FOMITHEA HOTEL — Hotel in Municipality of Thira

We stayed at Fomithea for a week in July/August and it must be said that the staff are wonderful and cannot do enough for you, the hotel is super clean and is cleaned daily, and the pool area is also spotless. The location is perfect, a short 5 min walk to the beach and all the restaurants/bars etc, and a definite contender for a Santorini break on a budget. ||We stayed in an unrefurbished studio booked via TUI, and TUI do not advertise that these studios are not refurbished, so if considering booking through TUI this is definitely something to think about. That being said, the beds were relatively comfy, the air con worked well, the shower had great water pressure and the lack of shower curtain was not an issue as the floor dried super quick. The only downside to the bedrooms is that the walls are super thin and some guests are loud until the early hours, meaning quality of sleep is not always fantastic. There is a balcony with the studio however it is a solid wall that is too high to see over when you sit on the chairs out there - would definitely be better either lower or changing so the view can be admired while sitting down, as the view from the studios is beautiful. ||There are signs in all of the rooms stating you must not reserve sunbeds with towels at the pool, however people do this every day and this rule is not enforced by staff. There are not enough sunbeds for the number of guests Fomithea have at one time, and it’s next to impossible to get a bed after 10am. The pool is lovely and quiet in a morning, but, again, after 10am it is overrun by children being loud, splashing and taking up the entire pool with their games - which would not be an issue at all if there was not people attempting to swim or relax in the pool at the same time. It seems some of these children who take over the pool are local children, rather than paying guests, which makes the situation worse as those who are paying to stay here do not get the full use of facilities. ||I think Demi behind the pool bar deserves a special mention as she works tirelessly every day for super long hours and always provides lovely cocktails and service with a smile. What a lovely lady!||The staff on reception are also super helpful, we have had a few questions etc during our stay and they have always been on hand to answer anything. They even booked us a taxi to Fira and helped us navigate the island! ||To conclude - staff are wonderful, facilities are clean and tidy, rooms are good on a budget. Avoid booking with TUI without knowing exactly what you...

We arrived very late evening after a 2 hour flight delay.|Our room was very disappointing as it had very old furnishings that were falling apart.|The bed had a creaky wooden frame, with a thin mattress. The room was boiling hot.|In the morning we looked over the balcony at about 10am to see that most of the sunbeds had been taken and that only 2 were left together. I was aware of the no reserving sun bed rules but others were reserved so I put two towels down. It’s a good job I kept looking over the balcony while I ate my breakfast because within 10 mins the lady from the pool bar, at the request of a hotel guest was removing our towels from the sunbeds. I said “excuse me but there mine”. She said “but you’re not sat here”. I said I would be straight down. So she put my towels back down. They then simply moved a vacant sunbed and put it next to another so the other guest then had 2 beds together.|Every day after that the same hotel guest had the sunbeds we had on our first day and it appeared to me that it was simply her preferred location to sit and that’s why she tried to remove our towels as they were where she wanted to be. Every day after I could see between 9 – 11 beds were reserved with towels before 9am. We felt uncomfortable with the situation as it was not a relaxing atmosphere or area, so mainly went to the beach.|My summary of this ridiculous situation is that the hotel has 33 rooms, so that’s aprox 66 guests, but only 20 sunbeds. Also the lady at the pool bar obviously looks after those who spend the most at the bar and or are returning customers for which they make a right fuss over. I don’t think they value the TUI guests.|There is a safe box in the room, but they charge 2 euros a day.|The air conditioning unit in our room was very old and they have it set up so that it will only work if all doors and windows are shut and the key fob is in its slot. However every evening after returning from a restaurant the room was much hotter inside than it was outside. So if we wanted to sit on the balcony to avoid the heat we could not put the air con on, and when we went to bed and shut the doors etc it took 3 hours before the room cooled down.|It appears that TUI guests get the non-refurbished rooms, so I would definitely not recommend this hotel to TUI customers or those wanting a relaxed sunbed experience as they are crammed in, not facing the sun, and the regulars gather together talking all the time, or the hotels owners friends and families kids...

Firstly I want to say how friendly and helpful the staff are but....... we are a family of 3 and booked the triple studio apartment. The room was tired with three single beds, one of which was a pull out bed, basically situated in the kitchen. This is not ideal as a married couple with a child, it felt more like student digs than a holiday studio. The shower fell off the wall whilst showering and the bathroom is more like a wet room as the water does not stay in the shower area. When addressed with the hotel, they informed us that you need to specify whether you want a double bed but we were not given the choice at all, none of the pictures show 3 single beds but do show a double with a single bed as a triple studio. To me this room seems like a twin room with a pull out bed as the balcony only had two chairs as well. There weren't any other studios available but staff advised that they would try and put in a double mattress the next day and fix the shower, which they did. On a whole the studios are not great, definitely not what we booked but the hotel and rooms are lovely, wish we had booked the triple room instead of the studio as they are newly refurbished, to change over we were told it would be an extra £600 for 3 nights which seems bizarre considering we had already paid that...