Melas Hotel

We went with friends the first week of May and it was quiet, relaxing, beautiful and clean. It was our first time in Turkey. The staff were most helpful, the turkish bath and massage was very professional and worth every penny. The pool is small but you have the sea and the kids have their own pool in the village. Would recommend staying in the hotel if you are couples, but the village is perfect for families. Walked all the way to Side town on the beach at sunset and it was a wonderful sight. Our friends came home and booked straight away for Sept 05 and are going again Sept 06, we are taking more friends in Sept 06. Check out the bread and cheesey dish (bit like a pizza) served at the beach bar........ahhhh i cant wait......enjoy.

Went to the Melas Hotel on the 20th of June 2006. Arrived at the hotel at about 2am in the morning and reception staff and bell boy were really helpful. Room was amazing, large with a whirlpool bath! Every part of the hotel is spotless clean and maids cleaned room on a daily basis and restocked mini bar. Most of the guests at the hotel are german so the staff mainly speak German as their second language but you can get by for ordering drinks etc, however Yasin in the bar was great, made imaginative cocktails and even tried to get us on the Raki! Lethal stuff. Food in the hotel was really good, plenty variety and different choices were available each day, always pasta available, rice and salads. Hotel does a late breakfast 10am - 11am, there isn't as much choice as the early breakfast, but enough to keep you going until lunch. Afternoon tea is served at 4.30pm with a huge slection of cakes! Sun loungers at hotel weren't much of a problem if you got up about 8am, however germans got up early to reserve their loungers by the pool only to go to the beach all day and come back about 3pm! The hotel is located about 500m from some bars and shops. Take Euros not Lira as most of the bars outside the hotel prefer Euros to the Lira. We went on a couple of trips and I would recommend going to see Antalya for the day, went to see the waterfalls and Amphitheatre. Hotel is fantastic and I would recommend it but I think the hotel mainly caters for older couples, my brother & I went to the hotel and we are aged 22 and 16 and sometimes felt there was no one our age their and not much to do in the evenings but if you just want a hotel based holiday to chill and relax then the Melas is perfect.

Our First Holliday without our 2 kids for 15 years, been to this area of Turkey on 5 hollidays , this was the best hotel, food, drink, rooms, staff etc every thing was fantastic. Met one couple from down south UK who didnt enjoy due to hot weather ( Turkey in August is Hot someone should have told them ???) if you want a 5 * Holiday this is the place to go. Try the local Market,£7 return from hotel booked taxi door to door, we went at 8am nice and cool and back in time for a dip before lunch, excellent value for money. Good luck Mark & Judtih, Whitehaven , Cumbria

