We stayed here from 18th - 31st December. We first had a 1 bedroom 1st floor appartment for 6 nights costing £117.71, then a 2 bedroom villa for 7 nights costing £213.95, as our son came to join us for Christmas and my 60th birthday.
The appartment at first we thought was v.nice, dated but with lovely veiws of the lighthouse!! Then we realised that the lighthouse started at 5.30pm till 7.30 am. Even with the shutters and curtains closed the flashing light was still visable.
Then we noticed the appartment had an ant problem (1st floor?!) due we found to bad cleaning, they would infest anything, draws, cupboards, not nice. Cost US a fair bit in sprays and powders.
Moved to the villa for the Christmas week. Much better, or so we thought. No view and the trees blocked the sun! We had to call out maintenance as we had blocked drains and we also had to put a complaint into reception about the gardeners using chainsaws from 8.30am BOXING DAY and for 2 more days. WHY?
There was one heated/outdoor pool which was good for that Christmas day dip.
We had our Christmas meal at the O Farol resturant. Lovely food, well presented but not worth taking over 3 hours to eat and certainly not worth 37 euros each !!
Glad we had a hire car as the site is a bit out of the way. Our weather was brilliant so we were able to visit local beaches.
Clean and tidy communal areas.

Got a 2 bed apartment for a week and i can confirm that Rocha Brava is comfy and clean,
maid service turned up nearly every day, which for an apartment complex is nearly un-heard of,
Each bedroom had aircon / heating and decorated to good standard,

3 Out door pools on site, but only one was heated for winter use, which was fine, supermarket's near-by that where cheap, and plenty to go and see fro this great base,

Only down side was the gardeners chain sawing trees to keep the grounds looking good from 8:30am for 3 days straight out side my apartment,

Dear Sir/Madam,

I have just returned from a weeks stay in a sea view apartment at Rocha Brava. Overall the holiday was great and the apartment was great, especially the view, area and the everyday cleaning of the apartment. Unfortunately, all of this was let down by the attitude of the reception staff. Luckily, I only asked them three questions, such as Where's the pool? Where can I rent a car? and can I use the phone?, each time I was greated with a miserable look and a question like What? instead of an answer. The worst came when we were going to reception to meet our transfer, we had to use the parasol as an umbrella as it was raining very heavily, the receptionist was very unpleasant towards us because he will have to return the parasol and didn't seem to understand or care that we would have been soaked through on our flight home if we hadn't used the parasol. I really think these receptionists, we dealt with four through the week and all were quite unpleasant towards us, need to be retrained or replaced as they don't suit the job. I, a former receptionist myself, understand that it can be a very difficult unrewarding job and some guests really don't deserve a polite greeting and smiles, however, a professional receptionist should treat every individual the same and should understand it is their job to be polite to customers as they represent the business on the front line.

Regards,

Derek Hall

We explored most of the Algarve and felt Rocha Brava was in the best location . There is a 11 km cliff walk running through Rocha Brava and the scenery of cliffs and beaches was spectacular.The map of this walk is at the beautiful Val Centanes beach 10 min walk from our unit. Our unit was a one bedroom overlooking the gardens. It was clean and adequate and well stocked. There are 3 pools and we were near the heated pool. We had our meals out on the balcony and the view was great. There is a couple of restaurants and market on site but I recommend you have a car because the groceries were expensive on site. We went to InterMarche and Pingo..where prices were comparable to Canada. The only disadvantage of this location was lack of evening entertainment. We did drive to Carvoiero quite often to check email and go out for supper.