South facing, first floor
Valley
from €240 a night
The smallest of the rooms and the one people ask for again. A deep window seat, the valley in front of it, and nothing else competing for the view.
28 m²Queen bedRain showerWindow seat
Douro Valley, Portugal
A house at the top of a very old valley
Fourteen rooms in a four-hundred-year-old quinta, a kitchen that writes its menu each morning, and a great deal of nothing to do.
- 14
- Rooms
- 400yr
- Old walls
- 40km
- Sourcing radius
The house
It was a working quinta long before it was a hotel
The walls went up in 1618 to store wine, and for most of four centuries that is exactly what they did. The floors are uneven, the windows are where the light was needed rather than where symmetry wanted them, and none of the fourteen rooms is the same shape.
We restored it slowly and changed as little as we could get away with. What is new is honest about being new; what is old was left alone.
Fourteen rooms, no two alike
Everything on the menu from within forty kilometres
A cellar that predates the current building
No cars needed once you arrive
The rooms
Fourteen rooms, no two the same
The building refused to divide evenly, so we stopped trying. Each room kept the proportions the walls gave it.
East facing, second floor
Ridge
from €310 a night
Under the original roof beams, with the light arriving early. If you are the sort of person who wakes at six anyway, this is the room that rewards it.
36 m²King bedFree-standing bathBeamed ceiling
West facing, ground floor
Orchard
from €280 a night
Doors straight onto the walled orchard, which is quiet enough that people take their breakfast out there without being told they can.
34 m²King bedPrivate terraceGarden access
Dual aspect, top floor
The Long Room
from €420 a night
The whole of the top floor. Two windows at either end, a bath under one of them, and enough distance between the bed and the desk to forget the desk.
58 m²King bedSitting roomDual aspect
The table
One menu, written each morning
What arrives from the valley decides what is served. The kitchen writes the card after the delivery, not before.
To begin
Garden, raw and pickled
Whatever came out of the walled garden that morning, some of it cured, some of it an hour old.
From the fire
Hearth-cooked, over vine
One protein, cooked slowly over prunings from the vineyard behind the house.
From the coast
Two hours from the water
Delivered on the morning boat, which is why the card is written after it arrives.
To finish
Cellar and orchard
Fruit from the orchard, and something from a cellar that predates the current building.
The days
Things worth getting up for
All of them start at the door, and most end back here in time for dinner.
90 min
Walk the ridge before breakfast
Two hundred metres of climb and the whole valley underneath it. We will pack coffee.
2 hrs
The cellar, with the person who fills it
Six wines from within forty kilometres, poured by someone who knows the growers by name.
Half day
Ride the old rail line
Flat, shaded and almost entirely traffic-free. Bicycles are in the courtyard; take them.
3 hrs
Cook the fire menu
A morning at the hearth with the kitchen, then you eat what you made for lunch.
2 hrs
Swim the quarry lake
Twenty minutes on foot, cold all year, and empty on almost every day of it.
All day
Nothing, deliberately
The library, the orchard and a jug of something. It is a legitimate choice and we will not disturb you.
Before you come
The practical things
Porto is ninety minutes by car, and the drive along the river for the last thirty of them is the best part of it. There is also a train to Pinhão and we will collect you from the station, which we would recommend if you would rather not drive the valley roads.
Reservations
Come and stay
Send us your dates and how many of you there are. Someone who works here will answer, and they will tell you honestly which room suits you rather than which one is dearest.
Reservations
stay@solsticequinta.com
Telephone
+351 254 738 210
Address
Quinta do Solstício, Douro
Nearest station
Pinhão, 12 km