Dorisol Florasol Hotel

Room with a view (ish)

Ok this is not the best hotel on the island but it is centrally located, clean and the staff are very friendly - they even gave us a bottle of wine as a birthday present for my husband without prompting. The kitchen aspect is basic but is enough to whip up the odd meal or lazy lunch. We had a room which over looked the road - which they were digging up - this meant it was very noisy but as the aircon was even louder we learnt to live with it the bonus is we had a beautiful sea view. The pool is lovely and we often had it to ourselves not counting the odd lizard. Ok we saw some cockroaches but they were all dead ones and none in our room or the breakfast room. The breakfast room did get crowded and hot and so it is worth getting up a bit earlier to stand a chance of sitting by the window. There is a free bus but it doesn’t run that often and you have to share it with the other Dorisol Hotel - this means it can get very busy in the afternoon - but the walk to Funchal, although long, has lots of places to stop and admire the view if you can’t get on. If you are after cheap and cheerful with a good pool and good access then this is a good choice - if you want pampered luxury then pick somewhere else.

Traveller's tip

Things I wish I had known! Washing up stuff - they provide plates etc but nothing to wash up with The Open top site seeing bus stops just along the road from the hotel - it is pretty much the end of the tour so jump off to save the walk. The resturant next to the hotel is one of the most expensive around but the supermarket does cheap meals Take your own pool towels - they say they provide them but we never saw any.

You pay for what you get

This hotel was a inexpensive but of a really poor standard. Our seaview room was really noisy with road traffic from 5 am in the morning. Car parking was non existent. All hotel facilites - tennis, pool were based at a partner hotel a ten minute walk away. There was a collection of bugs in the bathroom floor for the duration of our stay. Poor facilities are one thing but the staff were really unhelpful. It was as if we were an inconvienience. Sometimes you can bear bad facilities if the staff try to be helpful but they simply were not. A smile goes a long way. statements like "...you can park you car outside but it will get towed away at 8 am by the police" are not really helpful

Traveller's tip on getting the most out of your stay

Don’t stay in this hotel

Could Do Better

The hotel is right in the middle of the hotel zone. The view is marred by building works. We had a major infestation of bugs in our room (in the bed!). Although it was dealt with quickly it put us off the hotel. On the plus side, the breakfast buffet was very good, the staff were pleasant and helpful.