Malpas Hotel Review - 12 of 154 Reviews

We booked the Malpas as a five star hotel but were very disappointed when we arrived to discover building work in progress, which started early in the morning. We were woken up by the noise of the builders hammering and banging and shouting. Then the next night we were woken by others 'guests' returning to their rooms around 3am after a night in the casino, slamming doors, turning on their tvs loud, etc. After two interrupted nights and two mornings of builders noise, which continued all day, we demanded to be moved and got a bungalow suite when we complained to the receptionist - much bigger and quiet. So it pays to complain!

Standard rooms are standard hotel fare, again, not like a five star hotel in London or Paris, but OK for a family sunshine holiday. Our first room was clean and the bed comfortable, but the suite was much better with space and privacy - and no builders.

The half board deal is good value if you like hotel buffet food, and plenty of it, but we found that it didn't come up to good London restaurant standards so we ate out most evenings. Drinks were also much more expensive than we expected, especially for the local wines and beer. The minibar prices were just silly, but since a Hilton charged me Euro3.50 for a Kit-Kat a few years back, I've never touched the contents of a minibar anyway!

Luckily, Kyrenia town is only a short drive from the hotel, and we preferred the variety of restaurants here, although the harbourside itself was very touristy and the food here overpriced. However, it did mean we spent a lot more money than we planned on food, which we did not expect to do at a five star hotel.

The indoor pool was heated, and thankfully not overrun with children at the time we went, but I was surprised the outdoor pool was not heated, but apparently no outdoor pools are heated as the summers are so hot.

Lots of friends said how unspoilt north Cyprus was but we found lots of building going on and it's clear that the coastline will soon be one long line of hotels like the Costa del Sol unless the government does something. Inland it's more traditional but still the country looks scruffy and needs to clean up its litter. Reminded me of Spain 30 years ago before the Spanish started to realise not every tourist was a mug and that rubbish needed to be collected, not just thrown anywhere.

Overall, we enjoyed parts of the holiday, like visiting the Roman town of Salamis without crowds of tourists everywhere, but think Crete and Corfu has more to offer those like us looking for an upmarket holiday in the Mediterranean.

Liked — not a lot
Disliked — noise, building work, buffet food, drinks prices…

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