Parador de Santo Estevo

This parador is one of the most stunning we have visited. Incredible location (if not easy to find!), beautiful public areas, and the usual very helpful staff. I can highly recommend it. But we did have a couple of issues that slightly disappointed us. Given we reserved a standard room I wasn't expecting one of the best views from our room, but we equally didn't expect to view a bunch of old scaffolding poles lying discarded right in front of our window. These should have been tidied away out of sight. Secondly there was a large birthday party event on the second night we were there. It was noisy, it meant that some of the public areas had been closed off to the rest of us during the day, and it didn't really fit in with the atmosphere of the place, which was more one of quiet contemplation, as should befit an ex-monastery. This is not the first time recently that a parador experience has been slightly tarnished by external parties. Paradores needs to decide on it's corporate identity, is it about a unique experience, or is it purely about making as much money as possible?

What an amazing experience staying in such an incredible and beautiful piece of History. The location and the restoration of the building is just spectacular. Highly recommend the restaurant the breakfast, the bar.... every aspect of this hotel is incredible. And each and every person working at this hotel Coke above and beyond to make your stay incredible. The front desk in particular helped us with a future reservation that was messed up and they completely straightened it out and just did such a professional job at it. This is an incredible property and with some beautiful hiking trails. Highly recommend staying here. If you are staying at the hotel. Also, there's a small shop right where you turn to go up to the hotel that sells local artists products and it's a definite stop as well.

We stopped to see the Parador and end up enjoying some drinks and snacks and we wete very happy about it! The hotel is incrediblea and well maintained! The staff was lovely and very accommodating! The café was lovely! It's worth a stop!!

Wow! What a beautiful place to stay. The building was built as a monastery in the 6th Century - it just exuded history. The room was beautiful and spacious. We did a lovely walk up to a viewing point which helped us understand the nature and beauty of this part of Spain - well worth doing. There is nothing else here apart from the Parador and that is part of its charm. You just have to relax and immerse yourselves in the tranquility of such a special place. Food was excellent and if you can get a table on the terrace it’s even better. Well worth the trip.

Before getting to Santo Estevo, we stopped at the Peñas do Castro lookout before reaching the property. We had no idea what awaited us or what we would see. The castro was impressive as was the view over the Sil valley. What was really astonishing was the view of the parador from above. We were speechless. We couldn’t contain our excitement that that would be the hotel we would be staying at for the next two days. Checking in was easy and efficient. I have to commend the associate at the reception to let me speak my rusty Spanish and not switching to English. Our spacious room most certainly hasd to be an upgrade and met exceeded all our expectations. It took some time to figure out the shower functions but we managed. We enjoyed the ample breakfast buffet and local game with chestnuts at dinner. Our welcome drink was a glass of the “9 Bispos” tinto. This was one of the best red wines we ever tasted. We even tried to find it in wine stores later on. Beside the hotel itself the true beauty of the property is its isolated location and the nature trails. We did two hikes – one to the mill ruins and the other to the historic hermitage. We were alone on both hikes and had the whole woods to ourselves. We also made the short drive to the Ribeira Sacro and Pe do Home lookouts. The views into the canyon from those vantage points are extraordinarily spectacular and should be on the lists of things to do for any guest of the hotel. Then we enjoyed the spa to relax and to give our muscles a well deserved refreshment. Knowing that parking would be an issue we asked the receptionist to contact Hostal de los Reyes Católicos to make parking arrangements. Unfortunately that wasn’t available.

The parador at Saint Estevo is absolutely fantastic, the building and facilities are top class, the food and wine are excellent and the staff are superb

Unbelievable! Service, staff, food, the place, all deserve a 5 star. If you want to know more, come and stay for a night or two!

The Parador itself is very nice. We liked the room, very comfortable beds and nice shower. We had a sitting area that made the room bigger. The hallways are covered with glass, so it helped with the early morning cold temperatures. The public rooms seemed empty, some with just two modern chairs. Not too much effort to decorate these areas to appeal to the history this place represents. ||Be careful with the elevators, they do not have a sensor on the door. Our friend was hit by the door while closing as he was coming in. He backed out and put his hand thinking it would make the sensors stop it and ended up with damage to his nail.||The reception staff was a bit cold, to say the least, except for the young lady that we did not have the fortune to be the one to take care of us. The older lady wanted to get done as soon as possible and the guy honestly does not have the bit of interest in helping guests. He seemed bothered. We saw how rude he was to other people, so we tried to avoid him, but unfortunately he was the only one there when we checked out.||We had made reservations at the main restaurant to eat there for the two nights, since going out at night was not a good option, but found out that they only have one menu and it does not change. We were not impressed with the food the first night, so we canceled the second night and ate at the cafeteria where we also had breakfast the two mornings. ||The location is very nice, but tricky to get to. As you get near, the road only allows one vehicle, but you have an empty area on the side with quite a drop. We asked the housekeeping staff and were told that if two vehicles need to pass at the same time, one must back up. That's concerning, luckily for us, we did not experience this situation. We cannot imagine that happening with all the buses that go there. Both nights there were 2-3 buses bringing large groups that only stayed one night.||We visited a nearby town called Luintra to have lunch on our second day. The O Campanario restaurant was great. Loved the food and the service. It does fill up, so you may want to make reservations, which we did. ||We went to the lookout point to take those amazing photos of the Parador. It's quite a walk through uneven rocky dirt road and at the end you have to walk uphill, the ground was wet which made it very slippery.||We were told that they have the queimada at the Parador, but when we inquired closer to our reservation they said it was not going to be possible. That was a disappointment, we were looking forward to it since it's something that we have never experienced and was highly recommended by a famous youtube couple from Spain.||We enjoyed our stay for a couple of days. We always stay in different Paradores when in Spain to experience the history and amazing places where they're located. Not sure this is one we will return to, but it was worth it.