Royal Star Beach Resort — Hotel in Red Sea

Need to know: |Take some of the reviews you see with a pinch of salt as I’ve noticed a lot of facilitated by the animation staff hounding guests to leave a review and checking it before posted. |Bring sea shoes as sea bottom is quite rocky but nonetheless beautiful - you can also get these from the shop inside the hotel for a fair price! |“Garden view” rooms are in actual fact the main road facing the hotel which are buildings under construction, lots of noise. |The spirits provided for cocktails etc aren’t the nicest - but are lovely without the alcohol lol. |Late checkout (6pm) is $20.00 - if you do checkout at the original time of 12pm your wrist band is cut off and you no longer are able to access the restaurants for food/drinks - they do provide you with a “lunch coupon” however if you are leaving later… |If you do late checkout your room won’t be cleaned and you won’t be provided with fresh towels - you’ll be left one towel per guest that’s it.|I’d advise bringing a beach towel - the pool towels whilst do the job are rather tatty and worse for ware.|There is a cash machine in the hotel that exchanges currency & allows withdrawals. |Download inDrive - similar to uber for cheap taxis. We paid less than £1 for a 15 minute trip to the marina there & back. Pay for these in Egyptian pound - cash.|Book trips through get your guide - best prices and great value for money for what’s included. |||Pros: |Majority of staff are lovely - especially the man at the sea bar! Some I found were somewhat rude or expectant of tips from you for doing the bare minimum. |You can use the hotel next door for their pool, beach (which is deeper so better if you want to swim), and evening entertainment which is where most of the entertainment actually is). Also has pool slides so great for families. |Your beach/pool beds are practically reserved for you by the recreation staff daily - though they may expect tips in return. |Dinner/Tea buffet lovely - we never went hungry and was fine eating salads & fruits. |There is 2 a la carte restaurants provided in the all inclusive - we didn’t actually book either of them but worth knowing (I believe one’s Chinese, and one is Italian). ||Cons: |Breakfast - unless you like different types of eggs there isn’t much else. Would’ve been nice to have some beans, and tomato’s everyday instead of once every other day! |Whilst the hotel overall isn’t bad - it needs a lot of tlc, definitely not as pictured on advertising.|When we first arrived after upgrading our room we had an issue with a leak and plugs not working in our room. We were told they fixed it and hadn’t and then were reluctant to changing our room until I asked to speak to higher management. This was thankfully then sorted and our room was also in much better condition than what we previously had. |In your first few days you’ll be hounded by different vendors - unless you are genuinely interested just say no. If you say maybe they will come back. |2 of the nights we were here they had set the tables around the pools, sets a lovely scene and would’ve been really enjoyable had we not been told by a member of staff we should move into the restaurant so families of four could sit at them tables (bare in mind they had no tables of twos) - we of course didn’t as we weren’t the only 2 sat at the tables. But didn’t set a nice tone to the fact we felt we couldn’t enjoy eating with nice scenery for one night. |The crows - there is outdoor table seating alongside the restaurant however when guests are finished with their food plates are left piled to the side of entrance to the restaurant in which the crows fly to pull the food off and it goes all over. We’ve watched staff leave food on the floor at times and walk by it. Would just help if they disposed of the food straight away or moved it indoors to help tackle some of the issue. This also means there’s always bird poo all over the chairs etc that isn’t cleaned regularly. And obviously it means guests directly above have balcony’s full of poo constantly. |The evening “entertainment” is essentially none existent so some evenings are pretty boring, as mentioned also most of it is in the other hotel so you have to mess about walking round to the other hotel. ||It’s a shame some of the hotel staff have a rather lack of customer service/just common kindness to the guests. This isn’t a reflection on all the staff but some. Rooms are dated, bed sheets/towels etc need renewing. Overall we have had a lovely holiday, but it would be nice if the hotel actually took on some of the critiques from guests as previous reviews seem similar and clearly nothing has been done to...

Just returned from a 6 nights stay, the main male receptionist upgraded our room, but wanted us tip him quietly. We were escorted to our room by a staff member, who then waited for a tip, offering to take me to the ATM. First evening meal: The restaurant/canteen, looked dirty, ferel cats wandering around. We were lead to a table which was just a thin table mat , with a piece of tissue with a fork on it on 1 side, and a knife on the other. We gave our drinks order of 1 white and 1 red wine, then went to go get the food. To say the food was good would be a lie! It set president for the whole week. Chicken, beef, fish are the only thing the cook's know what to cook. Beef comes in various disguises, goulash, steaks (fried beef) burgers (actually fairly nice), roasted ( dry or chewy). Chicken came mainly Egyptian version of KFC negative any flavouring or taste. Didn't do Fish (allergic), but it was always hidden in a tray with lid on. Going back to our first night, we was eating approximately 7:20 ish, (bearing in mind that dinner finished 9:30pm), I asked a waiter for a 2nd glass of both red and white wine, he came back with a glass of white wine and no red. I asked for my red wine, to be told they had run out of red wine. I asked why not get 1 from the main bar, he shrugged his shoulders and walked off. 4* hotel running out of wine within 3/4 of an hour of opening and not doing anything to sort it out? This was a recurring thing, four of the 6 nights, red wine ran out early without replacement and another night the white ran out.

