Confortel Islantilla, Islantilla

(HOTEL REVIEW FOR HALF BOARD [Breakfast and evening meal])

Me and my other half fancied a sun holiday abroad (well more her than me), having spent the last two years doing the English resorts. We made a check list of things we wanted and then went along to our local holiday hypermarket. The checklist of what we wanted was as follows:

1. In the Algarve.
2. One week all in for £1000 for both of us.
3. Hot
.../> 6. Not a 'Little England' - I.e. not loads of drunks spewing up everywhere. And we wanted to know we were abroad.

Unfortunately everything in the Algarve (Portugal) either didn't fit the bill or was too expensive. So the Holiday booking agent came up with a compromise in Spain (I was quite willing to go off and look elsewhere, but Cathy was eager to get something booked [she doesn't think I can make a decision]).

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(HOTEL REVIEW FOR HALF BOARD [Breakfast and evening meal])

Me and my other half fancied a sun holiday abroad (well more her than me), having spent the last two years doing the English resorts. We made a check list of things we wanted and then went along to our local holiday hypermarket. The checklist of what we wanted was as follows:

1. In the Algarve.
2. One week all in for £1000 for both of us.
3. Hot
4. Close to the beach.
5. Fairly peaceful.
6. Not a 'Little England' - I.e. not loads of drunks spewing up everywhere. And we wanted to know we were abroad.

Unfortunately everything in the Algarve (Portugal) either didn't fit the bill or was too expensive. So the Holiday booking agent came up with a compromise in Spain (I was quite willing to go off and look elsewhere, but Cathy was eager to get something booked [she doesn't think I can make a decision]).

So having looked at the Catalogue we plumped for the Confortel, Islantilla. This being positioned in Andalucia, near the border with Portugal. The Catalogue was Thomson and we bought the package (parking, flights, transfers and hotel). I will only assess the hotel here though. Oh and by the way the catalogue quotes it as a 4-star hotel rather than a 2-star (as quoted in the title). I myself would say it sat somewhere between 3 and 4.

We arrived at the hotel on Sunday afternoon (04/06) after a two and a half hour flight and 2 hour coach journey from the Portugese airport, 'Faro' (would have been more like an hour but our coach had several stops to make). From a distance the building looks fairly garish having had a recent paint job in red, orange and yellow (pictures included!) When you get closer to the building you get a much better impression.

The hotel is quite formidible, having 340+ rooms and being designed in a horse-shoe shape. It is built in a quiet, almost purposely built strip of hotels right on the seafront. The views from the hotel are nice (palm trees, sea [from a higher level room], pool and surrounding bulidings in the Spanish style.)

We entered the very clean and elegant reception area and waited to be seen to ( the reception is very spacious and included one of the hotels three bars off to the left as you entered). This was the point when the first issue occurred... We had been sold the holiday having been told that English was widely spoken. From our initial encounter with the male receptionist we found that this was not the case. We had not elected to learn too much Spanish as neither of us are particulary adept at languages and had not been planning to go to Spain anyway. I had picked up a couple of phrase books though (the most helpful of which came free with a newspaper!)

I'm not saying the guy at reception did not know any English, just that if you strayed beyond the standard one-liners either he or us would become flustered. One issue was the fact that we unpacked everything and realised that we were in someone elses room (who had not arrived). We found this out because of his name on the pass card and not ours. Explaining this to the receptionist was painful, though was resolved in about 10 minutes.

Thoughout the holiday we found this was a similar theme. We did use some Spanish ourselves, but would often get into trouble if the person we where speaking too fired back a question. We found the best thing to do was to either point at things, rehearse the Spanish or hope that the person you spoke to had a decent grasp of English.

Believe me I have no problem with Spanish people not knowing English, but having been told that English would be widely spoken, we were in for a shock.

All the same this did not spoil our holiday and we found ourselves enjoying the challenge after a while. The head restaurant staff spoke English well and as the Restaurant was self service (more of which later) this was ok.

Our room was a straight forward double (we didn't request anything special). It was equipped with a mini bar/fridge (didn't touch the expensive stuff in it, but used it to cool or beers etc bought from the close by supermarket). A TV (2 out of the 10 or so channels being English speaking). A radio that had one choice (a seemingly random selection of songs... Beatles, Tina Turner, Spanish stuff). Air-Con that didn't really get going until an hour after you turned it on. A well equipped bathroom (excellent shower), clean comfy living area. and double doors to a large balcony with a table and two chairs. We had a sideways view of the sea that was reasonable. We would often sit on the balcony at night and watch the world go by.

Everywhere we went in the hotel was clean and pleasing to the eye. As previously stated the hotel is in a horseshoe shape and in the middle bit they have a pond like area with greenery and a pair of peacocks.

THE RESTAURANT:
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Large restaurant that was never completely packed (even when the Spanish descended at the weekend). Clean and with 3 or 4 buffet areas in the middle and off to one side. Three coffee/tea and juice machines could be found dotted around the place. At breakfast time you could just wander straight in and tuck in. At the other meal times you would receive a bill that had all the choices of drinks on it, when you sat down someone would immediately ask you what you required. This choice wiould have to be paid for seperately if you had gone half board (as we did)

BREAKFAST (07:30-10:00)

My favourite meal at this hotel. A nice selection of foods available. I usually plumped for toast (using the rather cool industrial toaster), juice, cooked breakfast of bacon, egg, beans, tomato etc and tea. Other things available were:

-Yogurts, fruit, cheese, omellete (cooked to order), fresh shell fish, cereals, cold meats.

