Advice about hotels in Portugal
 

We are planning a trip to Portugal in March. How important is it to book hotels ahead of time for various regions, is it easy to find a room when you get to a city? Hotel recommendations? Prices? Is it easy to take the bus or train between cities?<BR>Any advice about Portugal would be greatly appreciated.

S&C--- the local tourist offices are gems for information on availability and help on getting the type of lodging and in the price range you want. We toured the Costa Verde region of Spain and ventured down to Porto, without reservations. We only knew we wanted to spend some days in Viana Do Castelo. Their tourist office set us up in a nice one-bedroom apartment by the ocean for $30/day. The area was gorgeous and we would had never know about it otherwise. I'll say let the local tourist office help you out. As far as public transport, we drove, so I can't offer any personal opinion there. Enjoy Portugal, probably one of the last places in Europe where you can still see the real "Old World".

Portugal is great--I have done it twice in March. It is not easy to navigate in Portugal without a car--the rail system is not as good as the rest of Europe.<BR>You can always get a room that time of year just not necessarily in the place you may want. The Pousadas are the best answer in many locations. Search for previous threads on this forum. Portugal has a good data base here.

I would recommend you try to get reservations at a Pousada. It is run by the government, and they have pousadas tht are regional and historic. They are very well kept and the price not too bad. <BR><BR>My wife and I were just in Portugal two weeks ago, where we spent a week. I searched the Internet for a reasonable hotel and found one in the downtown area the Lutecia, in my opinion, quite satisfactory and reasonable in price.<BR><BR>There is a web site www.hoteldiscount.com that can help you with rates, reservations, etc. <BR><BR>We rented a car and drove around Lisbon and then went south to the Algarve, but you can move around Portugal in buses and trains, maybe not as good as other systems in Europe but it will get you there. <BR><BR>You may be interested in taking a conducted tour of Portugal, they take care of all the driving and even accommodations. There is so much to see there, either in the north or to the south. You may also want to consider staying at a Pousada, where the government has taken castles, forts and other historic buildings and converted them to hotels.<BR><BR>Any question? I'll be glad to answer your e-mail. LARRY

I would suggest you to check out www.bancotel.com since it has some interesting hotels within its list in Portugal. March is a great time to visit Portugal, especially Alentejo region (Evora, Monsaraz, Marvao, Vila Vi&ccedil;osa, Estremoz, Beja, etc) and Serra da Estrela area as for landscapes.