Sunny Days El Palacio Resort — Hotel in Red Sea

As a British tourist I am very disappointed, this was my first & last time visiting Egypt because of the experience we had in this hotel,||I had taken my son away to celebrate his 13th birthday & unfortunately the celibration was completely destroyed because of this hotel.||We was scammed for £140 English pounds by one of the on sight shops that is located within the hotel resort the Papyrus shop that is located inside the hotel is run by a scammer who harassed me & my son every single day as we walked past the shop he was telling us £20 for a picture that was a A4 size picture that was cheap quality and clearly not worth £20 at all we told him "no" ever day,, but as we was getting to the end of our holiday with only 3 days remaining the shop owner told us as we was walking past he will give us special discount & give us the picture for £10 English pounds so I decided to buy the picture which was a big mistake as I was paying for things using my bank card at this point of the holiday,, the shop keeper got his chip and pin atm machine out & had entered an amount that was not clear to me as it was in arbic numerals & egyptian,, I naively trusted that the transaction would be fine & for the £10 English pounds as this shop was a shop inside our hotel resort,, I first put my card in his machine to pay the £10 to be told by the shop owner the transaction was not successful it had declined & to try again which I did!!! This was at 10.30pm night time I made it to my hotel room where I had WiFi Internet connection I logged into my banking application on my mobile phone to see that infact the shop owner had taken two successfully transactions out of my bank account both transactions totalling £140 British pounds,, I immediately made my way back to his shop to confront him but his shop was closed,, and all the other shops next to him was still open ((the shop would have normally still been open at that time as it was every other day he had clearly made a good bit of money from scamming me & closed up early)) ||I had no choice but to wait until the next day to go to his shop to confront him but he was not in the shop the next day there was a completely different member of staff working & when I confronted the member of staff who was in the shop,, he all off a sudden did not speak English that was his response to me which was a lie!!||So I went to the security who was located inside the hotel reception area to report the problem but the security became rude and intimating towards me his response to me was "what do you want me to do about it this is not his problem and that this was business" he was very aggressive asking me do I have a problem ect I was alone with my 13 year old son we both felt very uneasy threatened & intimidated by the whole situation!! So i said I will go to the police to which the security laughed & told me this is not a police matter this is business & that the police will not do nothing because this is not a drug problem!!!||So we had a total of £140 stolen for a item that wasn't even worth £10!!!||We felt unsafe being in that hotel for the rest of our stay after this!!!! The hotel itself is very dirty an old fashioned, the staff as a whole are very rude & unprofessional no communication from staff no interactions with staff no eye contact or smiles the normal stuff you would expect on a happy holiday from the staff running the hotel you stay at!||The food was horrible the same food served every day the food Hall was unbelievably confusing as you will find the food hot plates are situated some distance apart from each other over different locations of the food hall for example you would get chips at one side of the food hall & have to walk at least 30/40 meters away to find the rice & again walk some distance to find chicken or salad ect,, it was a complete shambles you had to literally do continues circles around the food hall to find a plate & to find a knife & fork or table to sit,,, the cups plates knifes & forks seem to be not washed properly as always filthy it was horrendous to be honest & just very unpleasant!! If you pay for all inclusive do not expect all inclusive at all you have to pay for drinks ect. It is a horrible place!!!||||STAFF: Staff was intimidating confrontational and threatening and out to scam,, we did infact get scammed by shop staff inside the hotel resort itself,, the staff constantly asking for tips and asking for cigarettes from me it is impossible to feel safe when the staff scam you and then become threatening towards you after reporting!!!! I felt very uneasy here as a single adult with my son!!! ||Constantly being harassed by the pool side by staff to buy tours pictures or massages and fruit drinks ect,, staff are very rude and not polite at all when you reject them they just come more frequently continually asking over and over again,, the harassment levels from staff and shops is unbelievable and unbearable,, all at times when you should be relaxing,, ||it is all and I mean ALL ABOUT YOUR MONEY TO THEM and what they can get from you!!!! ||||ROOMS: Old fashioned, run down and dirty the room service did not change bedding or towels or give toilet tissue they just gave one bottle of water daily and washed floor with a dirty rag||Had to ask constantly every day for clean bedding towels and toilet tissue,, only would you get a clean room with bedding towels ect after leaving a tip for room service!!! ||Air conditioning worked at spontaneous times of the day only,, as it was faulty and made extremely load noises this seemed to be a problem throughout the resort,, making it to hot and uncomfortable to sleep||||FOOD: was nasty the same food every day the knife forks plates glasses where filthy and never cleaned properly if at all, ||Had to pay for drinks before 10am morning time and after 6pm evening time and between the hours of 10pm and 6pm the only free drinks avaliable was orange squash juice or mixed berry waterd juice, and very watered down local beer ||Drinks where served warm and is very small plastic cups ||Pure fruit juice was available at £3 a cup, other alcoholic beverages where available at £5 plus per drink through out the day but are not free or included with all inclusive package||The ice cream machine and slush machine was only available from 2pm until 3pm daily and was never once working on all the days we was there||There was a fish restaurant and Italian restaurant in the resort that was just as the same food standards and quality as the main food hall, but a reservation and payment was required in these two restaurants to dine!!!! ||The food hall was very small for the number of people in the hotel always over crowded never no knifes forks or plates or tables available||Food hall was strangely set out and had to basically walk across large areas as the hot plates where randomly set over a large distance apart from each other both inside the food hall and outside the food hall by the pool areas ect it was very strange set out||||OVER ALL: This place is very bad horrible place we was the only English people here,, what should of been a good life experience was not at all ||Stay away research as much as you can before coming here||This was my first and very last time I will ever be visiting Egypt thanks to the el palacio sunny days resort!!!! ||Constantly harassed by staff wanting tips cigarettes or what ever they can get out of you,, the staff are not nice people very rude unpleasant intimidating and out to scam you and your family!!! ||Do not waste you time money or opportunitie of what should be a family holiday by going here,,, read all the reviews before thinking about going... ||So as a result of our stay in EL PALACIO SUNNY DAYS RESORT we will never-ever be visiting Egypt ever again, this was our first time visiting and our last time visiting Egypt...

