If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.
Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (EUR273.58), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.
A waft of rose as you wander the gardens, palm trees nodding as if to say ‘yes, we like it here too’, juicy pears to pluck and eat at will: 18th-century Portuguese stay Quinta do Porto Nogueira lies on promising land, where the lushness adds to the sensory pleasures. Most encouraging of all are its vineyards, which steadily supply very sippable bottles, for tastings, and the dining room, for elegant paired dinners. But it’s not just viniculture that’s key here, with local artisans teaching ceramic-making and tile-painting, and the chef imparting traditional recipes, meaning a very palatable intro (or re-intro) to Portugal’s best bits.
12pm. Earliest check-in, 3pm. Both are flexible subject to availability and on request (it’s best to let staff know in advance).
Prices
Double rooms from £248.35 (€290), including tax at 6 per cent.
More details
Rates include a breakfast with breads, toasts topped with avo or ham and cheese, pancakes, muesli, homemade cakes, yoghurts, fruits, juices, coffee and tea.
Also
The hotel has a room on the ground floor which is suitable for guests with reduced mobility, plus they can bring out a ramp in the communal areas if needed.
At the hotel
Farm, orchards, vineyards, rose gardens, winery and boutique, show kitchen, lounges, free-to-borrow bicycles, charged laundry and dry-cleaning service on request, and free WiFi. In rooms: air-conditioning and heating, bathrobes and slippers, free bottled water, and Damana bath products. The villa has a kitchen too.
Our favourite rooms
If you’re travelling as a twosome (a loved-up one, that is), you’ll enjoy the four-poster bed and fireplace-warmed cosiness of the Grand Suite; if you’ve come to wine and wine and then maybe dine as a group, then the villa with its own kitchen makes for a comfy and secluded place to rest up. All rooms here were destined for design greatness, with one half of the owner duo a literature teacher who has painted romantic quotes in most rooms (sometimes the look tips a touch fantastically romantic, so those with a lighter love language should opt for a more rusticated room). And we’re not just recommending the ones set next to the winery for ease of access – they’re really very pleasant crashpads.
Poolside
Fed by a trickling fountain, the sapphire-blue saltwater pool behind the main house is large enough to lap (open 8am to 9pm). Towels are provided and shaded tables, loungers and Azulejo-tiled cubbies are set around the sides.
Spa
There’s not a full spa, but treatments can be arranged in-room, where a therapist will expertly work out your knots.
Packing tips
Perhaps look up some wine-tasting tips beforehand if you want to appear in-the-know, bring wearables that’ll take you from vineyard to beach, and leave space in your suitcase for a bottle or two.
Also
There are plentiful opportunities to make the place your own, whether you’re biting into pears you’ve just pulled from a tree or playing the restored piano in the lounge.
Children
This is not one for little Smiths: you’ll need to be old enough to have valid ID (18 in Portugal) to stay at this wine-washed quinta.
Sustainability efforts
The hotel practises organic, biodynamic agriculture, and promotes local growers and makers, and traditional Portuguese craftsmanship.
Alfresco is the way to go – the hotel is landscaped to allow for sweeping views, and if you want some alone time they can set up a gazebo in romantic style.
Dress Code
This might be a wine stay, but there’s no need to roll out the barrel, just bring some breezy country-suited attire for sipping a few glasses tapped from it instead.
Hotel restaurant
The dining room is in the main house and it’s best to request dinner in advance of your stay. You won’t want to miss out on dishes made using ingredients from the grounds, fresh catches (the saffron and prawn risotto is remarkably good) and picks from local farms. You don’t have to pair wines with your eats, but it’s quite the enhancement for all who partake.
Hotel bar
We think there’s a bottle of something around here… The Romana Vini wine producers put those rows of vines into rivers of excellent red, white and sparkling wines, all of which you can get a tasting of – and a taste for – in the Winery & Barrel Room, with platters of cheeses, and charcuterie. But, if you want a more free-flowing drinking experience, order glasses to the lounges or buy some bottles in the shop to enjoy tucked under the covers.
