Annabelle Beach Resort

"Aegeo Spas - Magda was incredible and the full body massage was relaxing, and I felt really taken care of during this time. Totally recommend"

"I have a good massage from George"

"We have just reached the end of our stay at Annabelle Beach Resort and, unfortunately, the hotel has been a real disappointment. We booked and paid for what was advertised as a 5-star all-inclusive resort, but in our experience this is realistically a 3–4-star hotel at best and is in need of major refurbishment. I do want to start with the positives. Prior to arriving, I contacted the hotel with some specific room requests, and fortunately our allocated rooms worked out very well for us. The staff throughout the hotel have also been consistently friendly and welcoming, and our housekeeping has been excellent. Our room has been cleaned meticulously every day, and I genuinely couldn’t fault the housekeeping staff. Unfortunately, that is where the 5-star experience ends. The hotel generally feels very tired and dated and, in my opinion, requires significant investment and refurbishment to justify being marketed as a 5-star resort. The sunbeds around the pools and beach are also tired, and if you want a decent, peaceful position at the upper pool, you need to be up and out around 7am to secure one. Even something as basic as changing beach towels is unnecessarily restrictive, with replacements only available during a one-hour period in the morning and another one-hour period in the afternoon. The all-inclusive package has probably been our biggest disappointment. Only one complimentary bottle of water was provided at the beginning of our stay. After that, bottled mineral water costs €2 at the hotel, despite essentially the same water being available for around €0.60 at the shop immediately outside the hotel gates. The selection of drinks included within the all-inclusive package is also extremely limited. During the day, I struggled to find a drink I actually wanted without having to pay an additional premium. When you’ve already paid for a 5-star all-inclusive holiday, continually encountering supplements is frustrating. The food has been another major issue. In our opinion, it is around 3-star standard at best, and certainly nowhere near what we expected from a 5-star resort. Ultimately, we decided that rather than allow this to ruin our holiday, we would hire a car, get out and explore Crete, and eat at restaurants away from the hotel every evening. We have consequently had a very enjoyable holiday — but largely because we stopped relying on the hotel and its all-inclusive offering. Unfortunately, that has also made the holiday considerably more expensive. By the time we’ve paid for car hire and restaurant meals every evening, this so-called 5-star all-inclusive holiday has effectively cost us as much as if we’d booked serviced/self-catering accommodation and paid for our own meals and activities. That’s probably my biggest frustration. We specifically paid for a 5-star all-inclusive experience so that everything was there for us if we wanted it. Instead, we found ourselves spending considerably more money simply to achieve the standard of holiday we expected in the first place. There are some genuinely lovely people working here, and the housekeeping deserves particular praise, so I don’t enjoy leaving such a critical review. However, guests considering Annabelle Beach Resort need to have realistic expectations. We have made the most of our time in Crete and have ultimately had a lovely holiday, but sadly that has been despite the hotel rather than because of it. For us, Annabelle Beach Resort simply does not deliver the 5-star all-inclusive experience it advertises."