Restaurante O Colmo — Restaurant in Santana

I stayed at this convenient hotel during April 19-21 while on a guided hiking trip around Madeira. This hotel caters to hiking groups, and it has a cute boot washing station outside. A colorful A-frame house sits in front of the hotel, while two side-by-side bird enclosures are home to several parrots and parakeets located to the front side of the hotel. These are charming features of this well-used hotel.||Other positive features of this hotel include extremely helpful front desk staff who go the extra mile to help their guests, an onsite restaurant that provides great service and delicious food (their wood-fired pizza hit the spot), an amazing breakfast buffet (the assortment of homemade breads was my favorite), large hotel rooms, and a spacious lobby for different hiking groups to meet at before their days adventure. ||On the other hand, this hotel is showing its age with some quirky heating issues, squeaky floors, floor entry doors that slam shut, and worn-out bathroom vanities. I was in room #603 on the third floor. The heat is turned on every night around 6-7 pm until about 7 am the next morning. However, they use a radiator system that did not work in my room or the adjacent rooms. The front desk guy located a portable electric heater for me, which I needed the first night. The hiking group members in the floor below me complained that their rooms were too hot. The hallways and rooms have hardwood floors, except for a little strip of carpet around the beds. While I love the hardwood floors in my own home, the floors in this hotel are noisy and squeak when walking across them. One also needs to enter a side door to enter the hallway before reaching your room, and that door oftentimes slammed shut. Someone tried to rig up a cushioning system for it that was short-lived. The hotel rooms do not have a fan or other source of “white noise,” so ear plugs need to be worn all night. The rooms do not have a room safe (an envelope of items can be left with the front desk to be put in the hotel safe) or mini fridge (which would have been nice to have to store leftover pizza from dinner that was instead disposed of). The bathroom is dated with the wooden front of the vanity showing a lot of wear and tear. The placement of the toilet was odd as anyone with long legs would hit their left knee on the vanity. The bathroom floor was not clean, and there were some small ants that made the bathtub home. The hotel skimped on bathroom towels, and I had to ask the front desk for a bathmat towel to step on when exiting the deep tub. The aforementioned items were all manageable. However, I have never tried to sleep on a bed as hard as the one in my room. I woke up at 2:30 am with my entire right-side hurting, including my ribs, hip, knee, and ankle. I’ve never had sore ribs from trying to sleep on a bed! We hadn’t even done a hike yet! I couldn’t fall back asleep. The next night, upon a suggestion from another hiker, I folded a blanket lengthwise and put it under the bottom sheet of my bed. This provided enough cushioning to take the edge off. I would encourage management to purchase some pillow top mattress covers for use by some guests (such as those like me who have some arthritis in their hips). If I had an inkling that the mattresses at this hotel were the consistency of a board, I would have brought a Thermorest sleep mat to put on the bed. I hope I never encounter a bed...

This review is for both the restaurant and hotel.

Of the 10 hotels I stayed in during my Caminho Real 23 hike around the island of Madeira, I have to say that this is one of my least favourite. The reception in the evening was helpful with weather information as I was there during a bad storm period. The morning staff is somehow disappointing (maybe it's partly because till now after 7 days in different hotel premises in Madeira, I was spoilt by the good service) and less helpful/ unwilling to assist. There was going to be a storm and it rained heavily in the morning so I made enquiries about transport to avoid walking in the rain (local knows best?), i.e. all the way to Machico. Apart from the fact that the shuttle bus does not run in bad weather, he was rather reluctant to say more. I had the impression I was wasting his time. When I asked him about the picnic (instead of breakfast) made to order the evening before, he just said a "no, we don't have it". Maybe he was just having a bad day. In the end I managed to get the bus information from the girl in the breakfast room, who was really helpful.

The room seems to have been recently renovated - the bed is huge and there's a balcony. The lobby, as I remember it, was dark and less welcoming and still full of Christmas decorations in mid-January. Breakfast is simple. I think the hotel has seen its better days, judging by the recommendation stickers on the front door. If you're a fan of Santana's typical thatched houses, the hotel/restaurant even has one of its own (to attract tourists?). I've heard so much about Santana and for me it's more of a tourist trap with its typical thatched houses, the town sounds much more charming as it is - the only thing I can recommend Santana, is the good access to the mountain peaks from there.

Dinner at the hotel was good and of good value - there were rooms of empty tables, but the staff are very accommodating and friendly. I had the grill octopus with huge portion of sides (just look at the picture!) - the sweet potatoes and potatoes were delicious. Sadly maybe because I wasn't a fan of octopus, but...

I requested a lunch box instead of breakfast after a long hike with my 71-year-old father so he could sleep in and have some extra rest that he truly needed. A hotel staff member assured us—not once, but twice—that it would be provided free of charge, emphasizing that they wanted to make our stay as comfortable as possible. However, at checkout, I was charged 17 euros for the lunch box. The receptionist insisted there was nothing to be done and advised me to speak with the manager.

I reached out via email, but my messages were ignored for weeks. When I finally received a response, I was told that offering a free lunch box simply wasn’t part of the hotel’s policy. During a phone conversation, another colleague even mentioned that the manager had said if I hadn't paid the 17 euros, the receptionist would have to cover the cost himself—implying that the error was on the part of the staff who had given me the wrong information.

To add insult to injury, RMK Tours, the travel agency organizing our trip, confirmed that the charge is processed directly from the kitchen to accounting, leaving no room for discretion.

I ended up paying for a service that was promised to be free—all because of the hotel’s misleading communication and lack of accountability. This entire experience has left me feeling deceived and extremely frustrated. I cannot, in good conscience, recommend Hotel O Colmo to anyone. If you value honesty and reliable customer service, steer clear.

This is the first one star review I've...