6/10 Okay
David
Sep 18, 2023
Liked: Cleanliness
Disliked: Staff & service, amenities
There has always been a swampy sadness for me about these riparian landscapes such as the traveler finds at this bend of the Rio Mira. In this case, the Monte do Zambujeiro offers little to lift his mood. Perhaps Jose Saramago would have found a kernel here with which he could identify the "real" Alentejo as he made his way to Portugal early in the post-Salazar times. But today the traveler is greeted with a tired bed, a restaurant only open by special arrangement, and a hospitality that one may courteously describe as perfunctory and transactional. The traveler and his companion were reminded more than once of the check-out time (11 a.m.) and were careful to depart at 10:50 a.m. both to make the point and to be spared being tossed out like used linen. Others chasing the ghost of Portugal's literary Nobelist around the country may choose to stop and stay here, but this traveler will pass on doing so again, instead making his way on to a more comfortable place at which he and his companion may lay there weary heads. It takes the fullness of time to create a property that is memorable and worth visiting; it need not be the work of generations to provide a warm and generous hospitality.