La Mer Resort & Spa Crete — Hotel in Municipality of Apokoronas

warm welcome from the reception night staff Georgios and other girl later on, the day staff Manos, Argyro, Antous. They were all really friendly and helpful at any time. lovely well equipped room with all what needed for our stay. great shower with loads jetted functions. Outside of our garden level room was welcoming jacuzzi and hanging basket chair. Whole atmosphere and the grouds of the hotel was so relaxing and very quiet at the evenings, so as secure! If you are looking for relaxing/ romantic holiday La mer Resort & Spa is the right choice! High standarts of Daily room service. Morning and evenings meals at Perle Noir restarant we were looked foward for delicious traditional and all the rest varaites of food with great and always smiling shefs and most important of all professional restaurant staff- Evgenia, Nicolaus, Elefaria and always smiling Labros. All were really polite and helpful! Evgenia knew well after first day of our breakfast what I wanted to drink, and as soon I was back to the table with delicious breakfast plate , perfect Greek coffee was made by her and brought to me! It was interesting to find out, that water, drinks/ spirits etc at the dinner time and by the outdoor pool, beach they were all served at additional charge. And each time kindly was asked by staff how would you like to be charged ( we had choosed to the room, and paid all at our check-out). We had a choice for the dinner and decided to get it one's At La Brise de la Mer restaurant( at additional charge), and at that evening we enjoyed amazing views of mountains, full moon and delicious dinner. Victor said he had one of the Best cooked steak ever! Credit to the shef. During high pick of the day sun, other credit to the Resort is Spa service and all relaxing facilities- salty refreshing water of the swimming pool, hammam, steam room, massage- I can talk about it long, but best is to experience it all yourself with professional staff Maria. And Thanks to Anna, for feeling very well all needs of my body, while relaxing massage session with her! I found myself couple of times falling a sleep while lying down especially after using all the Spa facilities. Outdoor swimming pool was never crowded, there was always place for all. We could always find sunbeds by the beach even though I seen many people were heading out to reserve sunbeds way before breakfast time at 7.30 am (it's not appropriate, and it was their choice..). As Victor footballer& businessman, keeping great shape of his body even while on the holiday was important for him, he enjoyed his works out in well equipped outside and inside gym, so as small football/ volleyball pitch right next to the beach!!! Maintenance of the hotel and lovely Private beach ( where I loved sun bedding and staking stone towers) was really well looked after by 2 nice hard working man. And I was feeling great and safe taking a nice dip/ swim under life guard on duty. I loved the fact that at our last day of stay, I was lying down with my eyes closed right next to the water( I wanted to soak up more of the waves and rocks sounds), when I heard a gentle voice- Excuse me madame, is everything ok, are you all right?... It was a life guard!

Gelasakis, he is truly a gentlemen- the owner of the place. He was always there. Mornigs or evenings he would meet you with smile and he was always really friendly, he had time to greet &chat with guests showing his interest and care for everyone. We had amazing holiday at Crete and most important of all we found a perfect Place - Gem and it's La Mer Resort& Spa, Thank You all the staff and the owner for our unforgettable experience with ye! We definitely looking forward to come back, see you All at some point and some other year! Kind...

I read the bad comments about this hotel 1 day before arriving and hoped that they were wrong. Unfortunately, they were real and this hotel is definitely NOT A 5* STARS HOTEL. Why? For many reasons:

SERVICE: We arrived very late in the evening around 11 pm. We kindly asked if there is any possibility to have something to eat after driving 1.5h, of course with paying an extra, nothing was available. We kindly redirected us to a restaurant 5’ from there (thanks that we had the car, cause there is no restaurant next to the hotel). We couldn’t even have some fruit or anything to eat. At least, we got a glass of wine...

CLEANING SERVICE: TERRIBLE - Due to the COVID, they are cleaning the rooms every 2 or 3 days, which is ok. However, when the room was « cleaned » it was still dirty on the floor (seems that they don't vacuumed), sometimes we didn’t have the towel for the floor, I had to put a note to the team for the next day. Furthermore, we only had 2 paper cups for tea. We used them once and they never replaced it. Furthermore, there are no glasses next to the sink to put our toothbrush, I wanted to take a paper one but as they never replaced them, our toothbrushes are just lying next to the sink.

When we arrived, the little shampoos/shower gels, etc. that we had, were half-empty (probably leftovers from the previous guests). Even though the next day we had new ones, it feels weird that the team didn’t check that and left them in the room.

