Casa de Casal de Loivos
Turismo Rural is often where Portugal excels – championing and preserving traditional, rural ways of life through tourism, often with a focus on sustainability, minimising environmental impacts, and supporting local communities.
Casa de Casal de Loivos is the perfect example – this diminutive manor house has been the vineyard home of the Sampaio Pimentel family since 1733. The estate’s vertiginous slopes are the ideal terroir: south-facing terraces with loamy soils, underpinned by schist and granite. The current guardian of the family estate, Manuel Sampaio Pimentel, has had great success over the last twenty-five years, working with Van Zeller on his Quinta Vale Dona Maria wines.
Manuel opened up the casa to tourism in the 1990s, creating a home-from-home with a relaxed, unhurried atmosphere. There are just eight rooms, each one opening onto the terrace and pool, with their sweeping view of the unbounded Douro River as it wanders slowly west to the ocean. All meals are homemade using local produce, much of it grown on the property, and shared on the large family dinner table – with snacks and drinks by the pool on lazy days.
