Salgados Palm Village

Block 2 BEWARE LOOK IN TO THE POOLS AT NIGHT BEFORE YOU SWIM, the pools look great but when you look at the water in the dark the underwater lights show an infestation of insect lavae swimming in the pools (not so visible in day light) Very large nice rooms, plenty of free bottled water each day + tea in room but no milk?. About 5 good night shows in 2 weeks but some were repeated. Typical TUI resort about a 40 minute round walk to the local supermarket. To get to any restaurants, bars, entertainment you need to get the bus or a cab to Albufeira around a 30 minute ride. The restaurants have much the normal Euro food,as is the norm the food is never hot, but it was nice that the fried eggs were not left to go hard on the counter. Take care not to leave your food uncovered as the flies are a real pest and will be all over the plate (best to cover the plate with the large napkin provided). The fly issue is not helped as there are NO electric fly killers in any of the restaurants and the salad bar is not covered (I reported to a waiter that there were flies in the salad dressing, he took a spoon and fished them out but left rest of the dish to be used). The spirit drinks were not to my taste they were the normal jet fuel that All Inclusive hotels seem to serve, so it was a trip to a not so local supermarket to buy a drinkable bottle of rum. There is a free wally trolly to the beach every 30 minutes, but there is not a lot to do when at the beach. Golf is a big thing at this hotel and there were several parties of golfers there during our visit some rather loud late at night. All excursions from this resort were very overpriced for what you got for your money. We had some small issues with the room that were never resolved, the toilet was constantly running 24/7, the balcony doors were very hard to slide and kept being left open by staff, we had to speak to the rep and ask that the housekeeping staff did not leave the doors in the open position after going on to the balcony, the overflowing shower tray did get repaired but it took 3 days. The staff were very nice and very helpful at all times service was quite fast. Flights in and out were very early morning and the return pick up was around 06:30, the trip from airport to resort is around 1 hour. The weather was perfect.

The positives are that the accomadtion is very spacious. The food is plentiful and , with 3 restaurants, there is plenty of choice. You can choose to sit around the "noisy" pools or sit around ones with no entertainment. The little train which takes to you to the beach is very convenient. The beaches are beautiful and the nature reserve is worth a walk around. The negatives are that the pools are not as clean as we would have hoped and the rooms and communal areas appeared not to have been cleaned all week. The flies and mosquitoes are a problem so go prepared. There is a mixture of golf parties and families which use this hotel and we feel that this combination does not work. The golfers generally stay around the Sports bar and use the toilets, both male and female , whether there are women in the bar or not. This is totally unacceptable. The early morning golfers had no respect for other holidaymakers and often went around banging on doors to wake their party up and sat on their balconies , hallways or rooms being very loud and using bad language. Please note that the rooms are not available to enter until 4 o'clock which we have never come across before but appears to be the norm. The staff were very helpful . Although the Animation Team are very energetic, the entertainment leaves a lot to be desired.

We spent a week here in the middle of October - my husband and I. There are good things about this hotel but things that aren’t so good. We were able to get our room as soon as we checked in and not have to wait till 4pm. The room/suite was lovely and huge - we really liked the room. The shower was marvellous, beds were super comfy and both one of the best we have experienced in a hotel. Yes was dark in the morning but mainly because of the position, sunny in the afternoon. Food was fine, breakfast was good, lunch and dinner fine - always grilled fish, meat and salads. Can’t understand why previous reviews have said that they couldn’t find something to eat. Rooms cleaned daily and towels and bedding changed. Now this is where I don’t think that it should be advertised as Platinum. The bar area was not great - inside the bar smelled really unpleasant, a bit like soured milk/vomit - not good. The area outside could be loads better - very basic with cheap looking tables and chairs, not that clean, ash trays not emptied - just very basic and no particular atmosphere. The sports bar was ok but again just ok - these areas should be much improved in my opinion to warrant the Platinum rating. Also a bit of a moan - for at least 3 nights we took a bottle of wine to our room after dinner with no problem - no challenge from staff and we though that this was ok. However on our last night we did the same, to be challenged by a staff member at the restaurant that this this was not allowed, explained that we had done this previous nights with no problem, he said that no not allowed and if we took it he would have to speak to the manager (not sure what he meant by that - possibly get us ‘done’ lol). Really - we are grown ups and I can’t see what the problem was. This is nowhere near a Platinum hotel - we paid a very decent price (sale from TUI about £500 each but I checked before we left and the price was about £700) - not worth the normal price. At the time of this review this hotel is not on sale for next year and according to TUI it’s because they are reviewing the contract - think what you think about that.