Sol Cala D'or Apts, Palma de Majorca > Reviews (1)

I booked a VERY cheap family holiday for 9 days in October 2006 through FlyGlobeSpan, ex Glasgow. I was rather worried what I was going to, as the price was so good. However, I need not have worried. Even the flight out was better than expected.
We hired a car and after taking a few extra little tours (ie we got lost) we arrived in Cala D'Or. It was dark and eventhough I'd printed off instructions on how to find the Hotel, we went round and round in circles, as we couldn't see any road signs. I insisted hubby stop so we could ask directions, only to discover we were actually there. The receptionist was expecting us, and spoke to us by name. We were given our key, handed over out passports and directed up to the 2nd floor.
The electricity only works when the rear end of the key is slipped into a slot near the Apartment door. Hard to find in the dark, but very cost effective and energy efficient.
The Apartment was on 2 floors. A small kitchenette on one side and open, slightly spiral stairs ont he other. the main room was large, airy and had a table with 4 chairs, a bureau and 2 full sized beds, which had extra foam to make it like a sofa. Large balcony with table, 4 chairs and a drying frame. Upstairs was a huge king sized bed, a double walk in wardrobe and a bathroom with 4 pc suite. Everything was spotless.
Our balcony looked out to what we initially thought was the town centre. We faced a chinese restaurant, 2 shops and another restaurant. On the other side was a bar that aired TV Soaps and was Karaoke. Luckily everything stops at midnight. The pool area is in the centre of the block - 3 sides are accommodation and the other is the cafe/restaurant and reception. It is a lovely pool, with plenty of sunloungers (Eu2 each) and plastic tables and chairs (free), BUT, the water never got even luke warm. It was freezing the whole time - North Sea freezing!!
The Hotel has parking spaces at the rear, which are easily accessed by gates and there is a lift at the front end of the Hotel - it's glass and looks over the pool. There seemed to be holiday reps daily.
You can hire a key for the safe. I think it was 15Eu and you got 12 back at the end. There was also a TV but you needed to hire the remote, we didn't bother.
There was a small supermarket under our room. it was okay, but one further up the road was bigger and cheaper. The big one at the roundabout to Cala D'Or wasn't that great.
My only quibbles about the Hotel are;
The cleaning staff. Always worked in groups and just came in. The didn't even wait 5 minutes for you to gather your things to leave them in peace. The Hotel has various bins for your rubbish - they seem to be into recycling. However, the cleaners just bundled all our separate piles into one black bag.
The Restaurant/cafe. The season ends on October 31st, so they didn't have stock of everything advertised. It's quite simple really, just cover up or removed posters advertising things you don't have! The food they served was quite good, not the best we had, and there wasn't much staff.

As it turned out we were not in the centre. That was through the alley by the Karaoke bar, up the stairs and keep on going. There is the area of all the restaurants heaped together - but they are more expensive.
We ate at The Big Steak House/Fontanellas on the alleyway 3 times - it was 1st class. It's italian and their Lasagne was wonderful. The staff were great and you got some entertainment from the bar next door that had Tribute Bands playing nightly. The Best was Abba - the place was packed out.
We also ate several times at PP Chaves, which was across from our Hotel. their food was 1st class too and they did the ice cream sundaes our kids loved. We always seemed to have the same waiter and he interacted well with our kids.
Down the road from here are a few more restaruants/bars. One near the end was open but whilst looking at their menus a guy came out and said "No ice-cream, no food, we are closing soon". We thought it was a joke, but it happened another night - why don't they just remove the posters?! As it was early October, they should still have had food stocks.
Across the road from here is the stairs leading down to the beach. It is small and very crowded. cross the bridge by the stairs and this also takes you to the centre of Cala D'or, but there was a bad sewage smell here at night.
Overall, we had a great holiday and were very pleased with the accommodation. I think the star rating was 3, but feel it should be more.