Sao Rafael Suites

The hotel decor was stylish and elegant. We were upgraded to a spacious suite with a separate living room and 2 bathrooms and sea views, a complete surprise. They offered lunch on the day of arrival or departure as an extra. We left our bags and took a bolt to old town, spent time at beach before check-in at 4pm. It's about 8 min away by car and cost €3.66 one way. They have "snack time" between the main meals, which is actually good enough to be a 2nd breakfast and lunch. All-inclusive selection was decent. It is not a huge resort but still enough choice and most important thing is all the dishes tasted good, quality over quantity is always worth it. We requested one halal meat dish in advance for dinner, you can request more from the choices via email. They made sure to bring it to our table as soon as we asked for it to be served. Staff were helpful, kind, and friendly at reception and restaurant, always smiling. Two pools outside we couldn't use as out of season. Indoor pool in spa cost €15 to €20 euro depending on all day or few hours use. It rained on one day, so we used the spa pool and sauna. Only 2-3 other people came and went in the time we were there, which we liked. I read reviews of no coffee facilities in room, we did have a machine. Iron was brought up once requested, and they never took it back throughout our stay, which was nice. I read reviews of people complaining about golfer groups, this did concern me before going. However, once we were there it wasn't as issue at all. Yes, lot of golfers but they had fun and didn't bother others. Once we were in our room 126 we never had any noise disruption. The bed was comfortable, I actually slept well. Only thing I would point out is the mattress makes a lot of noise like a bean bag, not sure why. I would recommend this hotel to others for sure. Go with the right expectations and you will be pleasantly surprised.

Lovely hotel, location, food, drink and staff! Pool area was very relaxing with comfortable sun loungers. We dined in the hotels additional restaurant called Toscaria which was also very enjoyable and worth a visit.

We found this Hotel to be in a great location, you're close enough to all the touristy bits, but also just far enough out. We don't mind walking, so used to walk daily to the The Marina and Albufeira Old Town. There is a bit of a challenging hill outside the Hotel but we're used to things like that, but some people may find it a struggle especially in the heat! The Marina is probably a 20 minute walk whereas The Old Town is probably 40 minutes, but there are places you can stop on the way. The Marina has all the typical bars and restaurants you would expect, something for everyone. There's inside space if it's too warm but if you enjoy the sunshine, there are plenty of seats next to the water. You will also find a lot of the boat tours and water sport activities go from this area. If you walk the other way out of the Hotel, you will find a lot of Villas and a lot more locals, which we found quite pleasant, the bars and restaurants in the other direction were traditional, very reasonably priced compared to other places, I'd go as far as saying they were cheap but you were welcomed with a whole lot of love and not just a number. Back to the Hotel, first appearances look great, the Reception area was modern, clean and looked quite new so was great at first impressions. We were then given our all inclusive wristbands which was also our room key, what a genius idea! First impressions of the room, very big! On entry, if you went to the right you had a lounge area with TV, dining table and mini fridge. There was also a wardrobe so I'm presuming the sofa turned into a sofa bed, this lead out to a balcony. The seating on the balcony was practical to keep clean but uncomfortable to sit on. Then if you went left to the entrance there was a bathroom with a shower, toilet and sink. You then headed through another door into the bedroom with a massive bed and another balcony. The wardrobe space was unreal, I've never stayed in a Hotel with so much wardrobe space and hangers, it was great. Then into the main bathroom which had a double sink, toilet, bath with a shower over it. The rooms were looking a little tired and need of TLC in quite a few aspects but not the worse I've seen. However to sell yourself as 5 star, you need to have some better maintenance. We also had a problem with the air con, if you left the air con on overnight, which you needed to it started making a dripping noise, to the point it sounded like a big leak and there was going to be a flood so often woke you up. We never mentioned to Reception as we couldn't be bothered to pack up and move rooms but we did mention it on departure so i hope they fixed it as it wasn't good. The dining room, although they had 2 restaurants plus the pool bar, you could only use the buffet restaurant if you were all inclusive. The tapas bar was at an additional cost but it was always empty so maybe that's something you need to look at going forward as staff must be so bored! Even if you offered one night to al

Just done a short stay for 3 nights, I have to say I would not consider this to be a 5* hotel. The location was okay there’s not much around and a supermarket is quite a walk away however was cheap and easy to get Ubers to get around. The atmosphere in the hotel was alright any staff we spoke to were friendly. The room we stayed in was lovely and we had no complaints everything was topped up daily and towels were changed daily. Have no complaints and the bed was very comfortable. The all inclusive food was not great, I think for a 5* hotel the food choices was absolutely minimum we decided to eat out a lot as there was not a lot we liked. Not saying the food was not up to standard but the minimum selection of choice made it difficult for us all to be able to have a full meal. If you’re taking children who may be fussy then I definitely don’t think the food choices are ideal. There’s pizza at lunch and dinner but other than that there was chicken nuggets one night so if going with children be prepared the options are not great. A football team arrived to stay in the hotel on our last night, it did seem they were very well taken care of compared to everyone else but wasn’t the end of the world.

Wow! The best hotel we have ever stayed at. We went with my dad as he has terminal cancer, we wanted to go to fatima to pray and wanted to stay somewhere lovely, the suite was out of this world, the staff were so friendly and caring especially towards my dad and the all inclusive hotel food was so delicious, everything was 100/10. 40 mins from faro airport, close to beaches. Everything is not far and can get uber and taxi, Highly recommend staying here. Hope to go back again soon.