Hotel Costa Verde — Hotel in Cefalù

Me and my partner stayed here for a week and it was such a lovely holiday. Great range of activities and all staff are friendly and speak very good english. We loved the water aerobics which was quite often.

The food tasted absolutely lovely but if you’re vegetarian, the options are a bit repetitive. Most meal times the only veggie pasta option was the same tomato pasta which i got a bit fed up of towards the end of the holiday, tasted lovely though. Sort of the same with desserts. Not many dessert options, usually one dessert option which was always something fruity, or 2 flavours of icecream. Not many fruit options either. Just apples or oranges most days. But at the end of the day, it wasn’t too expensive (for us) for a week of all inclusive so you can’t expect perfection. Some of the waiters were rude and we witnessed one older man shouting at a younger member of staff and slamming cutlery down, infront of all of the customers. Also, on our last day we were given a blue envelope to put tips in. We were planning on going back upstairs to the room to grab some cash after we eat, but one man walked past us and picked up the envelope whilst we were eating, it was empty and he huffed and walked off! Even if we WEREN’T going to tip, this wasn’t necessary.

Also at the restaurant - vegetarians beware! I had a “fried mozarella” which i bit into and chewed and it had ham/bacon!! Luckily the only reason i’m vegetarian is because i don’t like the taste of meat, so i wasn’t too bothered, but this could be awful for someone else.

Pre warning, you also have to pay for bottles of water (€2.50 at the time of this review) for a litre, and you pay for ice creams at the pool bar around €2-3. You get wristbands and you pay for your icecream, drinks (if not all inclusive) with your wristband, which you can only top up at the hotel main reception. We found this very handy not having to bring our purses out with us to the pool. We found it quite easy to get a sun lounger most of the time, but we went during off peak season.

The beach is absolutely lovely. It’s a 10 minute free bus ride with a beautiful view on the way there. You can buy a nice pizza using your wrist bands at the beach bar too. It’s a private beach so it’s nice and quiet. Lifeguards are lovely. Be careful of people trying to “give” you bracelets or necklaces on the beach though.

Be warned if you go during off peak season (we went May 28th-June 4th, so was very hot still) they keep the air con off until the middle of June, even if it’s hot! We were absolutely sweltering every night and had to sleep with the balcony door wide open (so we had some visitors come in the night lol, billy witches) . They turned on the air con on our last day there… In my opinion you should be able to put the air con on whenever you like, especially if you’re a hot bod like me. The bed wasn’t the comfiest either. Mattress is very hard and hurt my back to the point i could hardly bend most of the holiday. Probably ok if you’re a back sleeper.

There’s a coach from the hotel to cefalù town which only costs about €4.20 per person for a return. The town is amazing and lots to do.

Unfortunately the hotel restaurants and waterpark wasn’t open when we visited, they open about june 15 (i think) during peak season. The pizzeria opened on our last day so we were gutted as we missed it.

Overall we had a lovely, memorable holiday at Costa Verde . But like everywhere, not everything is perfect which is totally understandable, but none of that made it a “bad” holiday. We will definitely come again one day, in peak season when everything is...

Start to finish:

Transfer time is 2hr20min from catania to hotel, but no stress if you like a journey through Sicily and don’t get travel sick easily, it’s a beautiful drive full of mountains and different wildlife.

Upon being greeted by reception, they are well spoken in English and are very helpful, they explain everything you need to know such as wristbands, where things are, what time breakfast/lunch/dinner is etc. They will take your passports the first day for data protection purposes so don’t stress this as it’s procedure and you can pick them up the next morning.

YES there is a motorway in front of hotel, but I barely noticed it half the time.

Wristbands:

They have a wristband idea there, which means you top up your wristband with euros to use on different things.

We were all inclusive, so most things drink-wise came with it, there is a “all inclusive”menu with a bunch of drinks on it, there is a variety, but if you go off the menu, they will charge you for it from your wristband, which is fair enough I guess. This is the same with snacks at the pool bar and stuff, there are specific times during the day where it is “all inclusive” where you don’t have to pay, and times where it doesn’t come under that and you have to pay(which I think is a bit silly, but swings and roundabouts I guess)

(P.S. bottled water does not come under the all inclusive, you have to pay for it, there are water jugs and stuff around the pool bar to help yourself to.)

