Hotel THB San Fermín — Hotel in Benalmádena

I stayed at the San Fermin Hotel for the first time as a solo guest for 11 nights on a Half Board basis from 1-12 June 2025. The main thing for me was to enjoy a quiet and relaxing holiday which I was certainly able to do, thanks to the hotel’s welcoming and friendly ambience.||THB San Fermin is officially rated a 3-star hotel, but my personal experience tells me it should be closer to a 4-star hotel, subjectively at least ‘3.7’ stars.||* Summary Appraisal |I enjoyed an excellent experience staying at the THB San Fermin, so I award 5 TripAdvisor stars.|| Detailed Appraisal || Staff – 4.9 out of 5 |Always the most important asset of any hotel. All members of staff are a credit to San Fermin and deserve full recognition by management (pay rise?). All were friendly, polite, and professional. Many were also good fun and humorous. As a solo traveller, they quickly made me feel comfortable and relaxed.|| Guests – 4.1 out of 5 |Apart from a couple of rowdy stag parties held over the weekend (6-8 June), most guests were very friendly and always on hand for a good chat and a laugh. This made for a good atmosphere and helped me as a solo guest to relax even more.|| Room and Room Cleaning – 4.9 out of 5 |I stayed in Room 120 on the 1st floor overlooking the pool area, nearest to the caravan snack bar below me. Perfect! The brightly designed and decorated room met all my needs ... comfortable twin beds, plenty wardrobe storage space and numerous shelves and drawers to store other stuff. That said, I appreciate that two people sharing the room might find storage space problematic. No issues from my perspective because I was a sole occupant. The balcony was an adequate size and had a table and two chairs. Ideal for me. Air conditioning was the best I have encountered anywhere! The bathroom was spotless and had a great power shower, also the best I have come across anywhere in my extensive travels! The room also had an efficient fridge which cooled drinks very well. Kettle was also handy for tea and coffee.||Cleaning – what can I say, other than excellent! I had different cleaners on different days and all of them cleaned my room to a high standard. Every cleaner was very friendly; some even helped me with my Spanish which I am slowly learning day by day 😊|| Hotel Cleanliness – 4.9 out of 5 |The entire hotel is spotlessly clean, thanks to all the excellent room cleaners, pool attendants, gardeners, and all other maintenance/technical staff. They work so hard, and you can see they take pride in their work. It was nice to be able to chat with some of them. Excuse my Spanish, but I’m gradually getting there!|| Service - 4.2 out of 5 |Service provided by all reception staff was excellent. Thanks go to Fernando, Maria, Veronica, and others. Service provided by all the waiters in the main restaurant was of an equally high standard. Thanks go to Cruz, Guada, Nati, Carlota, Sergio, and others. Similar gratitude goes to the bar staff. Thanks to Lola, Monte, Antonio, Alex, Christina, Encarni, Pablo and others. The bar service was slow at times, but that was in no way the fault of the existing bar staff who all worked tirelessly and efficiently. I think the problem was because of staffing shortages – more staff please!|| Food – 4.8 out of 5 |The food was delicious. I was impressed with the variety of dishes on offer. I never experienced the “bit repetitive after one week” sentiment that is often expressed by guests in any establishment. Regarding the temperature of the food, I always found it to be at least warm, often hot. Well done to all chefs working in the main restaurant and the caravan snack bar on the terrace!|| Entertainment/Activities – No score |To my knowledge, there wasn’t any formal entertainment. However, informal entertainment came from spontaneous banter among guests and staff alike 😊 I never involve myself with formal entertainment anyway. However, I understand that its absence might be a negative for some.|| Swimming Pool – 4.7 out of 5 |The main pool is a decent size and well maintained. Same goes for the smaller children’s pool. I used the pool several times. Very invigorating. Felt good afterwards. 😊|| Location – 3.5 out of 5 |San Fermin is situated towards the top of a steep hill, about 100 metres from the main promenade and seafront. Bonanza Square, on the other hand, is a convenient 10-minute flat walk from the hotel. It has a few restaurants and bars as well as an excellent MAS supermarket which I recommend.||A downhill walk to the strip took me about 5 minutes. There are plenty bars and restaurants to choose from. Benalmadena Marina is also worth a visit. The return uphill walk to the hotel takes longer, at least 10 minutes. Several reviewers have expressed issues in terms of getting to and from the strip. However, I was fine with this, and my walking pace improved each day. I never used a taxi to go return to the hotel. Nonetheless, I fully understand why people with mobility issues needed a taxi.||I also used public transport bus and/or train to places such as Fuengirola, Torremolinos, Malaga City and Cordoba. Transport is excellent 😊It’s efficient and inexpensive. Very handy.|| Value for money – 4.5 out of 5 |Overall, THB San Fermin offers good value for money.||* Summary **|THB San Fermin is officially rated a 3-star hotel, but my personal experience tells me it should be closer to a 4-star hotel, subjectively at least ‘3.7’ stars. I had an excellent holiday experience at the hotel.||Gerard...

