excellent food,one buffet style and three al a carte theme restaurants.Help yourself to drinks either at main bar or pool bar.Hotel and grounds very clean.Not really sited in a resort as such but if your all inclusive you dont really spend that much time away from hotel.We did visit La Gomera and had one shopping trip to Plya De Las Americas(hotel courtesy bus).Would definitely go back again if possible out of main school holiday period.

Room excellent overlooked the sea. Large comfortable beds maids did a great job cleaning room daily. Food choice was excellent even show cooking.
Seperate themed restaurants which needed to be booked in the morning only hassle.

Took two teenagers with us both of whom thoroughly enjoyed the freedom all inclusive plan gave them. First time used all inclusive but would recommend this for a relaxing break.

For the more active you need to hire car to get out and about.Hotel staff very freindly service was far better than expected. Even all inclusive drinks were drinkable.

Just spent two lovely weeks at Bahia Principe with husband and two daughters 15 and 9. If you want a relaxing holiday in super surrounds but don't mind being a bit off the beaten track, they this is the place for you. We do all-inclusive every year and this was one of the best (the worse being Club Mac Alcudia).

We book with Going Places, and we stayed in the "Tenerife" part of the complex, all the English in this Hotel were with Airtours, in the "Adeje" they were mostly First Choice and Direct Holidays. Although we were outnumbered by Spanish holidaymakers, and did feel that the restaurant and evening entertainment was mianly set up for them.

The food was ok, I would love to say it was fab, I know none of us gives our kids and old man 7 or 8 choices but they did cater very much for the spaniards. The themed restaurants are a bit of a laugh, Mexican and Chinese are run by the same guy who has a terrible personal hygene problem, and his waiteresses are the most miserable in the whole of the canaries. The Italian and Seafood were great. We could'nt understand why the grilled king prawns were'nt translated on to the English page of the menu!

No problem getting a sun bed by the pool in the morning. Pool Bar food a bit grotty but drinks great. Would definately good back, not next year, off to Sharm el Sheik.

Just came back from a weeks r 'n' r. Did absolutely nothing on holiday except enjoy the hotel facilities and read a couple of good books. This place is ideal for that. Beautiful surroundings - but very isolated. The hotel is meticulously clean. The food was good - lots of it, a decent choice and again very clean. The all inclusive was good. The red wine was chilled and not the best I've tasted - moved onto the cava (not really cava) and that was very nice and stuck to that all week. I paid 160 Euros a night for a superior king room via www.allrez.com.

Finally just a quick note about a couple of other comments I've seen to reassure travellers.

Pidgeons - at lunch time if you choose to have lunch in the Spanish restaurant it is basically a large hard wood gazebo - so you're outside effectively and there are about 3 pidgeons in there. Although I am terrified of pidgeons and they were very placid and were not there in the evening. If this bothers you you can take lunch in the main restaurant.

Flies - there were a few flies - emphasis on the 'few' - but you are in a hot country. All the restaurants were meticulously clean - including their crockery and cutlery.

Sun loungers - we never had a problem getting sun loungers and we are not earlier risers.

Parasols - can be a problem. Basically our strategy was to get loungers near to where a parasol was covering loungers that looked 'reserved' with only a towel. If after a while, say 30 mins or an hour, no one had come we take it (there are signs saying no reservations).

Obviously if people have left more than just a towel and have gone for a swim or for lunch it would be a bit of a liberty - but the times we took a parasol no one turned up for hours to claim their sun loungers or didn't even turn up before we left!

Anyway - this is a great hotel. But make sure you get a good deal - I've seen tour operators advertising this for

A Halloo to you all.
I have just got back from Tenerife, we got home at 5am yesterday morning so this review is pretty fresh!

I travelled to BP with my husband, son of 14, daughter of 6 and my mother-in-law of 75'ish .

The hotel is beautiful, really very pretty and the gardens between the buildings and pool are well tended and stocked with loads of palms and other exotics, there are even banana's growing near one of the buildings! The beach next to the hotel is small and has a few sun beds. This last week a fresh load of sand has been added and is now quite nice. It is however quite busy as alot of holidaymakers from the north of the island also seem to make use of it.

As the previous posters have mentioned the location is poor if you are looking for a varied nightlife. The location is however perfect for people wanting a more relaxing holiday, which is exactly what myself and my family wanted.

The walk to Playa Paraiso will take a bit more then 15 minutes for the moderately fit though. The quickest way (besides a taxi) is to go via the small beach next to the hotel, climbing up a series of steep steps and cutting across an empty plot of land before following the main road into the village. This is not for the faint hearted as the climb is quite steep, especially in the heat of summer .

PP has a few shops and the prices are cheaper than in the hotel and the supermarkets are well stocked with booze and cigarettes.
There are a few souvenir and camera shops and quite a few restaurants and bars (one favorite with several guests was Talk of the Town), which provide some variation when you get fed up with the entertainment at BP. A taxi will cost anywhere between 3.50 euros and 5.90 euros depending on the driver, number of people, wind direction, bird mating rituals and the stand of the moon.