Rooms: Room was spacious enough, not as big as expected, was expecting a bit better quality for a “superior” room, you get a fridge to but your water bottles in, mattress is very hard, only get one pillow but can ask reception for another.

The shower is relatively small but you can get what you need to do, done in it, like I said, for a “superior” room i expected a bit better quality.

GET THE SEA VIEW, you will not regret it, the view from my balcony was absolutely amazing and made up for the little bit of disappointment I had with the room.

Food and drink:

The food was absolutely amazing, best part of the hotel, there isn’t as much selection as your normal buffet style hotel’s B,L+D but the food you do get is very good quality and I have no complaints there. However, if you’re a veggie, or vegan, there’s not that much choice for yourself or it can be very repetitive during lunch/dinner.

Snacky bits are done in the afternoons at the pool bar, all inclusive applies at certain times otherwise you pay for it.

Drinks are served during lunch and dinner, (breakfast you help yourself to a glass and go to one or the many jugs at different stands,)

you get your own jug of water and bottle of wine every lunch and dinner( I would advise drinking as much water and wine as possible, as you are not allowed to take it out of the restaurant)

WiFi:

WiFi was okay I guess. Nothing else to say.

Pools:

The 2 pools were lovely, plenty of space for everyone when we went, not a lot of fight for sun beds. They are a tad on the cold side but considering it’s very hot it is a nice refresher and you get used to it after a while.

Transfers to beach/Cefalú:

They offer a shuttle service free of charge to the beach and one for the town of Cefalú for €4 round trip. I would suggest...

I’ll start with the positives hotel reception staff cleaners restaurant workers and most of bar staff are nice .rooms are clean and pools are nice private beach also nice there’s also a bus takes you to cefalu which is a lovely chilled out town where there English is good and are very friendly , entertainment team seem a nice bunch of people but don’t speak much English iff your there for two weeks though the entertainment will be repeated 2nd week , the breakfasts aren’t the best iff you like a English breakfast your choices are scramble egg fried egg poor bacon and hot dog sausages and toast iff you like cereal crossants and yoghurt and cake you’ll be fine , the buffet at 1 ocklock and 5 o’clock are decent pasta fish sometimes meat veg and roasties ice creams your given unlimited wine and water with this the resteraunts are all nice so get them booked in as many times as you can . I found the all inclusive is not a all inclusive there’s 2 bars one at pool one near reception your given a a4 piece of paper you can basically have a list of cocktails .a child size cup with a beer in a child size cup of water at bar iff you want a vodka and coke I was charged four euro for this payed for vodka not the coke iff you want a ice cream you’ll have to pay you can get a toastie for free at certain times you will be charged for a bottle of water aswell I|Also think the all inclusive drinks are watered down but can’t prove this also iff you order 2 drinks on your armband at wrong time be prepared for bar staff to go mental with you only at certain times there are two female bar staff one with straight hair she is lovely and friendly the other butch frizzy haired one is vile she would be a natural for the angry Karen restaurant chain in uk when she realises you can’t speak Italian she will insult you especially when she has a audience with other Italian guests and be as rude as she can I thought it might be her sense of humour but by day nine you just realise shes vile it will only take a English person who can speak Italian and makes out they can’t to give her enough rope and record these interactions to get her employment terminated 😉 on a whole I did like the hotel and would not let one individual spoil my holiday iff your booked up and worried would take a little extra money for ice creams premium drinks book the restaurant as much as you can cos they are actually lovely go into cefalu as much as you can as it’s a lovely town iff you can’t be bothered with the handful of rude staff tip them a little and they’ll suddenly become charming and blow smoke up your behind ! iff you speak Italian you’ll be fine and I found the Italian guests nice once they got used to you be prepared to be looked up and down first few days but that’s nothing I’d also go into cefalu stock up on water your favourite spirit and a flask to fill with spirits by pool and simply add them to your soft drink save a...