"Firstly, a word about the transfer from the airport to the hotel; the drive by coach takes 2 – 3 hours, so if you have a late arrival at the airport, you’ll have a very late check-in at the hotel – it’s certainly worth thinking about a private transfer or even changing airports to get a more useful flight time, we arrived at 03:45 and I wouldn’t recommend it.
The hotel itself is clean and immaculate throughout and most things work just as you’d expect (barring the lifts, but it is only a 6-floor hotel – so no real problem).
The staff, both housekeeping and restaurant, were unfailingly helpful and friendly – in fact they provided the only real high-point of an otherwise very disappointing stay.
A few things I must mention:
The beach - the hotel is the Selene Beach, but the beach is very unimpressive, very small and shared with the family-friendly hotel next-door. The sunbeds are tightly-packed and you’ll need to be up early to towel-out a spot if you’re intent on spending the day at the beach.
Location - The hotel is adults-only but right next door (and very close) to a family hotel – so you can hear children shrieking and the referee whistle of their supervisor on the water-slide which overlooks the Selene’s poolside area. Outside the hotel, there is nowhere for a nice walk, just pavements full of cheap shops selling fake goods and tourist-tat.
The entertainment – very little activity during the day; aquarobics (with the least engaged/interested instructor imaginable) – a large-scale velcro darts game twice daily – ‘Zumba’ styled aerobics on certain days. The evening entertainment is little better - 2 x beach party and 2 x karaoke per week (both at incredible volume, you really cannot escape the noise – no sleep until those events finish – about 11pm – for anyone). There was a really good acrobatic show one night and traditional Turkish dance another, something to see at least – the choice of evening events seems quite at odds with the age-profile of the guests (most of whom seemed to be in their later years).
The food – clearly, the food is produced with nationalities other than the British (and with low cost-of-provision) in mind. Many stews (with little and/or very poor quality meat) odd, ill-matched, vegetables - a large dish of white rice at every meal but no sauce of any kind to accompany it. Cheap pasta dishes with, again, nothing to accompany them. Lots of the ‘hot’ food is also luke-warm/cold. You could see customers of all ages and nationalities lifting the lids of the food containers and lowering them down again having taken nothing. You couldn’t even find a nice, fresh bread roll – the bread always seemed several-days-stale. Many nights and lunchtimes I had to fall-back on a small salad and a plate of chips. This can in no way be described as 5-star dining – given the hotel’s rating (and the amount we paid for our stay) I expected to be very much better-fed.
The restaurant – bearing in mind the hotel’s 5-star rating, I was surprised to see place-mats instead of tablecloths (more like a cafeteria than a restaurant). The restaurant also gets very hot when full – which happens quickly at dinner since the snack bar etc. are closed by then.
We paid quite a lot of money for our trip and I can say entirely honestly that I have never been so disappointed by an hotel – how this place achieved 5-star status (and TUI Platinum status also) I have no idea. I’m equally mystified by (and rather suspicious of) the huge number of VERY positive reviews here (this suspicion appears to be shared by a number of contributors to this site).
I could not even contemplate a return to the Selene Beach, which I found to be both curiously overrated and seriously overpriced."
