"We have just returned from a week at this hotel……let’s start with the good points as it won’t take long! The animation team are the saviours of this place, they were amazing at entertaining everyone and always remembered everybodys name…..special shoutout to Momo and Simon Camel.
Now to the hotel itself, the lady who checked us in was lovely however didn’t really give us any information. We had 2 wristbands slapped on us and when we asked what the second one was for we were told it was because we had booked through Tui. We still don’t know what they were for! We changed some money at reception, paid the taxes and the deposit for 4 towels (a topic I will return to!). We were handed cards for the towels but not told where to go to pick them up. After a (long) trek halfway down the beach a very grumpy man virtually chucked 4 “towels” at us. They are not what we consider towels, more like cotton throws……not great at absorbing water!
After a couple of hours our rooms were ready. Room was pleasant enough although the bathroom was dated and mouldy. The shower was bizarre, fitted three quarters down the length of the bath, when you switched it on you didn’t know which way the hose was going to flex and 9 out of 10 times it would just spray above the curtain and soak the tiled floor turning it extremely slippery. Once I managed to get the hose to stay in one place it was good pressure and warm, however if you are over 5’ 8 there is no way you can get underneath it! Oh and then there was the awful shower curtain to contend with, once wet it would stick to your body!
Dinner on the first night was Fisherman’s night I believe, none of us are big fish eaters so we didn’t eat a lot and decided we would reserve judgement on the food until the next day.
Breakfast…..the usual egg station you would expect at an AI but instead of queuing up to receive fresh eggs or omelettes you had to take the cold congealed ones that had been sat out.
The pastries were hard and stale!
Lunch and dinner tended to be the same food over and over again. Not only was the choice limited, it was always cold. One day we saw some fresh chips coming out of the kitchen, our teenage boys both had some and even they were stone cold. I admit that I am a picky eater so knew that I would struggle, however my husband has a great appetite and will eat most things but even he was struggling to find anything edible let alone hot! Our 2 16 year old boys lived on cold pizza and cold chips! The desserts looked appealing but had no flavour to them whatsoever.
One lunchtime I watched a young child grabbing handfuls of pasta from the buffet, shoving them in his mouth and then going back in for more!
Once tables had been used, the waiters were very slow to clear them and when they had been cleared they were never re-set. We had at least 5 mealtimes were we struggled to find a clean table.
There were pizzas and crepes available in the afternoon but these were also colds and undercooked. Ice cream?? Non existent…..we have been on a lot of All inclusive holidays (including adults only) and every single one has offered ice cream……..this hotel was full of kids that couldn’t even get an ice cream unless they got their parents to fork out for one at the extremely over priced shop in the hotel.
We were provided with one bottle of water in our fridge on arrival but this was never replenished. We had to literally beg for a bottle of water everyday. If you asked at the upstairs bar you were told to go to the downstairs bar and then vice versa. We were hoarding any water we could get our hands on and trying to keep it cold in the useless fridge!
Luckily the air con in our room was fine but our boys were not so lucky. We asked at reception 4 or 5 times for them to do something about it but nothing ever was…….extremely uncomfortable for them.
The entertainment was in a central location, shared by 3 hotels. It was impossible to get a seat and even if you did it was a good 10 minutes walk to get a drink!
When sitting in the bar it was clear the bar staff had their favourites and it seemed the only way to avoid the long queue at the bar was to keep on tipping the waiters, as Brits we tend to tip when we have received great service not just to be acknowledged.
We were also unaware that guests from one of the other hotels could come and use our facilities but we couldn’t go and use theirs. This caused some issues on the night of the England match as a number of guests came from the neighbouring hotel taking all the prime seats.
The pools were nice and the lifeguards were fantastic, however people insisted on congregating on the pool steps making it difficult to get in and out of the pool safely. One lady asked the lifeguard to move some children away from the steps as they were causing an obstruction only for her and her friend to then plonk themselves on the steps! There are the usual activities of aqua gym and dance class but the music is so ridiculously loud you can’t even have a conversation with the person sat next to you!
We were advised not to use to excursion man in the hotel as he was very expensive but to instead go across the road to The Black and White where Sammy would do you a better deal. And they weren’t wrong, we paid £30 each for an all day trip, we were picked up in a lovely new air conned car with a fantastic driver. This same excursion would have cost us £93 each through the hotel and that was on a packed coach. Would also highly recommend The Black and White for a meal………hot and fresh, a nice change from the cold muck in the restaurant.
On our last afternoon my husband returned the 4 towels and received 2 cards back, we explained we had 4 towels but insisted we would only get 2 cards. He went to reception to hand the cards in and get our deposit back, the man would only give us our deposit for 2 towels. Hubby explained we had 4 towels, he said well you only have 2 cards. Husband came to where I was sitting and explained what had happened, he wasn’t sure if was misunderstanding what was being said. I then went up to reception and explained that we 4 towels but had only been refunded for 2. The man told me to be quiet and listen to him. He said you only had 2 cards so you only get money for 2 towels, this guy had seen the 4 of us with our towels every day for a week so must have known I was telling the truth. When I argued back and told him he had robbed us and the hotel was thieving from us he literally yelled in my face that I should respect him.
Avoid this place at all costs……rude staff, mouldy bathrooms and the most awful and cold food we have ever had the misfortune to eat. Now before anyone says oh it’s Africa the food is different there, we have visited Tunisia and Morocco many times so know what to expect.
This is advertised as a 4 star but is 2 star at best."
