The cottage is in a beautiful setting surrounded by trees and you can hear the rivers - a real retreat from city life. The cottage was really comfortable and well equipped, we loved eating outside, trying and failing to spot the birds that we could hear in the trees.
We made extensive use of the bread van, which comes every morning, allowing us to have sugary treats for tea every day.
We took the odd break from swimming in the pool to go river swimming which was a real treat - worth the walk to find the swim at the old dam.
Amarante is not too far away, and there is more to explore there than you might see at first glance. The art museum was really good, we borrowed (e.g. they were free) bikes from tourist office and did a really nice ride on the old train line from Amarante into the hills.
Harry was really helpful in helping us find things to do without being at all intrusive and on top of that saved our bacon with the hire car. You do need a car to get to the nearest shop.
Highly recommended.