We stayed at Benalmadena Palace on the 18th aug 2005 for 2 weeks and we loved every bit of it.

The hotel had every thing u could wish for to make a fantasic holiday.

The Apartment itself was very posh with a pool veiw which was great.

The cleaners was in every other day Cleaning changing bedding, towels, bin's ect.The Staff was amazing spoke very good English. Three brilliant pool's.

We also enjoyed trying out the Sauna, gym, jacuzzi, arcade and Cinema. We loved the BBQ next to the outside pool.The Restaurant was a very high standard, and the 2 Bar's with Happy Hour was really good buy one get one free. The entertainment staff was really good fun.

There were even pc's with internet I would most definitely return to BENALMADENA PALACE in the near furture, and would reccommed it to anyone.

This hotel has very mixed opions. Though during my stay at the Benalmadena Hotel, I could not find fault.

The staff were very helpful, on the first night we did not have enough bedding, reception sorted this out straight away and could not apolgies enough.
The room had plenty of space and very clean, with enough wardrobe space and drawers, everything we needed for the self catering was there. We asked for a sea view and got this free of charge.

There was some building work going on but this started later in the day and did not last very long, I have only mentioned this because of reading other comments.

The entertainment was good, and varied throughout the day and the evening.

We only ate at the snack bar a couple of times and the food was ok there.

Reception do ask for a copy of visa card, this is to cover for any breakages, I don't think this is unusual as I have stayed at many hotels asking for this request.

I though the only downside was the hill, though cant complain about this as it does state in the airtours brochure. - use the lift to avoid the hill!

After reading the mixed reviews on this hotel we were very apprehensive to say the least!

We were very pleasantly surprised upon arrival. The reception area was very plush indeed, with lovely marble floors, and we actually got dropped off and picked up from outside the hotel (Not 100 yards away). We were on the fourth floor overlooking the pool (Which is well worth paying the extra for), as we wouldn't have fancied overlooking the main road.

The rooms were spacious enough, and were cleaned every other day, the towels replaced every other day too.

We did have dinner there one night,(Buffet style -11 euros adult, and 5.50 euros a child up to age of twelve), although I thought the food was more of a three star standard rather than four star standard, nothing special at all, think I would have been quite miffed if I had paid for half board!

The children

We were really looking forward to our holiday as I had read a lot of good reveiws on this hotel, it was what we imagined very new and well kept. There is a lovely indoor pool as it was cold in the outdoor one. The rooms werent huge but we survived. I would go back to this hotel if it was in another resort, didnt like Belemadena not a lot to do or not a lot of good restaurants.

There is a beautiful park about 15 minutes walk away with a big lake and the ducks, chickens and rabbits run freely the baby loved it. We also enjoyed the marine park. The crocodile park in Torrmelinos was great you get to hold a baby crocodile.

Booked to stay at the Benalmadena Palace and was absolutely dreading what we would get after reading this site... which is why I thought I would post a review, after my stay there last week, to put all those people who have booked's minds at rest!

First of all, the approach to the hotel may worry you when you first get there as there is building work going on in the area (which Airtours did not tell us about but I had gathered from other reviews) and the way the coach takes you makes you feel like its up a mountain in the middle of nowhere - but it isn't - really!

Once you get inside the hotel it is really lovely.

Cleanliness

Communal areas are clean and tidy. The staff are polite and our room, a studio on the 7th floor, was fine. We were pleasantly surprised to get a bedroom (shame the bed was hard though) as we were expecting to sleep on a settee bed in the lounge, with it being a studio. The room was very clean, there was complimentary bottled water and fresh fruit on arrival and in the bathroom there were fresh clean towels and complimentary toiletries. The room was cleaned (including bed changed and fresh towels provided) 3 times during our stay of one week which was just right. There was a balcony which was very private as it was in the sloping roof but if you stood up and leaned against the ledge we had a view of the pool below, to the left the sea and to the right the mountains - beautiful.

Food

We didn't use the restaurant but we ate some meals at the snack bar (pizza, chips, sandwiches - all good) and the prices of drinks in the bars were very reasonable too.

There is a small on site shop and a nearby supermarket off site (5 minute walk) which we used for breakfast supplies and light snacks didn't actually do any cooking in our room - but who wants to when they are on holiday? Not me.

Entertainment

The entertainment was typical hotel style - y'know, a bit of cabaret, comedian, music quiz and kids entertainment, that kind of thing. What we saw of it was fine and the bar was full most nights.

