Holiday Inn Hotel Reviews Lisbon Portugal

Holiday Inn Lisbon – open windows to the city

a building with a sign on it
Holiday Inn Lisbon

Holiday Inn Lisbon was the second of four IHG hotels we stayed in central Lisbon during our two weeks in the city. Be aware there is another IHG hotel, Holiday Inn Lisbon Continental in the same area about 1.2 km away near Metro Pequeno Campo. We stayed at both hotels.

The distinguishing feature of Holiday Inn Lisbon is a small circular 11th floor rooftop pool and patio deck. Highview bar lounge area has tables under awnings. The pool and bar were welcome features on a late June afternoon, even though the high temperature was only 72 F. 

The pool is more suitable for wading due to its small diameter size of about 17 feet. Around 20 people were lounging around the pool in the afternoon with another 10 to 15 scattered around the deck taking in sun. The views are great from the rooftop, although I should mention the pool area is only accessible via two flights of stairs above the top elevator floor.

a city with many red roofs
Holiday Inn Lisbon rooftop pool deck view.
a group of people sitting in a pool
Holiday Inn Lisbon rooftop pool.
a pool with a deck and chairs on a deck
Holiday Inn Lisbon pool – IHG hotel site photo.

I took limited pool area photos due to all the chairs filled with bodies. 

a woman standing next to a bar
Holiday Inn Lisbon rooftop bar

Ice cold Carlsberg was a welcome change after a week of drinking Portuguese Super Bock lager, even though the pool bar beer was served in a Super Bock labeled plastic cup. They had Super Bock on tap too, which Kelley preferred.

a staircase with a door open
Holiday Inn Lisbon pool access stairway.

Location

Holiday Inn Lisbon is situated between three Metro stations and about 10 minutes walk from Saldanha Metro Station or Alameda Metro or 12 minutes walk to Campo Pequeno Metro, depending on which direction and line you wish to use. Alameda line goes to Lisbon downtown without the need to change at an intermediate station.

a stone building with a large fountain and statues
Fonte Luminosa near Metro Alameda Lisbon.

We arrived at Metro Saldanha after a station line change along the way. I had carried our luggage up and down more than 300 stairs due to nonworking escalators at all three stations. A Metro workers strike shut down the system the following day and I wondered if all the non-operating escalators were connected to the impending strike.

a escalator in a tunnel
Going up? Inoperable escalators in Lisbon Metro station.

 

 

 

a map of a city
Google Maps – Holiday Inn Lisbon
a screenshot of a map
Holiday Inn Lisbon central city location.

Holiday Inn Lisbon Room

I was upgraded to a corner room on the 6th floor as an IHG Platinum member. 

a building with a sign on it
Holiday Inn Lisbon exterior.
a statue of a woman in a robe
Lisbon statue of Antonio Jose de Almeida, sixth President of the Republic Portuguese 1919-1923. Sculptor Leopoldo Neves de Almeida.

The Antonio Jose de Almeida statue (1937) is situated in the roundabout in front of the Holiday Inn Lisbon hotel entrance. Most fascinating to me is the number of works I saw around Lisbon by sculptor Leopoldo Neves de Almeida (no relation to the President). His prominent works from the 1930s and 1940s are seen around Lisbon including the bas-reliefs, c. 1934, Cineteatro Eden and the Monument to the Discoveries (1940).

a building with many windows
Eden Cinema Theater bas-relief by Leopoldo Neves de Almeida 1934.
a large white monument with people standing in front of it
Monument to the Discoveries, Lisbon 1940 – sculptor Leopoldo Neves de Almeida.
a statue in a city
Our Holiday Inn Lisbon corner room view to roundabout.
a table and chairs in a room with windows and a city view
Holiday Inn Lisbon table.

The table in our Holiday Inn Lisbon room was appreciated as a place to dine after a week with no dining table in our other hotel rooms.

a bed with white sheets and a picture on the wall
Holiday Inn Lisbon king bed.
a view of a city from a window
Holiday Inn Lisbon window wide open view.
a bathroom with a sink toilet and bathtub
Holiday Inn Lisbon bathroom

One of the interesting features of the bathroom, besides the difficulty of covering the entire window with the minimal curtain while showering was the Teknos 2000 hairdryer on the wall. This was one of the few hotels where a search of closets and drawers for the hair dryer was unnecessary.

a white soap dispenser on a wall

a painting on the wall
Holiday Inn Lisbon entry hallway with closet.
a ironing board on a shelf
Holiday Inn Lisbon hallway closet safe and iron.
a room with a mirror and a television
Holiday Inn Lisbon room decor.

