help with madeira (and lisbon) accomodations please
 

hi. my boyfriend + i just booked a trip to portugal for early september. we are going to be in lisbon sept 3-7 and madeira sept 7-13. so far, we have begun searching for places to stay in madeira - but, would love some suggestions from fodorites who have stayed in these places before. we will most likely rent a car when we get to madeira - but, we won't have one in lisbon.

here's what we have in mind for madeira:

- we're looking for places under 100 euro per night (will be converting to us dollars).

- we don't want to stay in a huge hotel in the hotel zone. (but, probably don't want to be too far from the funchal city centre.)

- we don't need to stay in a hotel. an apartment-type place or other accomodation would be fine, too.

- would love to have views of the sea.

- looking for a place with a swimming pool.

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any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
THANKS!!!

We enjoyed the Baia Azul (a 4* hotel) during our trip to Madeira - it's about 2-3 km outside of Funchal, so it's out of the hotel zone. Beautiful seaviews from the room (which was fairly large) and a nice pool. It's a nice leisurely walk into Funchal, with plenty of shopping and great places to eat along the way. ENJOY!

thanks for all of your replies thus far. i will look into your suggestions.

on another note... as i was doing more research last night + looking at accomodations online, i found many places that were not neccessarily close to funchal that looked really great. so, i would like to ammend my posting here + say that we are open to pretty much ANY LOCATION on the island (except the "hotel zone"). madeira is not that big, and we will have a car.

thanks again so much!!!

You want to stay in Funchal or close by: the main roads near Funchal have been rebuilt and are in v. good shape, the farther out you are the more the older the roads; driving in Madeira is mainly on windy roads and in the evening after a few drinks may be adventurous; one week in Madeira, you want to be close to Funchal as there is little in way of restaurant choices outside of Funchal. I would suggest the Madeira website for hotel choices on the island. One highly recommended restaurant in Funchal is on the tiny spit of land where the cruise ships dock(sorry, currently forget the name even though we ate there twice in May)atop of the ruined fortress - excellent views of Funchal in the evening, great food at reasonable prices. I'll get the name and post.
In Lisbon we stayed at the Britannia - v. nice boutique-ish hotel with excellent personable staff.

the name of the restaurant in Madeira is O'Mole - highly recommended and go esp in the evening just before sunset. During the night, the lights of Funchal town are aglow and the view is special-enjoy!

At the beginning of the hotel zone and 15 min. walk from the centre of Funchal there's a boutique hotel called Quinta Perestrello. I haven't stayed there myself but I certainly will next time we go to Madeira. It has private parking which, in Funchal, is essential! Even if you have a car, you will not want to use it every time you feel like going to the centre.
Here's some more information: http://www.charminghotelsmadeira.com...erestrello/en/

thanks so much for your replies to my posting. my boyfriend and i just booked a room in the garden cottage at the casa das videiras (http://www.casa-das-videiras.com/) for the madeira part of our trip. the house that we will be staying at is actually at the opposite end of the island from funchal. it is in the village of seixal. we decided to stay there because we could not resist the promising beauty of the unspoiled coast and the natural warm pools on the ocean there (which are actually a very short walk from the house). also, the host, johnny, was exceptionally helpful with our questions and seemed very kind. i will follow up after our trip to let you know about our stay at casa das videiras. but, again, thanks so much for your suggestions! and, to richard k, we will definitely try to check out the restaurant that you spoke of (O'Mole). i feel like i read about the same place on this board through another posting. it sounds wonderful!

well, we just need to book our hotel for the 3 days in lisbon, and we will be all set to go! if anyone has any more suggestions for lisbon hotels, please let me know.

thanks!!!
sarah

If you are interested in self-catering this site is worth a look

www.medeiraapartments.com

there are nice apartments from 40 - 60+ euro's per day

There is a Best Western in Funchal too that has rates under 100 euro.

Madeira is simply stunning - have a fab time.

thanks, bbib. we already booked a place for madeira though. but, i will keep the apartment idea open if we ever return to madeira in the future. i am, however, looking into an apartment as an option for the 3 days we will be in lisbon. we'll see what happens. i suppose i better move fast. we are leaving for portugal on september 3rd! yikes!

thanks again,
sarah