The entertainment has improved since the last review with amongst other things: flamenco dancers, pop group, magic act and of course the usual things with the animation. While the animation team were obviously not professional entertainers, they were very enthousiastic and the crowd seemed to enjoy their various performances. And there was bingo in the annex to the main bar

The childrens entertainment was quite good. My daughter loved the coloring and creative activities in the morning while other children enjoyed the sporty options in the afternoons. The childrens disco was looked forward to all day and the different members of the animation team that dressed up as clowns were brilliant.
It is just a shame that the disco is so short, the management would do well to increase it to at least an hour.

I gave the hoteldisco a miss as after talking to several couples, I found out it was frequented by teens (the ones too young to go into town) and so was a teeny boppers paradise. If you are looking for clubs, go into PDLA.

The sunbed and parasols were a nightmare. Even though you are warned against reserving beds and parosols, people still did it. In fact, they started at 23.30! Some people even had the nerve to take parosols into their rooms in the evenings, and I'm not talking about the kids, I'm talking about the so-called well-to-do middle-agers Anyhow, if you want a bed and are in a larger group as I was, make sure you get there early (7am'ish) and then you will get one! I usually took my book with me for an uninterrupted read and waited for the bar to open for a coffee at 8am.

I found the food to be very good. Yes it did seem to cool down quickly, but food will do that with the airco on and a breeze blowing! The breakfast assortment was darned good, I preferd the one in Portofino as they cooked the bacon and sausages better, the coffee was nicer and they had little baskets for your bread (hey, the little things count!) Also I preferd going to the spanish restaurant for lunch as it was nearer to the pool, it was nice and cool and the choice was more than enough for me. The evening meal in the main restaurant was consistently good, though I did feel there was a poor choice of veg on a few occasions (that is really my only gripe about the food). The range of food changed each evening and there is even a special area with food for the children! Well done on that one BP. Try the peaches by the way, they were fab. Also the chocolate filled pancakes were very good eaten with a cooked banana (sounds gross but wow!)
We went to the italian restaurant and found the selection of starters was very good. I had the parma ham and some salad while the rest of the family had the tomato soup. I found the main couse to be a bit disappointing, but other diners had really enjoyed theirs so it does depend what you order. The puddings however are to die for, fab, marvelous, yummy! My personal fave were the almond biscuits.
The food at the lower pool bar was also very good, so I don't know why it was described as plasticy. There is a choice of toasted sandwich, hotdog, cheeseburger and jamaican chicken; all are served with or without chips. There is also fresh pizza, salad stuffs, olives and other spanish bits. My kids just stayed by the pool for lunch. There are also ice creams to be had, so I was happy! This pool bar is open from 8am till 24.00 after then it moves to the commercial center where it is still in the all-inclusive arrangement. This then closes at 8am when the pool bar opens again for breakfast of croissants, ham, cheese etc and danish pastries.

The rooms we had were adapted for disabled use and seemed larger than the other rooms (a lovely couple from Glasgow let me, my husband and son shower in their room.......... hiya Ida and Andy!......their friends lent their showers to my m-i-l and daughter.........whey hey Ann and Rab............. this was on the last day as we had to be out of our rooms by 12pm and weren't picked up till 18.00) Anyway, while the other rooms had a bath and shower with the toilet and bidet area seperated by swinging doors, we had a shower. The curtain was either hung to high or was made too short, take your pick, which left a huge gap which allowed the water to fill the bathroom, leaving the marble floor extremely slippery. I'm surprised no-one has fallen and cracked their skulls. Anyway, if you have one of these rooms, be carefull!

This was also a bit of a pain, there was no possibility of keeping your room on for the day when departing late, even though I know for a fact that there were rooms over (detective work ) poor job there BP, I was not impressed. I was also surprised to find out they didn't have the facilities to give packed lunches to their guests. I have been to several all-inclusive and normal hotels and they ALL had the facility to provide packed lunches. Maybe it was just the person I talked to. There seemed to be some conflicting ideas and understandings with the people who worked in the reception. One lady in particular was extremely unhelpfull, so if you want anything done, ask one of the lads! This one lady had told our friends that it was not possible to obtain a second key to the room (tripe, you can get one for 10 euros deposit) that evening my friend went back and was helped by one of the lads and of course he gave her the key. On another occasion said friend went for the tour reps telephone number as it wasn't on the notice board and the same lady shrugged her shoulders and turned away. The same eveing she went back and another lad opened a drawer and wrote down the number for her. PMS? I think not.
All in all the staff were very good. The waiters in the main restaurant didn't walk, they ran. The bar is understaffed so unless you want something weird, make it yourself! The lady who was at the pool bar most days was a real gem, never got flustered and was always smiling. The days she wasn't there, it took 2 ladies to do her work, give this girl a raise BP

The taxi into PDLA was 10 euros and a taxi into Los Christianos was betwee 14 and 16 euros (see previous reason). There is a pretty good market here on a Sunday where you can get everything from bra's and knickers to african masks and from hair braids (haggle lots) to fake designer handbags. Haggle, haggle, haggle!!!!!

