Kimkim Trip Reviews for Portugal

We absolutely love our experience at Cascade Wellness Resort. It was exactly what we were looking for!

I was not happy at all with the location of this hotel. It was very far from the beach or any location we would be wanting to visit. It was a big step down from the hotel in Portugal and after a full day of travel we were very disspointed to say the least. We ended up moving to another hotel which was much preferred.

Nuno was a wonderful tour guide! We loved this day and we were able to see so much of the area.

The azulejos in the lobby were incredibly beautiful and they had a great breakfast for guests. Very friendly staff and a quiet, comfortable room. If you have time, make a reservation to watch the sunset go down from the top floor patio. Great way to end your day.

Really nice, clean hotel, in a great location, within walking distance of most iconic sights.

Super helpful staff. Small room, but not a problem for one night.

Great location! Clean! Decent size room...small by American standards, though. Great staff!

Very cool suites hotel. Tons of room! Location is great once there, but hard to get to by car.

Very roomy apartment hotel. Tons of room! Location was pretty good. 20 min walk into old town center. Staff was nice, but not overly helpful.

Great airport hotel. We stayed here the night before our flight out, and it was an easy 5 minute walk from the hotel to the terminal!

Great way to see Porto! And more of Porto than on a walking tour. Our guide was amazing, and followed up with her suggestions on where to eat!

This is a must do while in Porto. Small van experience with 8 other great people from all over the world. Our guide was friendly and knowledgable, and it was a perfect day of wine tasting and seeing the Douro Valley!

This was fine, but our driver didn't speak english, so there was no conversation. Which is totally okay, but it just turned out to be a taxi ride, basically.

We love to do food tours when we arrive into a city. This one was great. We had two guides, both knowledgable about the food and the city! We were a group of 8 and it was very comfortable. We loved it!

Turned out, we were the only ones on this tour! So it was essentially a privately guided tour. Perfect for us. We saw many parts of the city, and learned much of the history of Lisbon. Highly recommended tour!

Great night! Food good. Service good. Entertainment good. What else could you ask for!

Had a tough time with this one. It was pouring rain in the morning, which didn't help, but regardless of the rain, the crowds and waiting lines at Sintra were ridiculous. We spent over 2 hours basically standing, moving 3-6 feet, standing again, etc. I would NOT recommend Sintra at all. On the contrary, I loved the rest of the tour. Cascais is an amazing place, and would have like to have spent much more time there. Lastly, the guide and bus driver were not aware that they needed to return us to our hotels, and basically left several travelers stranded, needing to Uber back to our hotels. Bad communication.

Our guide, Joanna, was great! Fun, bubbly, smart, and a great 4x4 driver! We loved this experience, primarily because of her!

Loved this place! Family run and a beautiful location. Met some wonderful people from all over the world, and enjoyed a lovely lunch and wine outside.

My only comment on this one is that it wasn't long enough! I loved it. Great crew, great boat and beautiful scenery! I could have spent an entire day doing this!!

Great hotel in a perfect location!

Can’t beat this location! Minutes walk from one of the nicest beaches in Lagos!

Great tour to see harder to walk parts of Lisbon!

Kind of a let down, for 2 reasons: the weather which is obviously no one’s fault but the tour guide herself was not good! Not a pleasant experience being with her for over 9 hours. Also this tour isn’t a small group, it is a huge tour bus

This is an extraordinary hotel! I wish only that we had spent more than one night here.

Make it more than one night!

This is a good hotel that perhaps comes more fully into its own during the high season. It seemed somewhat chaotic and understaffed, which may have been a result of coming back from Covid. Also, the pools outside are not heated so it's not pleasant for swimming if it's cool outside. The indoor pool isn't especially nice (though probably good for small children), so that's not a great option. Much was closed in the hotel while we were there also, which may have been due to it's not being high season. Our room with the sea view was lovely.

Excellent airport hotel. Had everything a traveller needs and extremely helpful staff.

This was one of our favourite experiences. Vitor and Andre were great and we had a blast!

The location was nice, but it was 100km from our hotel. The food was minimal and we didn't eat with the local family. Dialogue with them was also minimal. This is one I would have skipped.

A romantic getaway. Beautiful music to hear along with good food. Worth the money spent. But, we should have been picked up from the hotel.

The beauty and quaintness of Infante Sagres made us feel like we stepped back in history. Excellent breakfast and very lovely staff.

The M'ar de Ar Aqueduto hotel was classic and serene offering an exceptional gastronomy experience. The spa was great and the hotel grounds are beautiful.

The M'ar de Ar Aqueduto hotel was classic and serene offering an exceptional gastronomy experience. The spa was great and the hotel grounds are beautiful.

