"We stayed in a One Bedroom Apartment on the 4th Floor, so this had a main living space with a bed and kitchenette, and then a separate private bedroom as well.
Both rooms had Air-con, which functioned well but wasn't ice-cold. Both rooms had balconies. Our view was in-land towards the hilltop church and that was lovely.
Both rooms had good sized wardrobes with plenty of hangers, there was one safe.
The beds were reasonably comfortable. They could have been better but remember this is a 3 Star Hotel, so at that level and price they were as expected.
The pillows could have been a lot better. We did request an extra pillow which came later that day.
The kitchenette had a good selection of utensils. The electric oven (note this is an oven and not a microwave) can get very hot so would strongly advise not to leave this unattended at any time.
There wasn't a toaster in the room but I think we discovered on our last day we could have requested / hired one.
The fridge was a good size and had a small freezer compartment.
Clean towels are offered daily if you want them, along with rubbish disposal.
Full room clean and change of bedding is offered every 4 days I believe.
The bathroom could be improved with additional towel hooks / towel rails and a couple of shelves for toiletries.
The rooftop pool area was fantastic, but please note this is adults only. The rooftop bar seems to close by 6pm, which was earlier than we expected. You can still access the rooftop itself to watch the sunset but once it is dark they lock the rooftop down so no access mid/late evening.
The groundfloor family pool doesn't get a lot of sun on the pool itself, so the water doesn't feel that warm even on a hot day. The sea up to waist height felt warmer for example. I don't think the hotel can realistically heat that size and depth of pool without incurring a huge expense, so it is what it is. The beach is only a 10 minute walk away and the sea felt warm during our stay when the temperature was about 28C on average.
We found all the staff throughout the hotel to be extremely kind and friendly. Our daughter has some special needs and anxiety and the staff were very warm and accomodating and this really made a huge difference to our stay.
We didn't book the inclusive buffet breakfast or dinner so couldn't comment on that. We did eat in the lounge bar and pool bar areas a couple of times and the food was absolutely fine. Not sensational, but just what you would expect from a 3 Star Hotel and price point.
The onsite gym is free to access and is well equipped with a lot of weights and resistance machines. Could have benefitted from more cardio treadmills and bikes, and certainly could have benefitted from better air-conditioning, but for a quick 20-30min workout in the morning it did the job. There was usually only 1 or 2 other people using it at any time.
The onsite mini supermarket is very well stocked with everything you might need. Don't miss the fresh bread section tucked away in the front left corner! We found in the morning it could get very busy with only one till open so expect to queue in the mornings. It closes at about 6pm, which felt too early really, but there is another supermarket less than 10mins walk away which is open until about 10pm.
The lounge bar fills up quite quickly in the evening and I feel the hotel would benefit from a second space somewhere for guests to relax mid/late evening. Suggestions would be an area with board games or a pool table. Could even have a large TV screen and some sofas and show a family movie in the room once or twice a day for the kids / teens.
There is an arrangement to get a discount on the beach sunbeds and umbrellas by making a small payment at reception and then showing the receipt at the beach. We missed this as it wasn't fully explained on arrival. We have given feed back that an information sheet explaining things such as this and the toaster being available for hire would have been helpful as I think there are things available but it's not obvious unless you happen to ask.
Another example is that the lounge and pool bar menu didn't have many vegan options but the hotel manager has since told us that bespoke vegan dishes could have been made at request with a days notice. This is good but we weren't aware.
During our stay we ate at One80 Restaurant halfway up the hill to Mellieha old town, and also at Ventuno Restaurant at the beach. Both were excellent and would highly recommend.
There is also a large water park about 25mins taxi ride away called Splash and Fun, it is half way between St Pauls and St Julians. We visited twice and absolutely loved it. The food there was excellent as well. Perhaps the hotel could look into an arrangement with the water park as I could see an opportunity to run a daily minibus trip there as a paid for excursion, which would be cheaper than a taxi and perhaps with discounted water park entry if the hotel is bringing a minibus full of people there each day - definitely should be able to organise something.
Overall, we would return as the hotel was comfortable, clean and the staff were very friendly and accomodating throughout. Some small improvements could make this even better, but I get the impression management are open to constructive feedback and improvements so I think it will gradually get even better over time."