-Doughnuts, bread for toast, rolls.

-Bottled water, various fruit juices, tea, coffee

All the food myself and Cathy had were fresh and fairly tasty. Never piping hot, but they rarely are with this sort of thing.

LUNCH (?)

Didn't eat lunch in the restaurant so cannot comment. From what I could see it was similar to Dinner and could be bought for 20 euros.

DINNER (20:00-22:00)

We found the 20:00 start time quite late and often sat waiting in our rooms counting down the minutes long before. As you enter you are handed a slip that lists all drinks, you give your room number and are allowed to seat yourself. As soon as you sit a person (who usually couldn't speak much English) would ask for your choice. We always had a bottle of water for between 1.50 and 2.50 Euros as this was cheaper than the other extortionate wines and soft drinks. Once that was out of the way you were free to get on with it.
From what was available you could eat a normal 3 or 4 course dinner or mix and match (didn't seem to be any limitations). I often got a roll, main meal and then pudding.
The selection often centered on fish though every night you had chips available if you wanted. On a typical night this would be the selection:

- 2 Types of soups
- Salad/shell fish bar
- Pasta/Paella/Hot fish/Red meat choice/Mysterious thing in batter
- A hot plate was off to one side and the chef would often cook you a stake or omellette to order if desired.
- Pudding bar (cakes/nice ice cream)
- Cheese and biscuits
- Rolls and cheese sticks (with butter and spread portions)

Food quality was fine, nothing outstanding. Plates would be whipped from under you as soon as you finished by the hawk-eyed staff (who put you off pigging out too much).

THE POOL
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Large pool that had a segregated area for children and a disabled lift into the adult pool (the hotel on the whole was very disabled-friendly. During our stay we saw many happy wheelchair, and disabled people).

Around the pool were many comfy loungers that usually met the needs of the guests well (though the weekend days were a bit of a free for all). Again everything was clean and tidy. We only saw a life guard a few times and if I had kids I would have watched them at all times.

We spent a good deal of time either in the pool or around it and found it to be a good sun trap with a fair selection of hay umbrellas and shady spots.

Off to one side of the grounds were a large tennis court and two smaller ones (and a ping pong table).

The hotel did it's upmost to keep the guests happy and they often had activities going on (though the turn-out was pretty poor). Things like archery, aqua aerobics, boulles, shooting, dance lessons etc.

BARS
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There seemed to be 3 distinct bars within the hotel:

RECEPTION BAR

Pretty quiet, served a couple of beers on tap and a few bottled varieties along with cocktails, wines, spirits and soft drinks. During our stay they had a scrren showing the World cup which was handy.

POOL BAR

Open to the elements. Served same selection of drinks as the other bars + snack type meals (we had a very good hamburger here). Also there was a ice cream bar. Thia place was spacious and would seat 100+. The Spanish seemed to like this one best.

NIGHTCLUB

Unfortunately we only got to find out about this on our last day so can't comment on it. It's tucked in behind the giftshop.

OTHER THINGS
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- There was a well equipped gym that you needed to pay an entrance fee for.
- An indoor pool that wasn't operational (out of season only I think)
- A beauty salon that seemd to charge an awful lot (and if you were English you paid more?)
- A Creche for small children that looked well equipped.
- A mini-club for kids.
- Conference rooms
- Fairly expensive gift shop selling the usual tat.

THE SURROUNDING AREA
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The beach was easily reached via a keycard operated door at the rear of the complex. The beach was white sanded and fairly nice (though not the best I've ever been too). There were some scary looking insects about and thousands of ants on the floor of the walkways. The Sea appeared to be clean and had quite strong currents. During our stay it was only busy at the weekend.

About five minutes from the hotel was a complex of shops and cafes. The supermarket was good for bottled water (you can't drink the tap water) and beverages. Also other holiday essentials. It was fairly cheap and I would recommend buying stuff here rather than the hotel.

There was a Burger King, A Spanish speaking cinema, a smattering of fashion shops, bars, cafes (pizza, fish, Italian). We used quite a few of these places and found them all pleasant. Also there were a couple of cash machines and a gift shop were you could pick up English papers. All this area was clean and smart. Got extremely busy when the Spanish arrived on Friday night until they left on Sunday evening.

That's about it! We had a day trip to Seville which was about an hour and a half away (organized trip - 42 degrees!)
The bus service in Islantilla was not supposed to be very good though we never used it. The next resonably sized town was 'Leppe' which seemed like a fairly run of the mill kind of place. Portugal could be reached in an hour via car (if you hired one). And if you are a golf fan there are plenty of top notch golf courses within minutes.

IN SUMMARY
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If you are thinking of visiting this area I'd advise mugging up on your Spanish, or prepare to be patient. This place was sold to us as quiet. Though when the Spanish arrive at the weekend it becomes very busy (though family orientated). This was definitely a nice holiday but I won't be rushing back, as I could easily spend £1,000 elsewhere and have just as good, if not better a time. 

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