On arrival we was greeted by the very friendly reception staff and lovely porter who took us to our rooms showing us the key areas of the hotel on the way. The reception area was large, clean, smelled great.

Rooms - our room card was not working properly and electricity was turning off after few seconds and there was no 3rd bed for a child. As a couple we also would expect double bed and not two single beds. Once we communicated these concerns in the reception we was organised with a different room (with better view!) and it was relatively quickly resolved. Room itself I didn't feel was worth 4* - was quite basic, furniture and fridge was rather old but usable. Clean overall and cleaned regularly to in my opinion was acceptable standard. Had a good size balcony with great view. Personally room is not something that we pay much on as we spend our holiday quite active with minimum time in our rooms. Minor maintenance is needed - shower dripping etc.

Food- In my opinion the food choice was great, the food was in general tasty, there was Egiptian cuisine available - I like to try local food. I particularly liked the choice of meat especially the ones that were being prepared by the chefs outside the dinner areas on grill - from shish kebabs, chicken and pizzas. We never used a snack bar as we always came out full from the main meals. You can also eat your meals in the nearby hotels belonging to sunny days resort.

Drinks - water and juices dispensers are available at the pool bar to self service at all times. Alcoholic drinks we had were mainly rum, beer and cocktails which were all fine. At first it was frustrating that they were served in a small 150ml plastic cups but we quickly learned that if you're nice enough and tip you can get a proper glass and decent drink. Wine is available free at the lunch and dinner time in dining room only. Otherwise you need to purchase a bottle - I was hoping to purchase glass of decent wine and it was not available, which I think is a room for improvement. Also the cup size should be 250ml with the exception of beer min 300 in my opinion.

Toilets - common use restrooms I have found often lacking toilet paper and soap in the dining area, the reception toilets have frozen glass like doors, which are not very discreet and the ladies toilet area near the beach was poorly maintained with doors broken and toilets dirty. There were also maintenance issues with the doors on the male beach toilets and my son got stuck in the cabin once. I saw staff attending to these toilets during my stay but maybe frequency needs increasing.

