I loved this beautifull Guesthouse, the view from our room on the third floor was amaizing. Very clean and confortable room and beautifuly decorated. I will come back for sure.

Very clean and beautiful litle Guesthouse in the city center.

I stayed at the Lavra Guesthouse with my boyfriend in July 2011 thanks to a suggestion from my Lonely Planet guidebook. The hotel itself was very clean and charming, our room spacious and comfortable, and the washroom modern and practical. The staff, save for one annoyed night clerk, was multilingual (ie. English, French, Italian, Portuguese, etc.) and professional.
The issue is the area: we did not feel safe walking these streets at night (and truthfully not even during the day). One taxi driver even needed to be coaxed in order to drive us back to to our hotel one night. We ended up discussing this area with natives around the city, and more than one said that they avoid this area like the plague since they do not consider it safe.
In sum: the hotel is fine, but unless you have grown up in such areas and this ambiance does not faze you, I would avoid it.

We stayed at Lavra GuestHouse in June 2011, over St.Antonio's weekend (didn't know that this is a long bank holiday weekend for the city and that Lisbon and - of course - the hotel were pretty busy for this reason).

Small charming old building with a typical tiled facade over the steep Calcada de Sant'Ana, converted into a nice guest house.
Some cool minimalistic design in public areas with design touches mixed with traditional architectural details, pretty tiny but overall cozy 'ikea-with-a-flair' rooms (and definitely basic bathrooms, be warned).
A beautiful little old cloister on the ground floor and a magnificent back-side open terrace facing sunset over the city hills and the St.Jorge Castle.

Perfect location: Pena district, on top of the hill between Restauradores and Rossio & Figueira, short distance walk from downtown Baixa and public transportation in Rossio (buses - including AirBus from/to airport - and metro), but be prepared to some challenging climbing over narrow staircases and streets to get back here after a full day out in the city or, worst, when carrying your luggage on arrival.

The nearby Elevador Lavra cable railway connects the top of the hill with Restauradores but it's pretty expensive (Euro 3 per person per way) and doesn't operate 24/7: have a ride just in case you want to experience it as a tourist attraction.

Nice quiet area with a few groceries (food, drinks, cigarettes) and unpretentious family-run small restaurants over the Calcada de Sant'Ana for breakfast or dinner at definitely cheaper prices than the average touristic places downtown or in the Bairro.

Breakfast is normally not included in room price at the hotel, so if you don't go for the Euro 5 per person supplement continental breakfast in-house (basic, requires advance reservation and it's served only up to 10am in a nice, clean and neat breakfast room at ground floor) just consider stopping by somewhere right outside the hotel on your way down to downtown.
Same for snacks and drinks: get your bottled water at unexpensive price by the lady at the shop nearby, experience some interaction with the locals and try learning a little portuguese, it's definitely worth doing it!

The hotel is clean, rooms are cleaned and towels replaced daily, bathroom amenities are basic (just soap and shampoo).
Wiring and plumbing in rooms and bathrooms require some maintenance. Few electrical outlets in the rooms, usually none available: disconnect a lamp to recharge your phone or your camera.
No air-conditioning or heating in the rooms: not an issue in late spring, but considering the number of portable fans and heaters stuffed everywhere this IS probably a serious one in winter or when it gets hotter.

Hotel staff is nice, smiling and polite in general.

Reception staff is multilingual: good english, french, spanish.
More professional than friendly, they can switch quickly from polite to annoyed when forced to handle a complaint and you may need to get a bit rude to have them sort out a solution.
Don’t worry: it’s the standard universal reception/front desk attitude, you’ll experience exactly the same at any top luxury hotel in the world…

Reception is pretty helpful with tips on places, transportation, things to do but only available 8AM to midnight: a local phone number is your only available contact at night, therefore make sure you keep your hotel keys in a safe pocket when going out for the evening or, at least, record their 'emergency number' somewhere.

Quick check-in, quick check-out and a small storage space for your luggage if needed.

WiFi is free (ask reception for access code) but with such limited range and bandwidth that you'll hardly be able to get connected if not seating exactly in front of reception.