Just returned from a few days away and we absolutely LOVED our stay here. The hotel is lovely and is situated on what the locals call Cardiac Hill. It's quite a walk up from the beach and anyone with mobility problems probably would struggle, there is a shop half way up though which makes an excellent pit stop for a breather. We had a deluxe balcony room and it was lovely, bright and airy. The room has a small fridge which is very handy for keeping your bottles of San Miguel cool and also tea making facilities, you can get extra tea bags, coffee etc from the breakfast buffet in the mornings.

Now the important bit....food... Wow!!!!! It's absolutely fabulous!!!! We had half board as it came as part of our package and oh boy we were so happy we did! Breakfast is superb, plenty of fresh fruit, yoghurt, cereal, freshly made pancakes, and everything you need to create a full English brekky. It's all buffet style so you just go up and help yourself. It's the same in the evening, once again the choice is fabulous and they have themed nights so there was a variety of Chinese, Indian, Italian and Moroccan food whilst we were there. One thing I must comment on is the dining room staff. They are all ABSOLUTELY amazing and work so incredibly hard to keep the dining room clean and running smoothly. Please keep an eye out for Cruz, she is an absolute gem and she goes out of her way to make you feel welcome. We celebrated our 25th Wedding Anniversary whilst we were there and Cruz presented us with a complimentary miniature bottle of bubbly which was so lovely of her ❤️

If you are looking for a clean hotel with fabulous staff and amazing food in a wonderful location then look no further. We absolutely loved our stay here and will definitely be returning. Thank you to everyone at The San Fermin for making our break away so amazing.

Another thing to mention is that we got a taxi from the airport, you can't miss them, turn right when you leave the main departure doors. Cost us just under 24 Euros, so much cheaper than paying for a coach transfer and it only...

Hotel from hell

Just got home from 11 nights of sleeplessness and solid beds.

We went as a family of 6, 3 rooms and we were surrounded by 30 unsupervised 14 year old who were running around, screaming and shouting until 4am for 4 nights, reported at the the front desk who did nothing about it at all, called security at 3am one morning because they were partying in the adjoining room which have paper thin walls. We were told they're only here for a few more nights and to just deal with it. Spoke to the hotel manager who just gave us 6 free cocktail vouchers, 2 of our group are non drinkers. The beds are absolutely solid and we probably would have had a better sleep on the very few unreserved sunbeds outside. This hotel is advertised as a pretty quiet hotel, that is not the case, while we were there, there was 4 stag nights, 3 groups of 30+ children ages 14-16, and many many parties out by the pool until early hours. The sleepless night's ruined everyone's holiday because we were all so tired after having no peace. The key cards only work for a few days at a time and you have to go down to reception to get them to activate it once again. Cleaners did a good job of keeping the rooms tidy, however they are partial to leaving doors open, leaving your belongings fair game to everyone, and the young groups were trying people's doors often. And to top it all off, we asked reception to order us a large taxi for us all to get to the airport which we were refused unless we have someone who is disabled in our group, which we do. Was then told they will order us 2 small taxis and she only ordered one, leaving half our family waiting for a taxi that was never booked and the other half were at the airport.

Don't waste your money, go...