Pousada Valença

Beautiful hotel in perfect location on the Camino.

We stopped here for drinks & snacks whilst on an excursion in the area. The hotel is situated in a lovely location with views over the river and surrounding area. It was clean, the staff spoke good English but it was average otherwise. The food and drinks were OK but we've had better in local cafes in the town.

This is a nice location, but the management has irritating inflexibility on a couple of fronts. Breakfast only served from 8 am, bearing in mind that is 9am if you are crossing into Spain very late. Their biggest crime is charging 5 euros for bicycle storage. I have stayed in hundreds of hotels with my bike, and this is the first time anyone has suggested such a thing.

Staff very helpful and friendly. Some of them with very good command of English. I had forgotten some item in the room and they phoned me later to inform me about it and arranged to send it to my home address. The room was nice, breakfast individually served, unfortunately the Restaurant was closed, maybe because of very few visitors at this time of the year. Location and views great and parking no problem, just getting there is a bit tricky due to the narrow streets and archways of the fortress.

A lovely place to enjoy a delicious Portuguese lunch. With our minimal Portuguese they could still understand us when we tried to order food (delicious chicken and potatoes and seafood stew). If the wait for our food wasn't that long and I didn't have to beg a waiter to put a parasol up next to our table, it would have been a straight 5 star experience. I love their tradition of offering scrumptious bread before the food arrives!