The upper floor external terrace is spectacular, despite facing the large hospital located behind the hotel and the kind of treasure-hunt game required to reach it: get to 1st floor by either the internal or the cloister external stairway, find the wooden door leading to another external metal stairway and enjoy a beautiful view over Lisbon hills and the Castle.

We booked our 5-night stay through an online travel agency for 2 standard rooms (looking at hotel website pics they look nice) but for unknown reasons the hotel had only blocked 1.

Since the hotel was almost fully booked, we were given an interesting tour of the remaining available rooms and were shown a couple of awful ones on higher floors: an incredibly tiny twin bedded room with a window on the ceiling and a kind of a prison cell as a second option. Hopefully, those are not normally sold as part of the official hotel inventory.

We ended up getting assigned as a back-up the apparently pretty and cozy room n. 110, ground floor, old cloister: only at night we discovered that the strong deodorant fragrance that hit us when entering the room was supposed to hide the musty smell of walls, floor, furniture, linen.
We couldn’t sleep at all that night and asked to be moved somewhere else the following morning.

After some additional complaining we were finally switched to a nice large triple room on 4th floor facing the full view external terrace for the rest of the stay (not sure about the exact number, could be room n. 406) and agreed in moving back to room n. 111 on the ground floor for the last night only, since the hotel was sold out.
Despite being located close to infamous and smelly room n. 110, this last one was apparently fine while still a bit humid.

On the other hand, our friends who were assigned a room on 1st floor on the front of the hotel complained a bit about some noise from the street at night: check with the hotel when booking and ask for front-side upper floor or back-side terrace level rooms.
The romantic shady ground floor old cloister rooms are probably a good choice over hottest summer months.

Overall, considering location, charming ambience and services offered this place is definitely good value for your money with a double room priced lower than Euro 50 per room per night.

Some extra tips for first-time Lisbon visitors.

Airport is located in the north-eastern side of the city, close to Parque das Nacoes.
The easiest way to get downtown is by public transportation with the AeroBus: an approx. 30 min ride, several stops in the city center, Euro 3,50 per person per way.

When traveling in small groups (3 to 4 people) and/or with heavy luggage it may be convenient considering a taxi ride instead: quicker, more comfortable and you’ll be dropped right in front of your hotel entrance rather than having to carry your bags up and down hills and stairs from the bus stop to your final destination.
Price for a ride (4 people, 4 pieces of luggage) is approx Euro 20, but make sure you fix a price with the driver before jumping aboard: drivers may be very creative in applying unexpected fees and supplements for luggage to official meter fare.

Public transportation network includes buses, metro and streetcars within the city, trains to places nearby (Belem, Cascais) and ferries crossing the Tagus river.
Unless you plan to jump up and down buses and trams all day rather than walking and to visit each and every museum and attraction included in the card fee, the Lisboa Card is pretty expensive.

Go for Viva Cards available at ticket counters and vending machines in major metro and train stations and charge them for the number of trips you need or for a predefined amount: fare will automatically be deducted from the card when presenting it at card readers onboard.

Sounds great but it’s not totally flawless: there’s a small flat fee for every Viva Card you buy (approx. Euro 1) and you’ll need to buy separate ones at specific vending machines for metro/bus, for trains and for ferries.
In addition, Cards look exactly the same but will only work on their own network, so keep them separate and bear in mind which one to pick depending on the kind of transport you want to use.

They can be recharged at ticket counters or, at a slightly lower price per ride, at vending machines, that can also be used to check the remaining credit balance on your Viva Card.
Again, you’ll get a kind of ‘invalid/expired’ on-screen message if you don’t match the correct network Card with the proper vending machine.

Also, vending machines usually accept payments with credit/debit cards, banknotes and coins but will ask for exact amount and will NOT allow you mixing different payment methods (i.e. coins AND banknotes).
Be prepared, be patient and take your time: you’ll probably skip your planned ride if you think you can manage getting your Card recharged with the amount you need in just a couple of minutes.

