Chão do Rio – Turismo de Aldeia

Located in Travancinha, 12 km away from Serra da Estrela Natural Park, Chão do Rio – Turismo de Aldeia, offers a sustainable lodging experience.

On this 8 hectares farm, nature is cherished and enjoyed by guests, who are encouraged to explore nearby trails on foot or on bikes, which are available for free.
Likewise, children can have fun with hand cars, picking eggs from the portable hen house, feed the sheep or just play freely and safely.

The desire to contribute to sustainable development is intrinsic to the business culture at Chão do Rio. Therefore, they developed a policy of sustainability that allowed them to be the first rural tourism unit in Portugal to achieve Biosphere Responsible Tourism certification in June 2018.

With this policy, they take up the responsibility to respect and contribute to the environment’s preservation and recovery. Furthermore, they also to the economic and social development of the region, perpetuating the memory of traditional ways of life.

Some of the measures taken by Chão do Rio as a sustainable lodging include:

• integration in the landscape using roofs of vegetal origin, with materials originating from surrounding land cleaning;
• construction with sustainable materials, such as stone from local demolitions and wood;
  water heating through solar panels;
• recovery of a forest with species of native oaks and of the riverside front in the property;
• creation of wetlands and ecological corridors for the circulation of wild species;
• organic biological swimming pool;
• reduction of outdoor lighting to a minimum to avoid energy consumption and light pollution;
• the “garden” is a spontaneous meadow that does not require watering and whose maintenance does not include pesticides;
• availability of handmade soaps produced in the region with local ingredients;