We booked this hotel believing it was in Portovenere, but it is in fact a 10 minute drive away. Apart from this, it is a reasonably modern and popular hotel with a quality restaurant. The views across the harbor are surreal.

We had a perfectly average experience at this hotel. Had I not been paying luxury hotel prices, it would have been fine. The hotel setting and decor in the public areas was nice, and the swimming pool was too cold to use but clean. The location is great for those with cars; it's a short drive to Cinque Terre and Portovenere from there. There is no beach within walking distance to the hotel.

Our room was quite small and plain. There was a very nice patio with a lovely view of the harbor. I admit to being picky about bathrooms, but this one needed renovating and there was some black mildew growing here and there. I would only stay here again if the price was more of a bargain.

Be aware, this hotel is not situated in Portovenere, but Le Grazie. This is a 10 minutes busride from Portovenere.
We stayed 2 nights during our honeymoon. After having dinner, we arrived at the hotel at midnight, and the main door was closed, and nobody opened. Luckily we had the tlfno. to the hotel and got contact with the nightportier after 30 minutes.. Very bad experience.. No excuse the day after when we informed the staff at the front desk.

And the hotel need renovation.
Stay away from this hotel.

Having visited this nice little town 20 yrs. ago, I dragged my wife back there in 2005 and stayed at this hotel for 2 nights. We loved it so much we used it as our base of operations for a week in 2008. We requested and got a bay-view room, and the view is fabulous. The hotel's Cul de Sac is very quiet -- very rare in Italy. The rooms are above average, clean, and the breakfast good, considering the reasonable price.
We made daylong driving & boats trips to all of the Cinque Terra towns, and also drove to Pisa. While we did eat a great anniversary dinner in close-by, touristy, pretty, Portovenere, but we found ourselves walking from the hotel along the waterfront of the small Le Grazie harbor most nights. Locals come out to walk & talk, and there are very few tourists. Folks are friendly, and we felt like we were welcomed visitors in a small local community. We got this feeling no where else on the trip. We had the best pizza on our entire month-long Italy trip (a corner place with a brick oven about 4 blocks from the hotel), and one night a large sailboat left the harbor with great fanfare, and a family party which we were invited to -- (we speak no Italian, it never seemed to matter). Le Grazie has no clubs, no fancy restaurants, and one nice church. It is a throw-back, a hidden treasure, if you can slow down enough to enjoy it....