Minho B&B accommodation, Portugal

Our house is special because we don’t just offer a place to sleep. We strongly believe we are responsible to maintain the quality of live natural to the place where we live. More than that our commitment is to be an example to other local members of our community.

At the house, children from public and private schools are welcome to enjoy our activities. They make there first horse experience with our horses. Other children from the village school came and spend some time doing works at de potage and organic garden.

I am volunteer in an organization at Póvoa de Lanhoso and there I help the gardeners team to maintain the gardens with a good look. A Santa Casa da Misericórdia da Póvoa de Lanhoso helps a lot of old and poor people and also take care of children from the village. In our small village we have only one restaurant and people go there frequently. In the village of Póvoa and surrounding area we have several and good restaurants in different kinds, but all good examples of the typical Portuguese food.

Our Minho B&B is a building from the XVI century and the main materials are stone and wood. When restorations works took place, we use only local materials and workers, reason why the house keep a sort of special soul. The water we have belong to us and came from a natural source in the near mountains. In the kitchen we strongly suggest our guests to separate all the remains that left from the preparation of there meals. Those remains go to the public recycle containers. All the organic waste go to join manure from horses and to make compost.

We use in every parts of the house energy efficient light bulbs. At the end of the day is my task to go to the house and check if all the garden lights are off. In our farm we have several natural sources of water and this fortune is not a reason to spend more than we really need and so we control the most possible we can.

We are certified in Organic Production and by this we have to care all our production system following the roles of the Organic Production. My formation is specific in the area so we take good care with our environment. We don’t use any kind of chemical fertilizers and we feed our plants with the manure that came from our horses. They are GARRANO race, it minds a small but strong horse able to do nice and pleasant rides across the mountain roads of the surrounding area. We have seven adults and some young’s in a semi free regime. All the manure they produce is used to make good compost.

From our house and from the guest’s house we do and encourage doing the separation of all the organic remains and then they are used as food to the chickens, ducks and geese. In the guest’s house kitchen there are several containers to separate things following the colour code. Those remains are latter collected by the public service.

In our swimming pool we don’t use chemicals such as Cloro and the treatment of the water is made with active oxygen, as a result of this option, when we have to change water, we may use it for irrigation with no bad results for our plants.

During all year normal maintenance works in the garden are made by local people. Some supplies we daily need came from a local store and we invite our visitors to go there and to buy the goods they may need.

The most part of the daily tasks is made by me and by my wife Ana. But in many occasions we need extra help and we always call for Maria and Conceição. These two women live in the village and do for us different kinds of work. These women have made special effort in order to understand the good way of dealing with plants. In the breakfast we serve to our guest’s the jam is made by my wife from fruits collected in our garden. We invite also everyone to collect fresh fruits and vegetables from our gardens with no extra cost. All the repairs we need in the houses or in the outside equipment are made by Artur and Joaquim. They also live in our village and know quiet well how we want the job.