Embarking on our first full day in Portugal we met our lovely guide, Pedro, and immediately delved into Porto’s history through a walking tour. Pedro was warm and patient, adjusting the pace of our tour as necessary to help accommodate the elderly. He was extremely knowledgeable about Porto’s history, and he answered all of our questions along the way. Engaging in conversation was a breeze and very insightful. We truly felt Pedro went above and beyond. We highly recommend this tour!

Shortly after arriving to Portugal, we met with Sergio for a walking culinary experience. Sergio was very personable and knowledgeable about Portuguese cuisine (cod, sardines, traditional dishes, and pastries) and wine. Sergio guided us through the city center experiencing great dishes, cafes, and restaurants along the way, then he led us off the beaten path to experience more local treasures. This tour was an excellent way to begin our Porto experience!

Our excursion to Sintra and Cascais with our amazing guide, Nuno, was pretty magical. The Quinta da Regaleira that we visited in Sintra was like something out of a fanciful novel. Every bit of it was picturesque and at the risk of sounding corny, exploring the grounds was full of wonder. Nuno then took us to Restaurante da Adraga, the best beach-side, seafood restaurant we’ve ever been to. The food, wine, dessert, and service were top notch. After lunch, Nuno made sure we had an opportunity to visit and enjoy the shops and sights of Cascais. To top off our experience, this particular day was Freedom Day. Sharing in that moment with Nuno was a heart-warming experience. We feel blessed to have such wonderful and vivid memories of this day.

If you have a curiosity or enthusiasm for the Middle Ages, Tomar is a place that transports you to the period of the Knights Templar. Here, in Tomar, we visited the Castle of the Knights Templar. This site is an architectural marvel, and we were graciously allowed time to really take in the expanse of the castle and its grounds. Moments were powerful, serene, and haunting. A must-see for any history buff!

The day in Aveiro and Costa Nova with Marta was a treat! Marta is an incredibly knowledgeable guide with a well-rounded repertoire of places to visit and things to try. First, we spent the morning and early afternoon touring Aveiro, learning about the city’s large array of Art Nouveau buildings as well as its history as a once, major exporter of sea salts. We viewed the active salt flats via tuk-tuk and visited local shops by foot to collect a variety of local salts, canned fish, and egg yolk treats. Perfect for culinary aficionados or home cooks! We also enjoyed a boat tour on the canals of Aveiro where we learned that many of the guides are indeed local fishermen. It was a charming city. After Aveiro, Marta took us to dine in another town called Costa Nova. Here we enjoyed a fresh and delicious seafood lunch at Canastra do Fidalgo. Conversation with Marta was intriguing. We felt like we understood Portugal and way-of-life in the country much more holistically through her insights.

Now into the wild: the safari cork tour was a quiet diversion from our city excursions, as we made our journey south to the Alentejo Region. Our safari’s guide, Joanna, was both personable and quite knowledgeable about the lands that produced cork and wine. Always interested in understanding origination, production, and distribution, our visit to a cork factory after our safari tour was appreciated. One of us is now happily awaiting a unique piece of cork furniture directly from Cortiçarte. Our primary guide in Alentejo/Evora was Miguel. Miguel was outstanding! He truly went above and beyond to maximize our experiences in the region with care, consideration, and kindness. Amongst the most enjoyable of the experiences that we shared in the Alentejo was our visit to the small olive orchard, the Monte da Oliveira Velha estate, where Amor é Cego is produced. There, our hosts João and family warmly greeted us and shared the history of the estate before welcoming us to their table for an olive oil tasting and lunch. This experience was truly special.

There was no better way to end an amazing trip to Portugal than with an Algarve sunset experience guided by Pedro! Pedro was very personable, courteous, and possessed a wealth of knowledge of the Algarve. En route to St. Vincent Cape of Sagres via a 4WD jeep, Pedro took us to see some of the most picturesque views of beaches and breathtaking landscapes, particularly Cordoama Viewpoint! Pedro planned our experience perfectly giving us plenty of time to take in these views along the way. Our trip concluded at St. Vincent Cape of Sagres where we witnessed the most captivating sunset while enjoying great wine and bread with chorizo.

Our day started with meeting our incredible tour guide, Nelson, who guided us on our day excursion to Douro Valley. He filled us with the history of Douro Valley; Portuguese history and culture; and, insight on the vineyards' planting, harvesting, and production. One of the highlights of our tour was our lunch at Toca da Raposa, a quaint, family-owned restaurant that featured an excellent menu and wine selection. The wine tasting at Quinta da Pacheca was a charming experience, which we thoroughly enjoyed.

Location couldn't be better - hotel was clean and had a great breakfast. Room was pretty small, but you expect that in Europe.

There are two "secret" elevators nearby that locals use to avoid the hills. We found them towards the end of our stay - both are a left turn as you leave the hotel.

Stunning hotel! We would be very happy to stay there again. Our room was very recently refinished (it smelled like they had finished that morning) and had a couple of odd quirks. Namely the front door was abnormally short such that my husband had to duck to come in. And despite the room being HUGE, the bathroom didn't have a door on it which we found uncomfortable. Views were incredible, breakfasts were great.