Location

Yes, the hotel is set on a small hill but I would say it is only a problem for people with walking difficulties - there are plenty of shortcuts which are already mentioned on the site and which your rep or other holidaymakers will tell you about if you don't want to tackle it - we used the 'taking a lift down to the parking area' shortcut most times (get in the lift and press '0').

There are restaurants and bars closer than you think. We found a row of about 6 open air cafes/restaurants to eat out at if you turn left at the bottom of the hill (they are next to McDonalds - about a 5-10 minute walk from the hotel) and we ate at one called the 'Penny Farthing' which was very good and offered an extensive vegetarian menu for anyone interested.

The Beach nearest the hotel is a bit of a disappointment as it is a bit pebbly and full of what the sea has washed up but if you walk further along you will find a good spot and you can hire 2 sunbeds with comfy mattresses and a parasol for 7 euros. If you want to go further along towards Torremolinos, the walk along the promenade is absolutely gorgeous with palm trees all the way along, mosaic tiling and various artists

Hello all. This hotel, in my opinion, was very good there were 9 of us all lads on a stag weekend

We had a great room on the 7th floor right at the end. It had two balconies, kitchen, bathroom, shower lots of little shampoo and soaps stuff. There were 2 bedrooms but 1 was for a little baby with a cot in it, also it had a double bed settee. The room was clean although when your on a stag do with the lads the bed was the last thing on your mind when you rolled in at night.

Yes there was a pool outside which was freezing but there was an indoor pool Jacuzzi, sauna, gym and a steam room which in my opinion were all top marks.

The only downfall to this hotel was the walk from the road to the reception.

We stayed at the Benalmadina place for a week in April, my husband and I can not say a bad word for the hotel. We found the hotel to be very clean.

If you requested more towels for you room they was brought straight away. Staff could not have been more helpful. We ate in the hotel every day and the food we could not fault,

It was hot, well cooked and tasty,( which makes a nice change). The Hotels location, well there is a big hill outside, but during the day you can use the hotel vistas lift from thier car park up most of it then use the palaces liftup. No hill. Night time take the hill slow and steady its not that bad !!!.

We enjoyed our stay here and we will come again with the children.

Please beware that even though the hotel was lovely when our party booked we were not informed of the building work going on which could be seen from the 1 bed apartments.

After going on line to find out more about the resort we were only then informed of the two villas being built, we were told that they were completed on April 1st 2005 and that only the 2 bed apartments would see them.

This was not the case as we were in a 1 bed apartment, and on arrival pulling back the curtains then came across 7 villas not 2. Also in the brochure it states this hotel having 165 rooms 4 floors and 4 lifts.

Sorry to inform you that this is not the case, there are infact 7 floors 728 rooms of which 182 are apartments,so infact the hotel is a lot larger than stated, but still a nice hotel despite the location of the hill.

Although there were only three in our party, we opted for a two bedroom apartment which was very spacious. There was a large entrance hall, lounge and kitchenette. The appliances in the kitchen were very limited so it was impossible to cook anything other than beans on toast for breakfast.

There were no instructions on how to use the combi/micro oven and the cooker hood vented back into the room. The bedrooms were spacious with plenty of storage and the room safe was worthwhile paying for. We had a bathroom with good shower over the bath and a bidet; and next to that a wet room.

The sofa was rather dirty and smelly. We had to sweep up the floor on arrival as that was disgusting. Plenty of white towels that were changed regularly and baskets of toiletries were on hand.

The balcony was disappointing - we asked for a sea view and got the building works and it was definitely not private even up on the 5th Floor. We did not use the children's club, entertainment, trips, restaurant/snack bar, outside facilities so can't comment on these.

The indoor swimming pool was OK but crowded. We were alarmed when we were asked to pay

For a supposedly 4 star hotel this place was filthy. If you get star ratings for having vomit stains on the soft furnishings, dirty marks all over all of the walls and leaving litter lying on the stairs then perhaps it is but I thought it was supposed to signify the facilities and general standard of the property.

We were allocated room 713 when we arrived which had not been cleaned so were then given room 703. This room had the stained sofa and also had sloping ceilings so you banged your head if you stood up after getting out of bed or leaving the dining table.

There is also masses of building work going on adjacent to this property which airtours don't seem too keen to tell you about. The indoor pool was freezing, the childrens games area had vandalised pool tables with blood stain on wall and disco bar understaffed as well as having the worst entertainment I have endured for some time. For example the hogmanay entertainment was the rep singing ( deep joy eh?). I hope they are a good rep.

The jacuzzi and sauna are fine if you can get the kids out of them long enough. Don't be scared off by the hill it isn't the only bad thing about this place. Hopefully this property will be re-assessed and given the rating it deserves or the staff it requires to justify the rating it has.