BREAKFAST: The breakfast is very poor, we have different options for the eggs but that’s it. The choice is very restricted and the quality is not worth it. Look at the crepes in the image, they talk by themselves. If the dinner buffet is similar, you should definitely take the car and go to Rethymno or Georgiopolis where you can find many restaurants.

LUNCH A LA CARTE: The quality and quantity of the dishes we had à la carte were really good and the price is also reasonable.

TOWELS: I came 3 times to change the towels. Every-time, I had to come back the day after or an hour after because they didn’t have enough. Arriving on Tuesday night, we couldn’t change them before the Monday after. On Sunday, they are not changing the towels. I explicitly said that I couldn’t change them before as they were always running out of them. Answer: come back tomorrow. What kind of 5* service is that?

FACILITIES: -The hotel itself is very nice and clean as well as the pool area. -The rooms are very very small and there is just a hanger to organize your clothes. No drawers, no other facility, which is very unpractical. As the room is very small already, it seems that it’s always messy as there is no wardrobe. -The isolation with the door is very bad, you can hear everything from the corridor when people are passing by. -The Nespresso machine was lacking the part where you dispose the capsules (see picture) and the capsules were not from Nespresso which does not reinforce the luxury experience. -On the 4th day, our complementary bottle of wine disappeared for no reason, we didn't have time to drink it upon arrival (but actually we did not even have glass to drink it or should we drink it with the paper cups?)... -Finally, the signal of the TV was also often not working.

I feel like the hotel is lacking experience in 5* service. It’s a nice hotel, but definitely not deserving it’s 5 stars. I would never come back...

Overall experience:|We had the most magical time at La Mer. It far exceeded our expectations and was very reasonably priced for how amazing our experience was. A genuine 5 star experience. The weather is perfect in May (hot but not too hot - late 20s/early 30s) and the general atmosphere of the hotel is the respite that we needed. ||Hotel:|The hotel is gorgeous - much better than the photos show (and even the photos are lovely!). Everything is spotlessly clean and the attention to detail is incredible. There is a reception area with a free pool table and a balcony which we spent a lot of time at. There is a freshwater pool and a pool bar that then goes straight into the beach. It is very secluded and private. The hotel itself is very quiet and never feels crowded - the benefit of having only 75 rooms. ||Food:|GREAT. Our expectations were low as we have had bad experiences with half board/all inclusive. I am pescatarian so was particularly worried that I would end up stuck eating chips. However, the amount of care and consideration the chefs take on the food menu is incredible. The buffet has a great mix of traditional Greek food and other foods (a fair bit of pasta) and there is a very good chef who cooks fresh meat and fish. My partner loved this bit the best as a meat eater and I had the best sea bream I’ve ever eaten. We got excited going for dinner every night to see what they had on offer. The same can be said for breakfast - it’s not as changeable as the dinner buffet but it’s high quality choice of cooked, continental, fruit, yoghurts and sweets. Our overriding feeling for both meals was that all ingredients were super fresh. ||Staff:|We cannot fault the Cretan people. We have never stayed anywhere where the staff are so genuine, warm and attentive. A special thanks goes to Marianna (who we met at the pool bar) who was a particular highlight of our holiday. We hope to see her again!||Room: |The room was spotlessly clean. We agree with other reviews that the rooms aren’t big but this wasn’t a problem for us as we only spent time on the balcony in the late afternoon. The wardrobe space is definitely compact - if you want to hang up more than 5 items it would be a problem. ||Area:|There is not a lot to do around the area. We came here to just relax and not really leave the hotel so this wasn’t an issue, but if you want to explore then it’s wise to hire a car rental or there are buses/trains/tours that can take you elsewhere. There are a few good natural attractions to go to (from what we were told) so excursions are definitely possible. We walked to Georgioupolis one day, which was a nice walk, but felt more touristy and less Cretan than we had hoped. We hear that the old town in Rethymno is great. ||Areas for improvement:|There is a games room with lots of great games but it feels a bit stuffy - the hotel would benefit from making the front windows into bi-fold doors so that it can be more open air. This is why we decided to play pool in the lobby area so we could benefit from the terrace and wonderful sea views.|The reception bar could be better stocked - it was limited and we enjoyed playing pool up there but often had to get drinks from the pool bar to take up there (no bad thing, but if there’s a bar in reception it should be utilised!)||Thank you so much to all the staff at La Mer; we had an amazing time....