We booked our holiday 4 weeks prior to departure. Having deliberated for 3 weeks over which hotel to book we finally opted for the Marmaris Beach Hotel.

Anyway, we made a group decision to continue with our holiday and set off for Marmaris on 30th August. Once again we had not been informed by Goldtrail that due to the heightened levels of security that we needed to turn up for check in at least 3 hours prior to departure instead of the usual 2 hours. As it turned out this worked to our advantage as by the time we arrived at Cardiff Airport almost everyone else had checked in and we were able to go straight through! Great start - no queuing!!

We arrived in Dalaman at 2.20am and our luggage was out promptly. We found our transfer rep quickly and Goldtrail had several reps pointing us in the right direction - so far so good! Alas, it was a bit too good to be true. The rep misdirected several people onto the wrong buses so we had to hang around whilst luggage was recovered and people were re-directed. This took around an hour. So then we began our 2 hour transfer into Marmaris. We then arrived at the resort and were informed by the rep that there were several drop off points. We were the last! After the large coach painstakingly manoeuvered through the tiny back streets we eventually got to our hotel at 6.30am! Completely exhausted and more than a little annoyed that we seemed to pass our hotel numerous times prior to dropping off other guests! Absolutely ludicrous!

The room was small for 3 people (4 single beds) and basic but was exceptionally clean and the bathroom was superb! We were allocated a room at the back right hand corner of the hotel and the view from our balcony left a lot to be desired but we decided that we were only going to be sleeping and changing in the room and it fitted the bill more than enough for this. After half an hour of struggling with the air con we called down to reception who sent the duty manager up to sort it out. He was baffled so within 10 minutes another chap came in who fiddled with a load of wires and got it working! Somewhat worrying! We spent the next 5 hours catching up on well overdue sleep.

The hotel as I mentioned earlier was located perfectly for the beach. They had their own free sunbeds for guests and waiters were on hand to run around for us. We wanted for nothing. The hotel also had it's own restaurant which was superb and better still was the 15% discount offered to guests staying at the hotel. The pool was a bit on the small side but being that close to the beach was not an issue in the slightest! The rooms were also cleaned daily and the bed linen changed regularly.

I won't bore you all with details of the return journey. The rep was 30 minutes late collecting us which in the midday heat was more than annoying. We were seated at the front of the plane deirectly after the toilet which we soon found out was leaking. This meant 4 hours of the most disgusting odour and the carpet beneath our feet soaked in urine! I have since lodged a complaint with Onur Airlines.