I found step by step instructions on spg.com. Says 40 mins. of the driving time is on the Autostrata. Daughter lives in Italy (Army spouse). She says Autostrata is fine. I've considered the hotel for us when we visit but also have some spg points and could book them a night if they want to hike the Riike Trail. Or they can wait and we can all hike the trail in May.

Autostrata was fine for me driving in France and like you say, I even had fun on the hill roads.

Booked this hotel with points almost as soon as it became available. It's an unbelievably great deal if you book right now for summer 2016 -- a value of about 5.5 cents (USD) per point (for our dates, revenue rates are starting at 615 euros while award nights are 12000 points; I actually paid +1500 night more for an upgraded room though).

This brings me to a very interesting point -- 2015 award nights (at least, for summer) seem to be 16000 points while 2015 are 12000 points, so I'd recommend taking advantage of that while it lasts :)

We are hoping to spend a first week of July in Italy, so our current plan is to fly into Venice, get a car at the airport (need an automatic & Trieste doesn't offer them from what I can tell), drive to the hotel (need to figure out a place or two to stop along the way), spend about a week there exploring the area, drive back to Venice, turn in the rental car and spend two nights at the Gritti Palace (finally put SPG50 to use and got Venetian room for 665 euros -- not sure it can get any lower in the summer).

Haven't really started planning what to see near Portopiccolo but if anyone has any links they can share, it'd be greatly appreciated :)

P.S. And, of course, I look forward to hotel reviews! :D

While searching for any new information (conclusion - no reviews so far), came across this site which has sales materials for the Portopiccolo community in general and includes lots of photos:

http://www.mconlinevenues.com/hotel/...rtopiccolo.htm

See these two PDF files:
http://www.mconlinevenues.com/showPD...Bro_PP_ING.PDF
http://www.mconlinevenues.com/showPD...Ins_PP_ING.PDF

Completed a five night stay with points. About two weeks ago the cash rates came down to about 220 Euro, so not the great redemption value when booked.

Bit of thrill being in a very new property. Upgraded to junior suite. Furnishing a bachelor pad, this would be a good model. I'm not into writing detailed reviews, but happy to respond to specific questions.

First impression....Lake Las Vegas during the first five years. Some person or entity with lots of money and brass balls created this complex out of a marble quarry. All the faux stone and marble you see in USA, it's real here and quite impressive.

The hotel is part of a complex that includes retail and housing for sale. It's quite the isolated spot and hotel is not finished. Great crew....everyone encountered very pleasant.

I am thinking about stay end of the year. Has anyone stayed in november or december there? How was the restaurant and are there other restaurants nearby open?

Any recent stay reports? Seeing some very low rates for late June (EUR 130-ish) ... is anything wrong with this place (other than the grotesque mis-categorization as Cat 6)?

Considering using this hotel as a base for some daytrips in Trieste and Slovenia ... is that a terrible idea? Anything nearby in terms of small villages/activities/restaurants? Or is one essentially captive once checked in?

I was there few weeks ago for one night. The place is very nice and peacefull; according to my opinion it is an excellent base for exploring Trieste and Slovenia.
Very near is the castle Duino which I really enjoyed.

Super excellent Ambassador Recognition!
 

Oh my, what really nice Plat100 Recognition i got!

Got several emails from the GM Alessio, front office manager Valentina, head concierge Ramon a week prior to check in informing me they upgraded me to one of their Senior Suites overlooking the Marina.

When i checked in, no less than the Manager accompanied me to my upgraded Suite (for 90 euros BRG rate with breakfast included for 2) and showed me the ins and outs of the quite new room.

Also, they picked me up at the train station for FREE with their Benz car as an Ambassador guest! And in my room there was compli Champagne, letter from GM, Fruites and cookies! Super Luvs the treatment here!!

This place makes me feel so special :)

Thanks for sharing! Looks like a wonderful property...and it's always nice to know a property will treat Plats (and especially Ambassador Plats) so well.

Any recent updates?

I'd be interested
1.) Is walking possible along the beach or along a Promenade (1km or more)? It looks like just a small area
2.) How is the beach Club? Crowded? Sandy?
3.) Are there any Shops in the area?

Yes you can walk along the beach for a good ways. And you can walk to the Castle Duino which takes about 45 minutes or so.