Great location, friendly staff, very clean, good breakfast. Almost too trendy...looks like it was designed to be instagrammed. A small thing, but they could use sheer curtains on the windows, it was either blackout or be fully exposed to the courtyard and guests on the other side of it.

Amazing! Loved it! Highlight of my trip (I say "my" because my husband missed it due to jetlag). I learned so much, the guide Daniela was superb, and it was the perfect way to spend four hours in Lisbon.

So, the destinations were lovely. But our "guide" Rui on this was really pretty terrible. This was originally meant to be a small group tour and we really wish it had been. Rui was our private "guide" but he was really more like a driver. He didn't have anything to tell us about about the sights even we asked him really easy questions. As soon he picked us up he started to try to sell us on booking a walking tour with him in Lisbon and using him to book stuff for Douro where we were going next. Since he didn't have anything useful to say about the sights he was more like an awkward third wheel that we wanted to ditch. We overheard some of the stuff other guides were telling their guests and really felt like we missed out.

Our guide was nice and the bikes were in good condition, but we would not recommend this excursion. Porto is not at all a cycling city. We were riding bikes on crowded sidewalks and through narrow streets where it felt alternately super rude and super unsafe to be biking. Our guide mentioned that we were a small group (seven of us) and I literally cannot imagine having any more of us do that at once. Avid cyclists will be mortified and anxious cyclists will panic. Stick to walking tours.

This was a good tour of the city and our guide was very knowledgeable and personable. Through no fault of her own though she followed the SPECTACULAR guide I had had for the food tour, who is a hard act to follow and had already shared a lot of the same information. At this point we had already walked some of these spots as well, albeit with less context. I would recommend doing this tour before the food tour to help set overall context for Lisbon.

This vastly exceeded our expectations. I really expected this to be a tourist trap dinner and a show type deal - and I mean yes, mostly there were tourists there, but the quality of the performances and the food were very high. And a few locals even came in later on! Definitely recommend.

We loved everything about Quinta de la Rosa - I would just recommend leaving out the lunch portion of this or adding some expectation setting. It was a huge (delicious) lunch that ended up being the same thing as I had ordered for my dinner at their restaurant the night before. It was huge and lengthy and ended up taking a huge chunk of the day when I think we would have preferred a light salad and to move on to another tasting instead.

Nicely appointed historical hotel. Made us feel a part of the culture.

Denielle was an incredible tour guide. We’re pretty sure she knows everyone in Lisbon and they knew her! Food was great, drinks were great and she made us feel a part of this awesome culture.

This was the highlight of our trip. Vito and his staff not only attended to our every need, he ensured we were involved in every aspect of our experience. Vito’s talent, passion, and negotiation skills ensured we had the best ingredients! The fish market was great!!! Once arriving at his kitchen we were quickly immersed in an awesome culinary experience of which every aspect was carefully choreographed with passion and fun! The sea bass, crab and shrimp main course was outstanding! The fish soup was even better. Vito never hesitated to give us credit for cooking our own dinner, but we all knew better. Without his passion for quality ingredients and free spirit for fun -it could have been just another dinner. Vito has our strongest recommendation. If your passionate about great food and making new friends, this the experience for you. . We consider Vito and his staff family now. Thank-you for all you do!!

Tomash or Tommy was incredibly knowledgeable about every aspect of our tour. More importantly he was a blast! Tommy made our day with him very fun and we learned many things about the incredible city of Porto. Touring with Tommy is highly recommended!

Tomash or Tommy was incredibly knowledgeable about every aspect of our tour. More importantly he was a blast! Tommy made our day with him very fun and we learned many things about the incredible city of Porto. Touring with Tommy is highly recommended!

This was our most favourite place of our whole trip and we adjusted our itinerary to meet their 2-night requirement because nothing else compared in the Douro. The facilities, the views, the wine, the food, the amenities and the service were unparalleled. It’s a most special place that we’d want to return to every year. Truly a hidden gem.

Allow yourself a few days here to enjoy the property and surrounding areas

We had the most fantastic tour with our private guide. It was hands and away the best way to experience Porto. The four hours we had together flew by and the tour was one of the highlights of our trip.

The palace is away from the most touristed areas but nestled in the hills of the Algarve with lovely grounds and view. It was really nice to stay away from a crowded area. It felt special. The restaurant was good. The pool has a lovely open view. The location was good and we drove to all the spots we wanted to see- old town Faro, Lagos, Sagres and Cabo Sao Vicente, Rio Formosa. We even drove to Sevilla Spain - 1.5 hour away to spend the day.

You need to book your dinner meals as the restaurant has limited seatings.

Beautiful ride. We didn't see a lot of birds but the excursion was beautiful.