Cleanliness: Walls near tables are full of stains of spilt food and drinks, dirt encrusted on ledges, floor needed mopping not just sweeping. Most cups, plates and bowls were chipped. Cannot count how many times you had to wait for a clean glass, before you could order a drink, you had to search other tables for a knife or fork, if the table reseter wasn't around. Don't ask for a small T spoon, they don't have them, so trying to eat a boiled egg with a soup spoon or wooden stick is a joke.

Plus side: Most of the staff are very helpful, (when not oggling the young ladies).

CATS I am not a cat lover. So to see a restaurant allowing wild cats into a restaurant/canteen, without chasing them out aggravates me. To see people picking them up and letting them eat off their plates, or encouraging them to sit on the tables and feed them, and staff doing nothing infuriates me. This was the norm, 1 night, a guy put a plate with food on it on the floor for a cat, when I challenged a staff member, he shrugged his shoulders.

Bar, Cat's allowed to sleep on chairs and settees without being moved off them. This results in the furniture smelling of cat's and cat hairs everywhere. Again lack of glasses, meant you get thin plastic ones which are meant for pool area.

Rooms basic, you get a kettle and tea, coffee, sugar, no milk or cups. Bathroom Towels were thin but changed daily, Bedding wasn't changed in the 6 day stay.

Beach Beach towels, not cleaned daily, as too many stains showed. Sunloungers: Some by the pool area where fairly modern. The rest were wooden things made around 1930's , legs have nails sticking out. Some came with wheels (if they didn't fall off), other's the wheels had been cut off. The mattresses were in poor condition, with rips, tear's stains etc on them. Windbreakers were good, but very heavy to move. However, 1 day we tried moving 1, to find our hands covered in blue paint. Apparently staff had repainted them without leaving a wet paint notice anywhere. So me, my wife, the lifeguard and a towel man were covered in paint. No paint remover was available (or the painter's couldn't be bothered to get some), the towel man brought some cloth and suncream, which eventually with a lot of scrubbing worked.I have been to both Hurgarda and Sharm El-Sheikh previously. I have also been to Morocco, Tunisia, Sri Lanka and Goa, and can honestly say that this is the worst hotel I have...

Worst hotel I’ve ever stayed in. We stayed in a sea view room but it was more like a pool view room. We were supposed to stay there for 9 nights but we actually ended up leaving 2 days earlier. When we went to check out at reception the receptionist went into a discussion/ argument with us about why we were leaving also.

The room was old and dirty, cleaner only cleaned the room 2 times in a week period, we had to request toilet roll and fresh towels almost every day.

We had mould in the shower, no cold water only lukewarm, toilet didn’t flush properly either. Hair dryer also not working at all. Light switches also damaged and not working properly, air conditioning doesn’t change tempo or temperature, blows dust out as it hasn’t been cleaned since it was installed most likely, we and my partner both got really sick from the air conditioning and had to go to the pharmacy to get medicine. There were no toiletries in the shower and the shower wouldn’t drain fast enough either.

The cleaner kept coming to our room knocking on the door and just walking in at random days of the day, didn’t speak English. You cannot lock the hotel door from inside so we had to put a chair against the door to stop the cleaner from coming in.

Beds by the cleaner were not made properly, we had to remake them ourselves. Bed sheets filthy with stains all over them. Pillows hard and mattress old and disgusting. Floor also wasn’t cleaned at all.

Couldn’t get any rest here, they played loud music at random times throughout the day and night.

The food was also terrible, we ate the same thing each day and we actually lost a bit of weight there. Plates, glasses, cutlery also dirty and most of the time you have to wait on these things to be cleaned. The staff in the buffet area are quickly taking away your glasses and plates even when you’re not fully finished.

You also need to pay for wifi in your room which is 20 euro for 7 days, when we got there they “didn’t have a 7 day pass available” so we could only buy a 3 day pass and the WiFi then only works on 1 persons phone then. WiFi in the lobby also pretty slow.

The people from the hotel were really annoying when you were at the beach. Asking if you want tours and then quoting 100 euro for 2 people for snorkelling at one of the islands. We went outside the hotel and to a small street on the right side where we got the same tour for 15 euro per person.. the tours from this hotel are a big scam so don’t book with them, go outside the hotel!!!!

Be careful at the beach directly outside the hotel, there’s big rocks there and loads of sea urchins, there’s no signs or anything to say that. I would recommend going to the beach from the Empire hotel which is a 2 min walk.

The worker who was serving drinks was normally friendly but he refused to give my partner 2 drinks (one for me, one for my partner) because there was only 2 glasses left and there was a young lady standing behind my partner, the worker kept pointing at the girl, and not wanting to give the drinks to my partner. Eventually he gave them when my partner asked him what exactly was the problem..

On our last night (before we left early) at about 22:15 we were both sleeping as we had to leave early the next day. We were woken up by hard door knocks, someone standing outside our room with a piece of cake shouting “cake, cake”. My partner wasn’t wearing clothes and had to run to the door to hold it closed as they were just trying to open it and come in even when we said no.

The people outside of the hotel also are really annoying and try to rip you off so make sure you shop around before committing to anything with these people.

Even after this there are so many other small things, I really don’t understand where they got the...