It is a rocky/pebble beach. Just like every resort I've been to on the Adriatic including the LM Split.

Yes there are shops around the hotel. As I posited above, this is very much like the new Regent Porto Montenegro which is further down the coast. It's a large development with shops, restaurants, apartments and marina for big yachts. But it is geared for Italians rather than Russians. The prices here are rather reasonable in the shops and bars/restaurants. It all looks very high end luxury, but the very nice beach bar has prices for beer at €4 and €8 for a Mojito. The clothes seemed to be reasonably priced in the shops too.

The hard product at this hotel is very good. In addition to the high end Portopiccolo Spa, which hotel guest get one entry per day, there is a small spa area in the hotel on the 2nd floor. It has a very nice jacuzzi, sauna and steam setup. The rooms are of good quality too. But the service is far, far, far, wait, one more far, below a luxury standard.

1. Breakfast was a zoo. Count on at least an hour to eat. It takes several minutes for a hostess to seat you. Then another 10-15 minutes for someone to take your egg/drink order. Then another 20 minutes or more for anything to arrive. It was like this every day. They have buffet items and Prosecco if you like. But it's really not what you expect at a luxury hotel. They either need more staff or more efficient staff.

2. GPS/Signage. The GPS coordinates for this hotel will take you a couple km away, down a tiny set of streets to a dead end. This is true for the SPG website, Google Maps, Waze, and even my Audi MMI GPS. And there are no signs for the hotel along the beachside highway. After going back and forth a couple times I finally noticed a small batch of signs one of which said Sistiana and I followed that down to the public beach which is next to Portopiccolo. Also there are no signs for the Falisia private beach club until you actually arrive at this private beach club. You have to walk through the other private beach club, which is for the apartment/yacht owners. But none of the staff have even heard of the Falisia private beach club or know where it is. And once you actually arrive at the hotel club, the staff are about as helpful as they are at a W beach resort. :rolleyes:

Pro Tip: The beach restaurants Maxi's appears to have the correct GPS coordinates in Google Maps. So give that a try if you are driving in.

3. I booked an exec room and that's what I got. No Platinum upgrades. To be honest, the hotel was pretty busy when I arrived, but later it seemed to empty out. But they told me it was still full and I would get no upgrade. I booked on points so I guess that is why. And I'm only a Lifetime Plat 75, rather than 100/Ambassador. On the plus side they gave us a welcome gift of a bottle of red wine.

4. When I drove up to Portopiccolo, I pressed the button at the gate that is especially for the hotel. I then made my way to the interior auto entrance, but even though they should have known someone was coming, there was no one at the entrance. So I parked myself (they have nice big parking spots for all the huge German automobiles) and unloaded my bags in the dark. The garage is poorly lit. It actually looks cool from the entrance, but it isn't very practical.

But all in all we enjoyed our stay here. Hopefully they will improve the service over time.

Thanks so much for the summary review. Sounds like a nice property, despite the misses.

Did you by any chance speak with a manager about the various service miscues? I hope you did, since that may be the best vehicle to making the team aware of those...and resolving those in time.

It sounds like this new property is still getting its feet wet with regard to service...and perhaps also to the SPG Plat benefits and expectations. Crossing fingers that time brings improvement with service. This one is definitely on our radar.

We talked about the GPS issue and they are completely aware of the problem. But they, like a lot of us, have had no luck in getting Google to cooperate. As for breakfast and other issues, I'm of the philosophy that if they don't realize there is a problem, there's nothing I can do to help them. None of the problems I encountered were egregious. It's just down to having good attentive service or not. Everyone was very pleasant and polite, but it's just not a well oiled machine yet.

Any 2018 reports?

stayed there a month ago on a 3rd party rate. Wrote in and gave them my AMB #. At checkin we got upgraded to the very same suite (senior suite). Breakfast was good and not so busy since it was not peak season anymore. Staff is friendly, welcome amenity was ok. I would get a bit bored, if I had to stay a week there. I much prefer go to Portofino or Capri instead - much more authentic. Drive to Triest and experience the city and have dinner there. Overall the stay and treatment - especially for a 3rd party booking - was 9/10.
Will come back next year when I go to Tuscany.