If you know and love the Belmond (previously Orient-Express) Mount Nelson Hotel in Cape Town, and who doesn't, you will also love Belmond Reid's Palace in Funchal, Madeira.
Not, you might think, because both buildings have over a century of history and fame as luxury guest lodging, but rather because both hotels are pink hued and both have Cape Town interior designer Graham Viney's elegant touch.
Belmond Reid's Palace is on a cliff edge. While there are four hectare of lush, sub-tropical gardens, it is the deep Atlantic that anchors this property, the sun's reflection off the sea magnifying its appeal.
As a volcanic island, Madeira rises out of the deep like the stamen of a flower and as there is no beach to gently enter into the ocean, diving into the yonder off the hotel's cliff is like entering the deep Atlantic with a splash. Happily there is a ladder to easily climb out and a protective ring of buoys to prevent one being swept far out to sea.
In the near distance there is a pontoon to which deeply tanned people are swimming to show off their Vilbrequin swimmers and other high-end resort gear. Belmond Reid's Palace, is, after all, a bolthole for the rich and very rich.
While most of the hotel's interiors follow the elegant and comfortably formal handwriting you'd expect from a hundred-year old property, the recently updated fine-dining William Restaurant, named after founder Willian Reid, with a blue colour palette that perfectly matched the sea the day we visited, is entirely contemporary.
Reid's, once considered the Most Famous Hotel in the World because of its A-list check-ins that read like the Debrett's Peerage combined with a list of the crowned heads of Europe may be, other than The Ritz, London with its royal warrants, the hotel with the most snob appeal. Amazingly, there is nothing snobbish about the experience there. Staff are warm, cheerful and pleasant and it has the feeling a resort with none of the formality you might expect. Except, understandably, when dining in the exquisitely chandeliered dining room which is a formal affair.
Afternoon Tea is an institution that Belmond Reid's Palace is famous for and is served on the terrace and in the sitting room. We had the most splendid lunch in their Garden Room restaurant, that overlooks their three pools. If you're familiar with Belmond Mount Nelson Hotel's Oasis buffet you will immediately know it. Who knew scallops got so large or prawns so sweet? The seafood we dined on there is probably better than we've enjoyed anywhere else in the world - all very minimally prepared so the true flavour of individual ingredients sing.
There's a Villa Cipriani restaurant at Reid's that links to Belmond's Venetian hotel on Giudecca Island and like everything at Belmond Reid's Palace it makes full use of the vista.
All accommodations are gracious and comfortable but the Churchill Suite is the sort of vast suite with deep terraces that is hard to leave. Like other Belmond properties, the TV pops up from a credenza at the foot of the bed at the push of button and the bathrooms have sensible open cupboards with place for luggage and hanging racks above. I was very taken with the painted ceramic tiles in the bathrooms and happy to see Penhaligon's Blenheim Bouquet still in use as bathrooms amenities. The association makes more sense there then elsewhere as Winston Churchill was born at Blenheim Palace and his patronage of Belmond Reid's Palace, and his pantings of Madeira, put it on the tourist map.
Visit at any time of the year, but be sure to book well in advance for Carnival on Shrove Tuesday in February, the Classic Car Show in May and the White Party in July.
For more, go to www.Belmond.com
