Do Cerro Hotel

2 readers found this review helpful

Fantastic holiday. Fantastic location. Fantastic Hotel. Miguel and Manuel Fantastic Staff
Arrival temp 29c very hot, to hot, infact it just got hotter all week.
On arrival we were meet by Miguel (Almeida) in reception. He was brill at giving us all the Hotel Info we needed. He gave us a lovely welcoming. I would highly recommend that he do reception duties all the time. He should be the Hotels front man. The rest of the reception staff were hit and miss, moody, and we soon learned that if we needed anything to wait until Miguel was about. The rest of the reception staff could do with taking a few lessons from Miguel.
Our room was the smallest in the whole hotel, room 101, very compact, with a small balcony but very clean and neat. Maids excellent. Air con was on a timer and kept our room lovely and cool. No safe in this room, it was at reception and you had to ask reception staff to let you in and out (this seemed to cause the staff some hassle except Miguel) Only down-side to the room was that there was no washing line on the balcony to dry beach towels etc. My saying is 'if you are complaining about your Hotel room then you are spending to much time in it!'
The Hotel pool was fab, very clean and the sun loungers class. The wee pool cafe was very short staff and you had to wait on your order. This would need to be looked at, it needs 2 members of staff at lunchtimes But the food excellent try the chicken salad sandwiches, yummy. The tv in the cafe is broke and kept switching itself of, very annoying for my hubby who could not get to watch his footie in peace. This tv needs replaced.
The Hotel bar was run by a lovely friendly wee man called Manuel, he always had a smile and was really cheerful. The Hotel bar had entertainment on every night, but to be honest there was only 2 nights of interest to us. The 2 nights of the singing guitarist need replaced, even bingo or pub quizes would be a massive improvement.
The Hotel breakfast is just the norm as in any hotel. The Hotel small fruit loaf is beautiful and the bread is lovely. Buffet Dinner I would give a miss, I recommend that you get a voucher at reception for the Hotel Steak House the food is 100% better than the buffet, and the voucher gives you 10% off.
The Hotel is approx 2 mins walk from a fantastic beach, and approx 8-10 min walk from the Old Town and The Square. It is down a slight hill and a few steps. You have to climb this hill back to the hotel it is steep but you are at the top before you realise, for those who are lazy a taxi back to the Hotel from the The Old Town is 5 euro, but you will have walked it quicker!!
The Square is a fab place, there was entertainment on every evening, the Square was massive and there was approx 3-4 entertainers on at the same time, you just moved from cafe to cafe and watched them all for free! The Square is surrounded by cafes and restaurants.
If you are a plain eater like my hubby we found a fab wee restaurant called The Shalom II
or The Shalom I all the same place, off a side street from The Square, easy found. We got Steak, chips, rice, saute onions&veg and sauce all for 9.95 euro (and the steak is cooked to your liking). Their Grandmas apple pie and fresh cream is to die for. We lived in this wee restaurant all week, lunch or dinner it was fab, not a bad meal once.
Would we go back....YES
Would we book same Hotel ....YES
Would we recommend this Holiday ....YES

