Hotel Real de Caeté

There’s a nice view from the property, though the rooms are quite simple.

Avoid this place. I found the hotel on booking and had never had a problem with a hotel or inn there before. Reinaldo, the owner, called and asked me to send the full 300 reais for the reservation in advance to secure it. I told him I’d be coming from Belo Horizonte and might arrive around 9:30 pm because of traffic. He said that was fine and that he’d wait. Before leaving home, I tried calling him several times and sent an audio message, but got no reply. When we arrived, the hotel was dark and closed. It’s isolated and felt very strange and unpleasant. We called out, rang the bell, and waited, but nobody came. We had to find another hotel at the last minute. When he finally replied on WhatsApp, he only said the hotel closed at 8 pm. We got our money back only after a lot of pressure and persistence, because we knew someone from town who contacted him and pressed him about it.

The rooms are great, and fresh coffee is available all the time. Sr. Reinaldo’s hospitality is hard to put into words. My colleagues and I stayed one night and wished we could have stayed the whole week. It isn’t a traditional hotel, but none of that felt like it was missing.

It’s a very humble place, and Sr. Reinaldo is welcoming and makes you feel at ease. The room we stayed in had a strong mold smell, the curtain was moldy too, and there was nowhere to hang a towel. Still, none of that stopped us from staying for one night.