We went on two excursions; one to see the dolphins and whales and one to the Teide. The catamaran trip was fab, we saw the whales and dolphins and a flying fish! Only one girl was ill on our trip, but on other trips loads seemed to get sick, so do be warned. The trip over the teide was very interesting but it takes all day. If you want a quicker trip, hire a car as it will work out cheaper than going by tour bus. The island tour was also very good according to a lady I spoke to, she found it really informative.

well thats all I can think of. Enjoy your holiday

Lisa

Just returned (24/6/03) from the Bahia Principe. We also went there same week in 2002 so I can now make a good comparison.
Bottler1 has written a good review which is still valid.
Firstly the hotel has not moved! It is still in a very poor location, miles from anywhere. The taxi fare to Americas is now 10 Euros each way. A free bus runs once a day at 11am but is always over subscribed.
The so called building works which we were worried about (and for which My Travel offered us a full refund) are just about non-existent. There is construction going on about 1/4 mile away but we heard nothing and it had no effect on our holiday.
We were the only group on our flight going to the hotel and when we got off the plane the Airtours rep told us to wait by one of the coaches. We waited and waited and got fed up so I went and complained that there was no driver and no rep. We were then put in a luxurious taxi and taken straight there. Compared to last year when I would have given an overall rating of 9.5/10 this year I felt it was slightly less at about 9/10. This may be because the hotel was full this year but not full last year.
Food - Very good generally. A wide selection and lots of it but if any complaint it was not very hot, except the Jamaican chicken at the pool snack bar! burned my fingers!
You do need to book early to eat in the Italian, Spanish or Seafood restaurants. Not a wide choice of ice creams but the chocolate one at the pool bar is best!
Drinks - Excellent choice and better still help yourself, I even saw a few of these...
The mini bar in your room is free! The maid re-fills it each day.
Last year it was 24 hours at the snack bar, this year only 8am to midnight, but you can save up drinks to last you all night if you can stay awake. The snack bar moves ouside the all inclusive area of the hotel (near the disco) at midnight until 8am
Entertainment - DO NOT BOTHER. Make your own
This was disgraceful again this year. They would be better off doing Bingo!!!
Surroundings - The hotel has excellent grounds with splendid gardens and surroundings. Well looked after and pleasant to wander around but there are some steps and quite steep slopes. Lifts are available from all levels if you can't manage the steps.
Rooms - This year our room faced the sea not the pool area. It was smaller than last year but still excellent. Air conditioning and room fan were spot on. Get a second key if you want to leave it on while you are out, still 10 Euros deposit. Maid service every day, very clean and tidy. No faults at all.
Pools - Still very slippery surrounding when your feet are wet. All pools were clean and superb (especially compared to the run down Aqua park which we made the mistake of visiting)
Sun Beds/ Umbrellas - Last year there were loads of spare ones. Sadly this year it was the usual holiday nightmare of getting up early to reserve your favourite spot and the umbrellas were in short supply. This may be due to the new part of the hotel having now opened and more guests using the pools.
You can get special towels for the pool area from the 'towel hut' and change them every day free.
Hotel shop - There is a shop in the hotel and a few shops just outside reception which also seem to be part of the hotel. The prices are too high. A Kit-Kat is 1Euro 20 cents for example. The choice in the shops is limited. You can get papers if you can't bear to be away from news.
Overall we had another good holiday at the Bahia and paid

Date of travel 8th June to 22nd June, 2003. Family of 3, two at 38 and one at 4. Everything booked independently.

This was our first time in Tenerife and we

Looking at reviews, we must have been lucky. We got a late private hotel only deal, and picked up direct flights.

We agreed

Review of Bahia Principe (Pronounced prince-ip-ay)

Stay August 2002. 2x adults. 2x16 year old girls

Location: Poor

The hotel is situated within a 15 minute walk of Playa Paraiso. It is currently the only development in the area. There is nothing of interest in the immediate vicinity and you certainly could not walk to Fanabe, Torviscas or PDLA. Playa Paraiso itself consists of one main street with limited shops and bars although there is a good Chinese restaurant.

The hotel does operate a shuttle bus to PDLA but this only runs three times in the morning and returns three times in the evening. Although I did not use it I understand that it operated on a booking system and was quite often over subscribed.

If you do not want to be stuck in the hotel you can use taxis (Max 15 euros to PDLA) or hire a car. (I recommend pre-booking through Autos Abroad.