Renard

A new starwood property in the Canaries. A search revealed no reviews....anyone been there? what did you think? Thanks

Alain

Good Morning,

This is my first post, I'm writing from Italy, and I will spend part of my next vacation at the Sheraton Fuerteventura Beach, Golf & Spa Resort Canary Isle, Spain.

I would like to know if someone of this forum knew this hotel.
Also like a Gold member do you know if I have to pay for the use of the fitness facility, the sauna and the Steam Bath/Room?

Thank you and apologize for my english

Starwood Lurker

Internal data suggests that access to the fitness facility is free for all guests, not just SPG members. I have nothing to offer regarding the sauna and steam bath/room. There is usually a charge for those and Gold members, or Platinum members for that matter, are not usually given free access to spa amenities.

You might send them an email and see what they tell you, though.

[email protected]

Good luck.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Online Guest Feedback Coordinator
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[email protected]

Alain

Thank you very much for your reply.

Best Regards

Louie_LI

We were at this hotel in December 2006, and what William says about the spa ($) and gym (free) was true for us then.

We did get upgraded to a corner room/junior suite based on status. Very nice large room with a huge terrace. There were some maintenance issues in that neither the jacuzzi nor the television worked. If either of these are important to you, make sure they work when you get to your room.

Also, pack a flashlight. The shortcut over to town is across an empty field and it is not lighted.

Alain

thanks for the info.

As fuerteventura? I'm going to rent a car for two week, for travelling around. the idea of the vacation is: have fun with the girlfriend, beach, sea, swim, and surf...

I'm moving the second week from Sheraton to jandia at Sol Melia.

another question: I'll have the gold status I think 3 days before of the vecation, so I don't think to receive the gold card in time... do you think that the people at the reception check the status with the terminal?

Louie_LI

Driving around the island is pretty easy, especially on the east coast. The road had recently been improved. Going over to the much more hilly west side is a bit more stressful; the road was new but the curves and the height of the drop off is a bit scary.

We didn't stay in Jandia but we did drive down there and the beaches looked very nice. Jandia itself is very built-up.

For your question about the hotel seeing your gold status, maybe you could bring a print-out of your account that shows the status, in case the hotel can't look it up?

nimeta

I am staying there over New Year. I am having 2nd thoughts though as some of the Tripadvisor reviews are very mixed - some real horror stories!!

Anyone been more recently?

nimeta

Guess not!

I am going to give this place a try anyway, and I'll report back.

nimeta

OK, just back from a week at this hotel. Went with my 70ish year old parents, my kids aged 2 and 4, and my bro and sister.

I booked 3 rooms. I was in the Pres Suite, which was very nice. 2 big rooms, 2 bathrooms and a living room and entrance room. And a very big Jacuzzi bath.

My parents and brother & sister had 2 standard rooms which were quite nice.

I noticed that the "duplex suites" were on 2 levels. I didn't go in one, but I guess downstairs is the living room, and upstairs the bedrooms. However, they had a jacussi outside on the balcony, underneath a rain cover - very smart indeed. (My pres suite balcony adjoined the balcony of the duplex suite so I hopped over the wall and had an explore )

The hotel has 2 Pres suites and 2 Duplex suites. I couldn't say for sure but I think the duplex suites have 2 bedrooms.

Check in was very nice. Front Desk Manager showed me personally to the rooms and went out of his way to inform us what was available in the hotel. I was offered a number of Plat Welcome gifts but, as usual, took 500 *points.

The hotel itself is great. Lovely pools, nice facilities, great beach, interesting Spa (which you had to pay for but the hotel gave us all a 1 day free voucher which was fine as we preferred to be outside. Hotel had tennis, archery, football and crazy golf facilities on-site and 2 18 hole golf courses right across the road. The beach has a man made stone dams to protect from the Atlantic rip-tides, so swimming in the sea is really safe.

Kids club was superb. Truly excellent!! Amazing frankly.

Food was generally expensive and poor quality. Invariably cold and often fruit would be of questionable quality. Thai restaurant grim according to reports, but I didn't go. Staff were generally great, but the hotel, and the island, suffers from a poor customer-service ethos. When you have a member of staff .....ing at you that they only got 2 hours sleep the night before on New Years Day at noon when we were trying to order the kids their lunch, you realise that things are not right. This sort of behaviour was limited to a minority of staff at the hotel, but a sizeable minority.

The best restaurant was the Mediterranean restaurant, which you have to book the day before. It's pretty good, especially compared to everything else we managed to find.

Another example was New Year's Eve. Having kids as young as ours we have to eat at 6ish to get them to bed between 7 and 8. The hotel closed their restaurants till 8 without telling us in advance. When we complained we were told to call room service - frankly not what I had really wanted on New Years Eve.

The island suffers from a very bad taxi situation. You cannot pre-book and often they are so busy it can take up to an hour to turn up. The hotel does not have a car service and you are at the mercy of the taxi's (hotel staff will just tell you "it's not our fault" and shrug their shoulders). We saw a few very stressed guests who had flights to catch and had been waiting 30 mins + for a cab.

Luckily we found an English guy, Dave, and his wife who run a really good private taxi service and know the island very well. Their tel's are +349287869069 and +34617828801 and email [email protected]. I can highly recommend them and wish I had found them earlier in our trip.

The island (and to a lesser extent the hotel) attracts a slightly rough element of British society, and the quality of bars and restaurants seems geared towards people from this demographic group. This was not so bad as to ruin the holiday, but as a British expat it always shocks me when I come into contact with such types (is it me, or is drinking pints of lager before lunch by the pool wearing a football top just soooo sad?) (or maybe I have become a snob!!??)

Overall. if you have kids this is great. If you want to come without kids to explore quite an interesting little island, then probably this is as good as you'll get on the island so you might as well suffer the food and stay. And for a Cat 2 redemption, this is a real bargain!!

TimWong

Thanks for your great report.

- Is any of the outdoor pools heated?
- Was it possible to swim in the sea during that time of the year or was the water temperature too cold?

Alain

Hi

Do you know why this Hotel does not accept point anymore for the reservation?

Renard

I show it accepting points....now are you sure there are standard rooms still available? Maybe a website issue? Call spg to make your points reservation if you continue to have issues.

Alain

Hi, I don't know if there are standard rooms available...
tomorrow I'll call SPG, I would like to make a reservation with cash&point

nimeta

Yes, one of the adult pools is heated to a very nice temperature. So is the kids pool.

The sea was too cold for me frankly, although I did paddle with the kids up to my thighs without too much problem. Others were swimming though. The man made bay that they have created creates a very safe swimming environment in an otherwise quite dangerous part of the world for sea swimming. I imagine in summer it is superb!