Valle de Santa Ines Holidays from £448

We might call these ulra posh "granny cottages" rather than "bungallows" Or, do you remember Channel 4s "Grand Designs" an architectural TV series? These "bungallows are sort of ultra posh modern "Grand Designs" "garden rooms". Really pleasant and comfortable. The high ceilings of the "bungallows" offer a really nice sofabed space. Our "Grand Designs" "bungallow" was, however, on a quiet dead-end road, not by a shimmering azure pool or a cute paving path between bungallows. But, being on the road actually gave us the feeling of being in a house and living on a very nice street. Which was very nice. The street runs - almost level - to the beach, around a corner. The sand isn't deep and soft but it is in a safe wide cove shape. I was delighted that my precious daughter wouldn't be swept away by ocean currents. The flightpath to the airport is high, so we didn't find the planes intrusive. We like the sense of connection that resorts near airports give. At the other side of the curved Playa del Castillo is a little "marina" with a FAB restaurant called, La Mar Salada, which had FABOTASTICO gambas al ajo, prawns in garlic. Extremely nice receptionists - including a lovely girl from Argentina. In summary, we loved our stay.

Overall a great hotel. Strong points are as follows; quite tidy and neat in the communal areas, good food at the breakfast and dinner buffets, polite staff, brilliantly easy access to the pool, complimentary cava in the afternoons, breathtaking views from the sea facing room! So pretty strong on most fronts. Negatives are as follows; caters mostly to German travellers but would certainly help if English proficiency was stronger amongst reception. Needless to say they were extremely helpful and did their best to understand me and my requests, so this is a minor (more of an experience thing than a functional thing). The next negative was with room cleanliness- now dont get me wrong they are spotless to the naked eye! But I did find a couple of light-ish wood louse looking creatures, once crawling up the bed and another time on arrival inside the cupboard. The housekeeping staff were awesome though, and did a fantastic job at cleaning the room each time they attended. So for this reason I only deducted one star for cleanliness. At least there weren’t any bed bugs. Facilities I gave a three because for starters, the gym is tiny- very difficult to get a workout in there when it was busy. I was expecting it to be small but some minor tweaks could certainly helped, e.g. making the mirror above the dumbells stretch the width of the wall so both benches can see their reflection. Secondly, some form of paid room service would’ve been nice for lunch.