Pueblo Andaluz

I've given this an excellent rating as it is meant to be 3-Star, but compared to a UK 3-Star it is head and shoulders above. OK, it is really a French hotel (perhaps 90% of the guests while we were there), but only one bar-maid couldn't speak English, but if you can't be bothered to learn how to order a beer or glass of wine in Spanish then go somewhere else. The pool is lovely and very close to reception, just across a very quite service road. You can barely hear the main road. The food was surprisingly good, but don't leave it until the last minute, it is a buffet, so fish for example dosen't fair well if it is left on a hot plate for any length of time. Always a good selection of every kind of meat, fish, veg, fruit etc. San Pedro is a charming small town 5 minutes walk away, the beach about 5-10 minutes depending how long you spend gawping at all the houses on the way (i'd say there isn't one house under 5 million Euros on the way!). Check out a restaurant called Bel Mar, practically on the beech that had the best food I've ever tasted, very friendly all-english speaking and SO reasonable (they let us stay untill about 3am both times we dined there even thought they close around 1). The beach is not sand, more like gravel, but walk a few hundred yards in either direction and you'll find proper sand. There's a freindly English sport bar literally just round the corner from hotel and an Irish bar too, amoung others but on the whole it's a very quite place. Definitely not your typical 'Brits abroad' place thank god, if you wear a hanky on your head avoid at all costs, but I would return there in a flash. Be warned that Peurto Banus, the nearest large town (mile or two) is for the rich and famous, with prices to match, but worth a look for the sheer scale of the boats, etc. Taxi from airport was 70 Euros/30-odd minutes.

We stayed for 8 days in a nice hotel, 100% clean and with excellent food, but - wow unwelcome! if you couldn't speak french you were virtually ignored. the reception had a couple of rude unhelpful assistants. all entertainment was in french, which would have been acceptable if they had only acknowledged other nationalities. yes, most of them could talk english, but chose not to. one woman on reception was very rude! when i tried to purchase some cards, she pointed me to the other end of the counter where a man was sitting, then came along herself to ask what i wanted. she already knew, and went to the place i stood in first place to take the money (the till was there)so blatantly obvious she didnt want to serve us. the staff who deserve all the praise are the cleaners, the hotel was spotless and the rooms kept as clean as was possible, and the chef,kitchen staff and waiters/waitresses. the food was excellent ! shame the rest of the staff let them down.

had a wonderful weeks holiday. no brits mainly french and spanish. food very good, no bacon and eggs in morning but as they cater for the french, plenty of cold meats, cheese croissants, pastries etc and plenty of fruit. evening meals were excellent. great variety and plenty of it. pool is excellent and only 5 mts outside the hotel. the road you have to cross only really serves the hotel and any traffic on it travels slowly. the holiday reps on site are french but the evening entertainment they provide is very good. not your normilal brits abroad holiday. drinking around the pool and for the evening entertainment is very minimal. you can go next door to the twin english hotel and notice the difference, i'm not knocking that. the accomodation is different, you have the main hotel and then you have other units off, when we arrived we wehad achoice of rooms to suit our needs. one member of our party found it difficult to access the second floor we were given and so we were allocated alternative rooms. the staff are very friendly and helpfull. all in all a very surprising and wonderful week. 5mins puerto banus 15 mins marbella 45mins gibralter 50 mins ronda

We stayed in this hotel for a week and had booked it as a package with a hire car deal. We arrived at the hotel in the dark and found it was situated in a small community of a few shops and bars. We parked the car down the side of the hotel and checked in. We were not warned that parking was an issue in the area even though we had commented on driving to the hotel and getting lost! In the morning after breakfast we found our car was gone as it had been towed by the local police. We had admittedly parked it allegally (unknown to us) but as we watched during the rest of the week the police only seemed to be targeting the foreigners hire cars. It was a costly mistake as we were 140 euros out of pocket, but you live and learn! After our little upset we had a very relaxing week in the sunshine and found the hotel itself very clean and pleasant.

We stayed there for one night after completing a tour of Andalucia. The hotel was difficult to find due to a lack of indications on the access road. It lies alongside the busy freeway to Marbella. The hotel is very pleasant. It consists of about one hundred rooms dotted along small plazas and alleys abundantly flowered. Typically Spanish. Beautiful swimming pool. We found the buffet dinner rather above average? That night , among other dishes, there was very good and well cooked Dover(or rather Mediterranean )sole. The secret is that the hotel caters for a French clientele who are more likely to appreciate good food than other Europeans. A big disappointment is the beach(half a mile away) which is a disaster

We were not entirely satisfied with our stay at this hotel. The hotel was clean, rooms reasonable and the gardens well maintained. The layout of the grounds was charming in that the rooms were like little houses in individual buildings, laid out like an Andalucian village, quite pretty to look at. The hotel staff in general were efficient and helpful, especially the reception staff, but we were not at all impressed with the dining experience. Most dining room staff were helpful except on a couple of occasions. For evening meals, the restaurant was open till 9.30pm but on our first night when we were just finishing our meal, only five minutes after the finishing time, the staff began hovering over us to remove our plates from the table. One young waiter stood over me while I put the last morcel in my mouth and he then removed my plate immediately! On another occasion, we chose a table for our breakfast, had our cereal and fruit juice then left the table to collect toast and coffee. When we returned, other people were sitting in our seats so rather than ask them to move we decided to move to another table. The waiter asked us to leave as he wanted to begin closing that area of the dining room. We tried to explain to him what had happened and that we had only half eaten our breakfast but he didn't want to know so we had to move to another area. In addition to that, the cleanliness of the cutlery and crockery left a bit to be desired and they often ran out of these items even when we were there early. JF, Paisley, Scotland

Very friendly, well run hotel. Mainly accomodate French clients using their Club 3000 Tour Operator. Rooms outside of main building are fairly basic, but clean, and they are well looked after. Buffet meals are quite varied and acceptable. Quite a suprise to find bottled water and wine provided with the evening meal!. Spent seven days there in May with my wife. Will go back again if we need to visit the area again.

we were one of two couples in this hotel with nearly 250 french visitors. the atmosphere was wonderful, with very polite people, no drunken behaviour as can very often be experienced in southern spain with na lot of roudy drunken english people. the food was very good served with wine and minereal water inclusive. The staff were very friendly. the evening cabaret artists were very entertaining, rather like the street artists on the champs elysee. thepool was one of the largest hotel pools we have seen and very clean with plenty of sun loungers and no germans reserving them with towels the evening before. we returned home very relaxed and would recommend it to anyone who appreciats french manners,food and fun.

Having taken a last minute AOA, we found ourselves at the Hotel Pueblo Andaluz. This hotel is just off the main motorway but it was tranquility at it's best. this hotel is geared for the French through their Club 3000, the grounds in which the hotel is situated are of breath taking colour, courtyards,alleyways, all well maintained. The pool which is situated on the opposite side of the street is large with a kids pool, it has poolside bar and a stage which features a concert by club 3000 reps every night. The food is excellent, and with good variety, if it's an English based holiday you're looking for this hotel is not for you, but if your after culture you'll have it in abundance at this fine hotel. A 3* hotel going on 5*. 9 out of 10

There are major problems with this hotel in terms of its location. It is situated on a busy motorway a long way from marbella. One of the guests was attacked and robbed outside the hotel while she was there. the hotel had made no attempt to warn her. Having said that, the staff at the hotel were very hardworking and the hotel was clean. More effort needs to be made to warn guests when they arrive. Most of the guests in the hotel were french and there were few british or spanish people to talk to.