Just returned from this lovely hotel in Coraya Bay, in Marsa Alam. A beautiful place to stay if you want a week of quiet in the Egyptian winter sun.
Was apprehensive about the weather, but it was sunbathing weather till about 4 30 pm and at night warm enough to wear short sleeved tops, no cardis needed. There is a nice walk around the horseshoe bay on a walkway, a 30 min slow stroll each way, with seats to stop and sit on and drink in the night sky.
You enter the sea from the beach in restricted entry areas to protect the corals & there was much snorkelling going on as the reef almost reaches the beach in places.
We were half-board and the food choice for breakfast and evening meal was of a very high standard for an Egyptian Hotel. No tummy upsets. There were staff members checking food temperatures and constantly replenishing with fresh food. Hot fresh food stations with a different freshly cooked food choice each night such as salmon, duck in orange sauce, turkey, veal. Fresh pasta station everynight where your food would be cooked in front of you. The salad, bread and dessert choices were outstanding.
It wasn't one of those hotels where you were worried if you would find the one thing you would like of an evening, you were spoilt for choice.
Would seriously condider returning. There is nothing outside the hotel complexes apart from a complex of shops that serve the five hotels in Madinat Coraya and a small water park free to hotel guests.
The Ibertoel Lamaya and the 2 Sol y Mar hotels appeared more child friendly and were all AI with no HB option like the Coraya. Large bottle of Sakara was 25LE, a glass of wine 35LE and glass of 7up 15LE. The Egyptains still havent cracked how to make a drinkable wine yet and it could be mistaken for paint stripper, this was Omar Kayan (spelling?) which is supposedly one of the best of a bad bunch, I stuck with the Rose on glass was normally enough.
The staff were brilliant all you had to do was raise a hand and they would be there, truely outstanding service.
The animation team worked their socks off everyday & taking into condideration it was a difficult audience to motivate ie mainly age 50 and over Germans and English guests who just wanted to read, relax, swim and eat they should be commended for their efforts to get folk involved in aqua, stretch, zumba, beach volley and various evening entertainments. They were tireless, unlike most of the guests
Doe
Hi Chris, it sounds lovely and relaxing! Glad you had a good week
I am glad you had a nice time and the hotel lived up to your expectations, it did look lovely on the website.
I know you were a wee bit apprehensive about the area as there appeared to be nothing around it so it is good that this wasn't a problem.
I remember having a bottle of Omar Khayyam and found it rather memorable.....for all the wrong reasons it was terrible. Maintaining quality appears to be an issue with Egyptian wines, I have had Obelisk which has been very nice then another bottle, possibly a different vintage has been poor and nothing special.
A wine that has been nice on the 2 occasions we have had it was Chateau des Reeves wine, however it was purchased in our hotel in Luxor and was not cheap (nothing was in the hotel), I don't know if you can buy it in the Liquor stores such as Drinkies
Did you have the option to upgrade to AI while at the hotel?
So cost wise do you think it would of paid to upgrade to the A/I or were you quids in by not ?
The option to upgrade to AI was 25 Euros per person per day and so would have been 350 euros for the week.
I'm almost embarrassed to tell you what our hotel bill was
Bearing in mind that this wouldn't suit everybody, we only had lunch on the last day and paid cash of about 250 LE we did this as Thomson no longer sell meals on the plane just cheese toasties & the like.
We had late breakfasts at 9am and ate at 8pm ish. Our bill on check out for drinks/mini bar items was 81.96 Euros spent another 50 euros on crisps & snacks from the hotel shop and tipping in small denomination LE as we went along.
We realised there was no point in us upgrading to AI as at the Hilton Sharks Bay last year we only ate lunch the first two days.
I guess it's understandable that they can't crack the quality wine issue as generally speaking they are a nation of non drinkers so they are only doing it for tourists. Fortunately my DH has always been partial to the bottled Sakara and I have water or minerals if the wine is too dreadful.
I had a couple of cocktails non alcoholic ones were ok & about 25 LE the alcoholic ones 65LE but the roughness of the base spirit shone through the later
There is little to do in the area so we personally wouldn't go for a fortnight, but for a week it was excellent. In fairness this hotel has been no 1 on the opposition for years so I hoped it would be of a high standard. There are now 70 plus hotels in Marsa Alam although I'm not sure where ? They must be spread over a long stretch of coast line.
Our bill on check out for drinks/mini bar items was 81.96 Euros
I take it you werent rolling back to your room legless and falling into walls every evening then Chris . Like me happy to nurse a bottle of sparkling water or the odd cocktail of an evening .
Crikey 70 odd hotels with only a handful of flights going in each week. it's a shame we can only fly in on a wed because that really messes us up.
Talking about the airport it was fantastic i think it is either new or refurbished. Arrivals is a bit cramped as you have to buy a visa and sort of queue up for immigration as well and the queues get mixed up, but you still get through in about 20 mins. So much better than Sharm and Hurghada. On departure it is even better, more seats than people, clean toilets with loo roll, a costa coffee and Pizza Hut lol and a couple of duty free shops all priced in the obligatory dollars.
The hotel was only 15 mins from the airport. No baggage people allowed in to hassle you, it was amazing.
we would mention it the next night and they would say they would put it on the bill and then they would forget, not sure if it is because we are good tippers or what
I bet it was
I did think that when we settled the bill the front desk would think good god these people have existed on water for a week all very strange.
Hi Doe have you added a review of the hotel to the reviews section yet? if not perhaps you could add a new review for us
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