Last orders
Breakfast is from 8am to a leisurely 11am, lunch from 12pm to 2pm, and dinner from 7pm to 9pm.
Quinta do Porto Nogueira sits on a vine-clad estate just outside Alguber town in rustic Cadaval, set over several terracotta-topped buildings and flowering gardens.
Planes
Lisbon’s Humberto Delgado Airport is about an hour’s drive from the hotel. Transfers (at an extra charge) can be arranged by the hotel on request.
Trains
Óbidos train station is a 25-minute drive from the hotel. There’s a direct route from Santa Apolónia in Lisbon that takes around two hours.
Automobiles
In this more rural part of Lisbon District, a car will come in handy – especially if you’re embarking on a town-to-country two-hander with Lisbon – and there’s secure free parking on-site. For more eco-friendly local forays, hop on one of the free-to-use bikes at the hotel.
Other
The expansive grounds allow for helicopter touchdowns too.
Worth getting out of bed for
If your happy place is being surrounded by fruit-laden vines (and perhaps a pear-hung orchard), then rural Cadaval will have you all tipsy smiles. Quinta do Porto Nogueira is just outside the pretty, regional town of Alguber, and there are plentiful tasting opportunities in its Winery & Barrel room (open 10.30am to 6pm). In season (around August), you can also partake in the journey from grape to bottle, and the Pêra-Rocha harvest when the pears are ready to pluck. Otherwise you can hike or cycle through the vines (bikes are free to borrow), perhaps with a gourmet picnic packed by the chef, or ask for a tour of the local cellars. One day you might swap your glass for binoculars to spy on the spectacular birdlife, or hone in on the geology, flora and fauna of the estate with a guide. Massages, or yoga and pilates classes can be taken in the rose-scented gardens; and unleash your creativity on the landscape, with painting, tile-decorating and ceramics workshops, and a traditional Portuguese cookery class in the dedicated show kitchen.
Off-site, there are several praias to lounge on within a 30-minute drive – or Praia da Areia Branca for body-boarding and surfing a little further out – and a quartet of 18-hole golf courses (including Praia d'El Rey and Bom Sucesso Resort). There’s a daily fruit and vegetable market at Caldas da Rainha; more fresh greenery at Dom Carlos I Park; Roman stronghold Óbidos with castles, churches and a signature sour-cherry liqueur; the country’s only inland salt flats at Rio Maior; Unesco-protected, Gothic, 12th-century Alcobaça Monastery; monuments and sandy isles at fishing port Peniche; and the grand yet unfinished 18th-century Pina Manique Palace in Azambuja. Harder-hitting hikes can be found in Cadaval’s Serra de Montejunto range, and Nazaré beach doesn’t just have a geomorphological phenomenon that forms large surf breaks, but also intriguing local traditions, such as female fishmongers sporting seven handwoven skirts.
Local restaurants
Tribeca, a 30-minute drive from the hotel, serves up fresh seafood in bisques, risottos or baked in their traditional wood-fired oven. A similar distance away, Sabores d’Itália offers plenty of homemade pasta and pizza in an elegant setting.
Local bars
There are several more wineries surrounding the hotel, such as Quinta do Olival da Murta, where you can combine tastings with guided walks to identify indigenous plants. Or Quinta do Rol, which also has a serious equestrian centre.
Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this fertile, family estate in rural Cadaval and unpacked their many wines and pinched-from-the-orchard pears, a full account of their dive into Portuguese culture (and wine) will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside Quinta do Porto Nogueira in Portugal…
Among 18th-century hideaway Quinta do Porto Nogueira’s natural assets – rose gardens, palm trees, pear orchards – there are the neat stripes of vines the owner family have been tending for generations. This means generous tastings at the on-site Casa Romana Vini Winery & Barrel room, pitch-perfect wine pairings with dinner, tours of local cellars, and other tipsy pastimes. But, this is no guests-gone-wild retreat – there’s a sophistication to affairs, plus a deep respect for Portuguese culture here, with workshops in tile-painting and ceramics-making, and cookery classes that delve into the past for inspiration. So, by all means imbibe, because this is the thinking guest’s drinking stay.