1 reader found this review helpful

I stayed in Hotel do cerro for 7 nights with 6 of my family a friends last week.
Weather... 10 out of 10, and am missing it already, but as for the hotel, awful.
The staff did not smile once during the whole week, they are all rude and miserable, they act like they are all doing you a huge favour by being there.
The food was vile with some pretty strange combinations, IE... french fries with boiled carrots, sliced beef in watery gravy, breakfast was the same all week, stodgy scrambled egg, beans, tinned hotdogs and a discusting excuse for bacon, it was like heated up ham, fish curry, rice with king prawns in but unpeeled prawns, with all the stringy pink bits in every mouthall that you had to spend 10 mins picking out. they had fresh rolls in the morning but hard ones in the evening. I basically lived on the rolls all week and did not eat in there as i really couldnt stomach it. Im not a fussy eater but it was just too discusting. the last straw was bread full of blue furry mould on, which Iv taken pictures of. Also the desserts didnt seem to have any sugar in them, so couldnt eat those either. The dinner tables are covered in ants.
you get no drink with dinner and if you get booked in on the 7.45pm meal (like we did) then all the fresh half decent food is gone and your left with the crap
We all went half board, but we all ended up eating out and spending our actual spending money on food, which I am very annoyed about so I am demanding all of our half board money back as this is not acceptable. I would go as far as to say this completely ruined our holiday, which like everybody else, we saved up hard earned cash to pay for and was looking forward to. we each paid £600, we got 2 rooms with 3 people in each, very crammed, dirty, no clean bedding or towels and even had to ask for more toilet rolls. The rep Jamie wasnt interested at all. we also didnt get given a meal on our departure day, even though we arrived late on the previous thursday so missed dinner, surely we should have been given dinner on the following thursday we left as that makes it 7 meals, 7 days, but we got told that our dinner was actually the sandwich and apple that was put in our rooms on arrival, which was half of a sandwich with just cheese in and no butter.
This hotel is NOT a 4* please dont anybody think it is. it is nothing short of a dirty old hostel and ill never understand how they can get away with rating it as that.
I must just add that, on the night of our checking in at the airport to come home, (10pm) we all got told by the rep that our plane was still in gatwick as there was a technical problem. and as faro airport was closing at midnight, we would all have to get put in a hotel untill further notice. you can imagine how everybody felt at being told that. we just wanted to go home.
So 4 hrs later we got put on a coach to a hotel 40 mins away.
Well, what can I say, the hotel was like the hilton or the ritz, it was a 5* BEAUTIFUL hotel. we got given a room per 2 people, dinner laid on downstairs, free wine everything. and breakfast the next morning was amazing. never had nothing like it. so how hotel do cerro state a 4* compared to that other 5* hotel I will never know.
It cost thompson thousands for us all to go there and im glad because they should tell people what these crappy hotels are really like before misleading people.
Our insurance states that we get £15 for every 12 hrs of a delay, ours was 16 hrs, but thomsons have informed us we wont get that because they put us up in a hotel for the night. WOW, BIG DEAL like we should be grateful, as much as that hotel was nice, we didnt want to stay, we all had work the next day, we didnt have a choice in the matter. Hence us all losing wages.
Just think twice about this hotel, overall, portugse people are miserable, stern faced, unfriendly people, and i feel terrible that I booked it and gave my family and friends the worse holiday theyve ever had, wish somebody warned me.

1 reader found this review helpful

Right where do i start! thsi hotel really was the holiday from hell!
after reading serveral reviews before we went myself and my husband where really lookingn forward to going to Portugal. Although on arrival to the hotel we could not believe it.... it was rated as a 4* hotel I would not even have given it 2*, i have travelled to many european countries and the service from this hotel was by far the worst i have ever experience.
Alongside the food that made me and my husband bed bound for 3 days - only in our early twenties. I was unable to leave the room from the morning after we got there until our 3rd day i had ionly eatern in our hotel. The food was a disgrace and to staff are all very miserble - the hotel is in desperate need of modernisation still cannot believe they rate it 4*.
There was major building work going on in the hotel that that no body was informed about. i was woken at 7am every morning by load banging and machine work - this holiday was a nightmare i could not wait to get home - i had to have 4 days sick leave of work when i returned from being so ill.
PLease do not go to this hotel unless you want seriously bad food poisoning and a crap holiday - the final touch was the plastic birds in the bird santury round the pool lovely!

1 reader found this review helpful

Have visited this family run hotel several times and each time it simply is better. Quaint hotel with individual rooms. Hotel re-invests continually to improve facilities and looks after guests with genuine interest.
Food may not be to every one's tastes but the hotel offers customers what they want for a good relaxing and enjoyable stay. You are made to feel like a valued customer.
Booking independently is simple or book direct with the hotel for great discounts.
Certainly will be returning again in the near future.

Hotel was not 4 star standard, the staff were unfriendly and not helpful.
The food was low budget and of low variety. Hotel situated on top of an hill therefore lots of walking to the town.
There were not enough sunbeds by the pool. We would not stay there again.

1 reader found this review helpful

Hotel was not the standard of a UK 4 Star, food low budget and of little variety, not enough sun beds by the pool, most staff unhelpful and not friendly. Only one person working in coffee shop therefore a 30 minute wait to be served. Restaurant would only serve some drinks, the rest you had to walk into another bar in the hotel. Location on top of a hill, lots and lots of walking. We would not go back there again.

2 readers found this review helpful

The Estalagem is a lovely friendly hotel. Staff on arrival were polite and helpful. Food was a mix of service and buffet but pretty varied and of a good standard. Breakfast was buffet, bit of everything - really good!
The pool area is lovely, the hotel is advised as good for adults and it was lovely to relax with no kids diving in the pool. Plenty of sun loungers for all while we were there and no need to fight to reserve any!
The hotel is quite quirky, lots of corridors and stairs and it is either side of the road but it is quite fun to see which way you get back to your room.
It is quite close to a school so it can be slightly noisy and also the hotel is at the top of a very big hill - if you want a nice stroll to the beach and back don't stay here!!
Views from the hotel are really good and the beach at Albufeira is fab! Entertainment at the hotel is not wonderful but there are various bars near the sea front with good entertainment and well priced drinks.
We loved it, very relaxing but not many young people (we are early 20's).