel drinking glasses in the room to Jo Malone amenities. They’ve clearly put a lot of effort into ensuring many aspects are perfect so it’s a shame they’ve let us down on some of the most basic expectations of a hotel. They’ve honestly got the potential to be an amazing world-renowned hotel so hopefully they’ll get there...

Probably the worst hotel night as far as I can remember in the last 15 years,||Which is really a shame because the facilities, location and view are great.||||The room was an authentic SAUNA, literally !!!!!!||||We were in Vinha Boutique Hotel on 1/07/22, as we were attending a wedding there, that day.||When we checked-in, we immediately noticed the A/C was not working properly. We informed at the same moment the luggages guy, which answered us that we needed to give some time so the room could cool down. Didn’t appreciate the answer at first because we noticed it wouldn’t cool down, it was indisputably an A/C problem.||||Around 30min later, we called the Reception and informed again that there was a problem with the A/C, so that they could solve the situation after we leave the hotel room to the wedding ceremony, because we had just enough time to take a bath and leave to the ceremony (15h30).||A lady came anyway to the room while we were preparing ourselves, to inform we needed to close the windows and put the card in next to the door, we told her this is done since we came in the room.||||We took care to check and re-check the A/C programming several times, to check the windows and the card even before claiming the problem.||We have been travelling in 4 different continents, several countries, a LOT of hotels, so believe me programming/using an A/C is not out of this world.||||When we returned to the room at 2:30-3:00 in the morning after the wedding night, it was not cold at all, not so hot but it was not unbearable, we had to sleep without sheets of course, but it was ok.||||The worst was yet to come, we woke up during the night 3 or 4 times due to the heat, each hour going and the heat was increasing, it was getting worse and worse, Until we couldn't bear it anymore around 8h - 8h30. We then get up to re-check the A/C control, and can you believe that at that moment the room temperature was 28ºC !!! Yes, 28ºC !!!!||While it was well configured at 14ºC (which was the lowest possible temperature).||||It was much cooler on the terrace of the room, and even on the corridor of the hotel rooms, than in our room.||||Mind-blowing and unbelievable this was our night in a FIVE STAR HOTEL which we paid the DOUBLE of all others hotels 8-10min from there. We paid 437€ for ONE night so we could have a good night after a good wedding, but was totally the opposite.||||A shame, and a nightmare after a long and tiring day and night.||No other...