Farol Hotel

great location - walk to nature or walk to city. very nice and helpful staff.inclusive full breakfast buffet add to a good value

Perfect location around 5 minutes walk from Marina, 10 minutes to town and 15 to train station. Friendly staff, clean rooms and lovely seawater pool. We even saw dolphins from the hotel twice.

First of all a big thanks to all the team. Nothing was too much trouble. Location right on the rock’s fabulous if you have great weather which we did! Our bedroom and the pool area let it down. Bedroom needed a refurbishment and the pool area in need of a smartening up as a 5 star does require. It was still an enjoyable stay and would visit again.

great location on the water just outside of the town center.

We had 2 nights in the Farol as part of a multi-location tour in Portugal. It was booked via Amex "Hotel Collection" 5 months before. It was around £450 per night and we were given a sea view room on the 1st floor facing west. Firstly, the positives - the staff were nice. The food in the restaurant was nice. The breakfast was OK, though not as extensive as other 5* hotels but then it's a bit smaller. Scratch a bit deeper, though, and it's trying too hard to be edgy and chic/contemporary, without actually thinking about the practicalities of the guest experience. Lots of little things should just be better, especially at this price point - the slabs of bare, undecorated concrete outside are all blotchy and look like a domestic patio that hasn't been cleaned for years. The stupid plastic chairs used in the dining room make a horrible screeching noise when you move them. There's nowhere comfortable to sit outside in the shade. Perhaps the biggest disappointment was the room itself - after being shown down to it by the super-enthusiastic staff member, almost the first thing I noticed was the prominent tear in the carpet. Then he started opening the cupboards to show us where everything was, and made numerous apologies for the noise - the cheap black wood/veneer doors made maddening creaking noises at the slightest move. I wondered "now, will he go to maintenance and get them to fix this with a bit of oil?" No, he didn't. And I didn't bother reporting it to reception so boo to me too. The room has no decor like pictures - it's a monochrome box. The bed was comfy and there was a single chair. There was plenty of hanging and drawer space if you could suffer the racket the cupboard doors make. My wife said it's not much better than a Travelodge and she's right. It's a £150-200 a night room in a hotel that wants to add £250+ on top because of where it is. All in, this could be a great hotel - it needs the outside to be spruced up and attention to detail on the decor if they want to make it a true luxury / boutique hotel. By contrast, we went straight from Farol to drive to Algarve, and stated at the Vila Vita Parc hotel for about the same nightly rate - and were immediately blown away by the staff, setting, attention to detail, the room (even though it was their cheapest room).

A nice room but very small and dark with poor storage space.

I had a 3 night stay (with 2 different reservations) as you are not able to amend your reservation. The first room had a large amount of ants. The solution offered was to send housekeeping. I asked for a different room. The staff member made sure I knew it was an "upgrade" as if thats what I waa lookong for. I was put into a room that did in fact have a lovely view, however was directly behind the kitchen and seemingly had construction on the 2nd floor above my room. VERY NOISY UNTIL VERY LATE (1am). Because of the ants, they offered me the breakfast for the 1st day at no charge. Mind you, had I been to amend my first booking I would have added rhe same room package type. When this was offered to me, I voiced my concerns to the front desk clerk. This was to be my boujie hotel on this trip. I spent a lot of money for a fancy hotel that offered subpar accommodations. I will not return and do not recommend.