Pool and lagoon - pool was good size but the water was colder than in the lagoon. At times it felt was too cold but on hotter days it was really helping to cool down if needed so not necessarily a bad thing. Lagoon was lovely with turquoise and blue like water, clean and great to swim in, I loved that area and the view. The bonus is that you can use pools in other nearby Sunny Days hotels including the Aqua Park which we didn't have time to use but we had a walk to explore and these are decent size facility. The pool is open until sunset. Sun beds were always available and if there was an issue finding one the staff members was on it immediately. Never took us longer than 5min to get organised around the pool.

Staff - cannot fail any of the staff members. Everyone was nice, helpful and lovely. They honestly make a great stay and I will be genuinely missing a good laugh I had with some of the staff members.

Entertainment - the music is on all day and in my opinion is pleasant. The entertainment is every night until about 10pm. Something different everyday from live singer which was average to Faker show, fire show or African show which in our opinion were awesome. There is also a disco that is open later at the beach area but we did not use this facility.

Overall we had a good time and great stay and would be keen to come back and visit Sunny Days El Palacio Resort again. Would recommend. Added photos are all from El...

Looking over previous reviews you would think you are about to enter a car crash but people really should understand that star ratings are half or even lower than what you would get in England… this is 4 stars on the website… England it would be 2 at most. So with this in mind, this should set your expectations correctly.

The room… it’s basic and tired but they cleaned it every day. We did have an issue with the front door alarm and it took us 3 days to realise that when it goes off after opening it, just leave it for 30 seconds and it resets! The balcony door lock was non existent. Saying all this, the place was safe and we didn’t feel like we would be robbed! Tip of the day is give your housekeeper 100 Egyptian pounds £1.50ish) and he will look after the room. Same for the beach guy and porters. They will tell you what to eat, where to go.

The food - the buffet is average. The quality is what you would expect from a 2 star place. It’s edible but not great. You will find something to eat. The buffet in the Palms de Mirette was far better and we ate there more often than not. The Russians (more on them later) don’t understand queue etiquette and just push in! The roast chicken is probably the best food we got in there. It’s a shame they didn’t do more Egyptian food as what they did put out was good… I suppose the masses don’t want this so they don’t do a lot and just stick to western food offerings which they haven’t quite grasped how to make properly; saying that, the Russians seems to stock pile their plates??!!!

You get two free “a la cart” dining experiences if you stay 7+ days. These really aren’t worth it. We went to the four seasons grill restaurant and it was shockingly poor. The other was the Italian restaurant which was just as bad, so much that we walked out half way through the main course. They don’t explain how it works. There is a menu on the table. Eventually we worked out that those items with no price are part of the all inclusive deal.. the rest you do need to pay for. Fair to say,the food you pay for from what we saw coming out is where they focus on!!

Drinks- you can only have small plastic cups of wine in the buffet or restaurants. They don’t sell glasses of wine at the cocktail bars. Here they only sell it in bottles and charge. The beer and the spirits are weak but you end up ordering either as they are free! Best tip is buy some duty free gin etc on the way to Egypt!!

The beach and pool - these are good. Clean and tidy and the pool was slightly heated. The signs all say you are not allowed to reserve sun beds, however all the Russians (it’s over run with them) get up at 6 am and lay towels down everywhere. They block areas off in groups. They play their own music at high volume and don’t care about anyone else. You do end up getting up at 7am and going down to get some beds yourself. December time, the sun and nice temperature to lie out is from 8am until 4pm. The sun is out longer than this but the temperature just drops.

The gym is good and well equipped but it has no A/C so you do get hot!

Outside the hotel are lots of shops, and food places so if you need to get out and eat, you can. We did just to get a decent coffee (it’s awful in the hotel). Just be mindful that every shop you walk past, you will be asked to have a look and they have “very good prices”!!

So, would we come to this hotel again? Probably not, as we have stayed at better in Hurghada, however it did work out to be roughly £21 per day per person to stay and eat here and get a sun tan, so it is cheap if that is what you are looking for. Put into perspective, a Travelodge is roughly £30 at its cheapest in the UK and...