Elevators and historical trams (i.e. n. 28) are tourist attractions: some Euro 3,50 rather than the standard approx. Euro 1 fare per ride will apply.
This will be automatically deducted from your Card at boarding, so, if you want to include them in your tour, make sure you charge your Viva Card for a predefined amount rather than the exact number of standard rides you plan to use for the day if you don’t want to end up zeroing your Card credit quicker than expected, be refused boarding and waste some extra time for recharging again.

Touristic Lisbon with Rossio, Baixa, Chiado, Bairro Alto, Rato and Alfama is a relatively small area but it may take some time and some orienteering skills to understand exact directions and distances at the beginning.
Forget about free maps highlighting only major streets and key locations: Lisbon is built over 7 hills, roads follow irregular paths, steep streets and stairways connect the various levels and places that look really close on a map can be located at a considerably different altitude.

Identifying some reference points here will be useless: the red 25 April Bridge or the beautiful dome of that church you see so clearly indicating your direction from top of the hill will suddenly disappear from your horizon as soon as you walk down and turn somewhere into the maze of streets. You’ll get lost in a minute.

Buy a real map or, better, a good travel guide and make sure it includes detailed maps with information on key highlights and complete transportation maps.
Buying one that includes some suggested itineraries will save a lot of time and efforts: perfect for a short stay, it will be helpful for tips on additional things to do after you get familiar with the city, if you stay longer.

Living-in is not particularly expensive in Lisbon but bars, cafes and restaurants in touristic areas feature definitely higher rates than the standard city ones.
Most of the Bairro Alto spots fall into this category: look for the most traditional places, follow the locals, skip restaurants featuring multilingual menus in too many different languages.

Almost anywhere you’ll be served some olives, bread, butter and (sometimes really good) cheese as appetizers without even asking as soon as you sit at your table.
Not free of charge or unexpensive, but it’s kind of the flat cover charge you may be imposed at restaurants abroad while getting nothing for it in that case, so it’s fair.

Genuine and traditional codfish dishes are worth the price paid, the take-away fried pasteis de bacalhau you’ll find around are cheap and tasty and can replace a meal.

On your way out for dinner try at least once the traditional Ginja – a cherry liqueur – at the Ginjinha in Rossio.
Have a coffee and some pasteis de leche at La Brasileira Café in Chiado (Pessoa’s favourite place, with his bronze statue sitting in front of the entrance).
Have your coffee at the counter rather than sitting outside: quicker, cheaper and a good opportunity to feel like a local.
Mix with locals and tourists in the Bairro Alto and Rato in your pilgrimage for after dinner drinks: just follow the crowd for the best places, drinks are cheap enough, the number of stops will depend on your resistance.
Once in Belem you got to try the pasteis de Belem: similar to the sweet pasteis de leche but baked after a secret recipe and covered with powdered sugar or cinnamon thay’re a perfect souvenir to take away with you at home.
The place is close to Mosteiro dos Jeronimos, just look for the queuing crowd outside the pastry shop.

What more?

If you happen to be in Lisbon over mid June, you’ll find yourself in the middle of celebrations for St.Antonio’s day: the entire city participates with decorations and parades.
Visiting St.Antonio’s church these days (next to Lisbon Cathedral) you may happen to be offered the traditional votive bread baked only in this occasion and, moving up to Alfama, you’ll find the entire neighborhood celebrating at night with street parties, lights, decorations and the smell of open-air grilled sardines at the corner of the streets filling the air around you.

Summer time and longer stay? Go to Brazil for one day.
Take the ferry from Cais do Sodre to Cacilhas on the southern side of the Tagus, then the bus to Costa de Caparica: a 1-hour trip will get you to this huge beach on the ocean, disseminated with beach bars.
On a sunny summer day this place really recalls brazilian beaches.
A funny little open white train will carry you to the preferred spot (there is kind of 20 stops over this very long white beach).
First 10 stops will get you to beach bars, last ones (18 to 20) will get you to the wilder side of the beach, with almost no bars but dunes and the nudist and gay area.
Train timetable is approximate and fare is not cheap but worth the fun: ask driver for timetable to plan your return unless you want to take a long walk back at sunset and stop at one of the bars for a drink before getting back to Lisbon.