This is a difficult review to write. As all the other reviewers have said, Dulcineia (Guilherme’s mother) is very kind and welcoming. We saw her only when we checked in and briefly just before leaving, but she left a basket of lemons, wine and pasteis de nata for us. The rest of the reviews, however, we couldn’t really agree with. There are mentions of new furniture and a relaxing garden, whereas we found old, make-do furniture and a quite scruffy outside area where there was nowhere comfortable to sit. Sadly, the house wasn’t very clean. The shower wouldn’t drain, and a bit of prodding uncovered why – a disgusting backlog of black gunge and hair. We spent a bit of time scrubbing the blackened fire door so that you could actually see flames! Old places are hard to keep pristine, of course, but there was a feeling that it had been a bit neglected. Things like an old woollen blanket covering up part of the cement floor in the bedroom didn’t make us feel comfortable.
Essentials were a bit lacking – some bare lightbulbs, candlesticks but no candles, a coffee pod machine with no pods, no proper coffee-pot alternative and no cleaning materials, for example
On three nights, we couldn’t open the window because of a very unpleasant smell. There’s a water treatment works down through the woods, and the giant Lactogal milk processing factory, but it wasn’t clear where the smell was coming from. It was never a problem during the day, however.
This could be a really nice place, It’s cheap, Dulcineia is lovely, the bedroom is large and airy with its own terrace and it’s well-placed for getting to the coast, to Aveiro or to the Paiva boardwalk. Providing you know what to expect, you shouldn’t discount it. Having stayed in a lot of AirBnB places all over the world, though, it’s only fair to paint a more accurate picture for other travellers. For us, it was a little too ‘rustic' and we felt it needed some more attention to make it a comfortable place to stay.