Palm Bay Hotel — Hotel in Municipality of Rhodes

The Hotel:

We arrived around 1-2am to a very friendly greeting from the owner and two daughters. They were all incredibly welcoming and polite, where we were promptly shown to our room. Overall, the initial experience and first impressions were positive.

Upon first inspection, the room (a self-catering three bed 'studio') seemed quite nice. However, when looking closer, some of the fixtutes and fittings could use some repairs. For example, some of the cupboard doors were wonky and the draws were a bit stiff and tough to pull out. With the room being self-catering and containing a sink, two hob rings, kettle, toaster and assorted plates and cutlery, as well as pans. However, there was no sponge or washing up liquid provided to clean dirty pots up with. On the topic of cleaning, in the bathroom, the hand soap turned out to be body wash.

The bathroom as a whole was decent, especially the shower, with a hand-held shower head that could be adjusted - though in our room it kept sliding down and could not stay up properly. There is also a tap for washing your feet. There is also a bidet in the bathroom next to the toilet, which is a nice feature.

We do have some safety concerns with the room, with the TV only being hooked on to its mount, so it could be easily pulled off by a child. As well, there is a plastic cover hanging off in the bathroom, possibly revealing wiring. Another oddity and potential concern is that safes are not located in the rooms themselves, rather to the right of the reception desk as you enter from the street, in a massive block/bank together with all the safes for each individual room. We did not use the safe here as a result of this.

Air con is an optional extra for these rooms, at €10 a day. The tourist tax is €5 per room, per day. For seven days air con and tourist tax cost us €105. Checkout is normally at 12pm, but late checkout is at 6pm at a cost of an extra €35, totalling €140 for all these extras. The air con is a must and works exceptionally well, being remote controlled though obviously does not function if the door to the balcony is open.

Pool Area:

We have some significant gripes with the pool area included, provided and with the hotel. The main pool itself is nice, but is not that deep at its deepest. The upper pool is quite small and could definitely use a pressure wash, as there are green marks at the usual water level of this pool.

The main issue is the lack of sun beds - they are free of course, but on multiple days and at multiple times there have not been any available. This is not due to the pool area being so incredibly popular, but due to a sea of beach towels on otherwise empty sun beds. There does not seem to be anyone or any policy discouraging or monitoring this practice, which overall only serves to sour everyone else's experience of (trying to) use the pool area. We have never experienced there being no free sunbeds at all on other holidays in Greece, as well as such blatant practices of trying to "save" sunbeds for later.

In Conclusion:

Palm Bay is a decent experience, with little frills and appears largely okay on the surface level. However, it does seem to be more focused at trying to provide an "all-inclusive" experience, with very little provided cooking supplies. Moreover, Palm Bay attempts to provide entertainment every night, with incentives in the form of evening discounts for eating at the hotel's (largely okay) restaurant. There are bus stops for both directions right outside the hotel, providing convenient connections to the...

Have just returned from a week at the palm bay with my wife and granddaughter and what a gem of hotel this is,we had a 2 bedroom apartment which was kept spotless by housekeeping staff clean towels every 2nd day and fresh bed linen at least twice during our stay.the hotel has 2 swimming pools the rooftop pool is an infinity with amazing views over the aegean sea the main pool has loads of sunbeds available and never had problems getting 3 beds around the pool which also has stunning views of the sea there are steps down to the beach but also has a lift for anyone aswell as anybody with mobility issues,once down the steps there is a lovely beach bar with again stunning views of the sea the waters was crystal clear for snorkeling or just swimming lovely turquoise colour.For me though it's the staff who are the real stars of the palm bay so helpful and pleasant always there to take food and drink orders from pool areas or in the main bar areas lovely pint of mythos during hot days and decent selection of food during day and also in the evening watched 3 tribute acts whilst there who were all very good.Lastly I want to say a big thank you to the wonderful reception staff and the nurse on our last day my wife had a medical emergency whilst we were packing to come we only had the room till 1800 hours and as it stood we were not going to be ready explained situation to girls in reception and they were wonderful said to take all the time we needed and even better said they had a nurse on site who would come and have a look at my wife which she did straight away she said straight away my wife needed to see a doctor we explained our coach was due to arrive at 19.10 and we still weren't packed they said not to worry they would sort something out we got to Dr's at 18.15 I explained we had less than hour to get back finish packing and be outside hotel for pick up by now my wife are now thinking we are going to possibly miss our flight home so dr treated my wife and then took us back to hotel so we could finish packing whilst he filled out fit to fly paperwork and other paperwork we needed then reception phoned and said coach had arrived 10 minutes early and was waiting i explained we weren't ready and said to let the coach go as we didn't want the other guests waiting for us and explained I would get a taxi to airport once dr had finished paperwork 5 minutes later reception phoned again and god bless them and the coach driver they asked if he could possibly do his pick up from the other hotels and then come back for me my wife and granddaughter and bless him he agreed so on behalf of my wife lynn myself and granddaughter niamh I would love to say a big thank you to the girls in reception ,the nurse the dr and coacdriver for everything they done for us will definitely be coming back to see you all again next year and staying at the palm bay again once...

Scam! Be aware of booking this hotel via Jet2holidays this summer. This hotel is closed and still being refurbished!!! We booked it in early may just to be told 48h before flight that it is closed and only option is to cancel or move us to other hotel - it turns out to be in “workers” area 15 min to beach, no internet, no card payments, no kitchenette in terrible area in the middle of nowhere. Also there was one couple who booked it half year ago and been told 24h before flight the same thing. All recent reviews are fake just to build up rating!!!

Compensation we got was £80 not worth it at all as internet it self costed us already additional £20, without the car holiday would be completely ruined but luckily we booked it too so at least we could see a beach - apart of massive factory chimney and village road.

So again, if you insist on booking it call this hotel before to check if they are already open or still under construction.

Good luck!

Update after their response:

Please everybody see our booking screenshot attached. If they lie so bad in review comment and even not tried to check or apology, I wonder what kind of lies and scams are happening behind the curtain.

Update 2 to their update: How they reply shows exactly how they treat customers, there is no apology, no understanding - just trying to blame me or turn sides. We have been moved, no explanation or apology given and now they say that they are opened and fully ruining!? So why we were not invited to our room we booked !? This is joke not a customer service, and based on their responses to my review I would now avoid this hotel. On the side note, we went there ourselves week ago and it was still closed and under renovation, so it is impossible that there was 85% occupation especially when we booked it for 2 weeks and other people in same situation with us. One star is still in place for how they behave and respond to customers. Review is not only for customers who were there is for all people who had something to do with particular place. Our experience is detailed above. We booked and payed for this hotel so we are fully entitled to review it. Customer service is below any expectations even the lowest imagined based in our experience.

since they say it was closed until now, why there are fake reviews from end of May - when they confirmed it was...