The minibar refrigerator was filled with items. My first chore after arriving at the hotel was locating the Minipreço market around the corner on R. Dona Filipa de Vilhena 30 B for food and beer. When I returned from the market Kelley was in her bathing suit ready for pool time.

a mini fridge with drinks inside
All minibar items were placed in orderly fashion on counter so I could load the frig with our beer, water and food.

In the evening I strolled down the street for dinner at B’Perfect Burguers for what turned out to be the first of a 3-peat experience during our three weeks in Europe. Typically I order a cheeseburger for Kelley and a hamburger for myself, which is what I ordered as a takeaway at B’Perfect Burguers. My hamburger with fries cost 8 EUR and Kelley’s cheeseburger with fries was 9 EUR. Something I learned while in Europe is there can be a vast difference between a hamburger and a cheeseburger, besides the addition of cheese. My burger turned out to be only a bun with meat and nothing else, while Kelley had lettuce, tomato, bacon, cheese and sauce on her burger. 

a sign with a letter b
Lisbon B Perfect Hamburgueria Bar

In the evening as we lay in bed falling asleep with the window wide open and a cool breeze chilling the room there was a loud bang, followed by another with light from outside illuminating our dark room.

fireworks in the sky
Fireworks from Rock in Rio Lisboa 2022 at Parque da Bela Vista.

Holiday Inn Lisbon

I booked Holiday Inn Lisbon for 21,000 points. The room rate was 168 EUR/$178.08 USD for the date. My cost was $105 to buy 21,000 EUR.

Something to note is prior to IHG One Rewards switching from fixed redemption rates to variable rates when using points is Holiday Inn Lisbon was 30,000 points per night in 2020. I was disappointed for a couple of years that I had waited too long to visit Lisbon as IHG hotel reward rates in Lisbon saw significant increases in points cost between 2015 and 2020.

IHG One Rewards variable rates combined with the option for 4th night free reward stays for Chase IHG Mastercard members dropped the price of my 4-night stays at Holiday Inn Express Av. Liberdade and Holiday Inn Express Plaza Saldanha and one-night stays at Holiday Inn Lisbon and Holiday Inn Lisbon Continental to lower nightly rates than were available in 2020 by 110,000 points for the ten nights I stayed in Lisbon with IHG.

IHG points used to sit in my account unused due to bad redemption rates. In 2022 I am building up my account balance as quickly as I can to take advantage of great deals all over Europe with IHG points.

2 Comments

  • P T August 14, 2022

    Was there anything interesting in the neighborhood of the hotel?

  • Ric Garrido August 16, 2022

    Gulbenkian Museum, Fonte Luminosa and Campo Pequeno are the main attractions of the area. Kelley preferred being in the downtown area of Principe Real and Ave. de Liberdade.

    I liked the Avenidas Novas area with the three Holiday Inn hotels due to an abundance of grocery stores and local restaurants with lower prices compared to the highly touristed areas of Bairra Alto and Baixa.

    Aside from one day when I explored central Lisbon on a 2 hour walk we did not see much of the area due to the temperature in the upper 90s/low 100s for our final three days in the city. We mostly rested in our hotel room recovering from Covid.

    I am writing a photoessay post to show the neighborhoods I walked through in central Lisbon. Now that I figured out where I went after plotting out my photos on Google Maps, I see I missed all the Miradouro/Viewpoint spots I skirted around on my walk.I was taking a walk aimlessly on instinct without consulting Google Maps for interesting sites around me.

    I want to get back to Lisbon sometime in the next year during cooler weather to see more places I missed in the city this trip. Also, I want to visit Cascais and Sintra and if we are in Portugal in winter I would like to go to Nazaré to see big wave surfing.

    We had a stay planned for Ritz Carlton Penha Longa in Sintra that I had to cancel after we were stuck in Greece isolating for a week with Covid.

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