My sister and I have just come back from a week's holiday at the Melas and feel that we've been spoilt for the whole holiday! It was out of this world and earns it's 5 star status. Staff at the Melas generally cater for the German tourist, however, everyone made an effort to speak english and attend to our needs non stop. If you go you would see Mehmet, Musafar, Mustafa, Musaret, Ilmass, Yohsin and many more staff regularly spending time with you to make sure your holiday exceeds expectations! Food was out of this world and although it's predominantly buffet style, there's always something exciting at the grill where the chefs prepare it for you. Watch out for the odd surprise from the Restaurant manager (Ilmass) as we found 'scotland soup' one lunchtime and was truly delicious.Everything was served at an extremely high standard each time. Watch out for the odd strawberry fiend who may disect the cakes! You know who you are. There were 2 other Scots couples at the hotel at the same time as us and I think this helped with the odd language barrier and certainly ensured we had a great time - the company we had was excellent and have gone away with many warm memories. Especially John and Emilia who were friendly and caring and made our week go with lots of fun and laughter. Staff at the hotel in the restaurant, bar and lounge in particular were always on hand and on a few occasions found that you got served more attentively if you were in a larger group. Perhaps we found ourselves building up a thirst with all the talking? Entertainment wasn't so great and although our entertainer (lovely guy who had lots of 'positive energy') tried on many occasions to get us involved in the hotel darts competitions or bingo, we were having none of it. If you spoke German you'd find this all fine and we have a few laughs about how creative my sister and I got at saying 'no thanks'without offending him. Facilities at the Hotel were of a really high standard - pool, Sauna and Turkish Bath to name a few were spotless and had staff at hand to cater for your needs. We met lots of nice people who were staying at the hotel and was easy to relax and chat with others whilst in the sauna-time passes quickly! One thing to watch for if you are a little 'conservative' and that is that our Eastern counterparts are more'relaxed' with their bodies and think nothing of baring all. Maybe it was just us, but it was an experience and gave us food for thought.You must go here when at the hotel. The room we were in was out of this world with a whirlpool bath (watch out for putting too much bubble bath in) and large balcony. I had a see view and on a good day you can see the mountains over the coast and many blue hues in the sea each time you looked out. It was lovely. Because of the weather at this time of the year (thunderstorms, hail stones, temperature ranging from 12-24 degrees) alot of facilities weren't there but don't be dissapointed too much by this as you still have the indoor facilities like the indoor pools and table tennis/squash/billiards and much more at hand! We still managed to get an afternoon of sunbathing in and a few walks along the beach which were superb. It was peaceful and ensured you had minimal 'stress' from the SIDE touts. Security at the Resort was brilliant and again made a difference and meant you had a relaxing haven to be in for the duration of your holiday. You can read other reviews on the SIDE tourist experience and my only word of wisdom for others would be to ensure you ask 'how much' before even committing to eating/drinking in SIDE as you can run to about 97 Lira (50 pounds) for a lunch when all you wanted was something light! Menagvat is the natural Turkish town where you will see their true way of life and you won't encounter half the touting stress as you make your way around. One further thing to add is that in Side around the harbour there are 3 shops worth a visit - Munever Dede the jewellers (lovely lady that will let you look around with no pressure to buy), the newsagent across the road who was friendly and chatty (we went back to say cheerio to these two) and also the guy just around the corner from the Munever Dede's shop who makes bangles/earings etc - so relaxed and left you to look around and hence we bought a few lovely items at a VERY reasonable price. Walk in the middle of the road past the rest as they will do their best to challenge you.

The hotel was amazing, we had a spa bath, in our room! The people working in the hotel were lovely. The swimming pool although small was so warm! The food was great. Everything was amazing. Would definately go back and recommend to anyone!

Stayed at the Melas for 14 nights 9 - 23 aug. '05 inc. This hotel is very, very clean. Well run with high standards of service. Could not find any complaints with the food or service. Hotel staff very attentive. Very clean, well kept pool area, good water slides for children and very clean sandy private beach. Temperatures very hot... average 39 degrees daily, nice air conditioned hotel recption lounge for relaxing at night. Clean well run health spa... excellent Turkish massage. If we did have to whinge about anything then this hotel is very popular with Germans and Russians; very few British as this is the first time Thomas Cook have marketed it in the UK..... but we had no issue with that. Perhaps evening entertainment could've been better and the beer could've had more alcohol in it, but these are minor points by contrast to the excellent service and hotels cleanliness. One of the better Hotels in Side. Would not hesitate to recommend. ****

iam welsh my husband is turkish and this is one of the best holidays weve had. the hotel was spotless and rooms large and bright with excellent housekeeping services room1424 food lovely even for a fussy vegetarian. yes i was ill for 3days with diarrhoea and dehydration b ut not2 serious. staff all great especially on the pool bar and mehmets pide in the beach cafe was lovely. yes lots russians and germans so if you cant beat them join them and go down at 6am to reserve your sun bed. its the best part of the day and the coolest take f30 unless you are turkish and go to bed after dinner for a siesta as it gets up to 45 deg in july and august no problem with mozzies but take a plug in and spray in case. also take immodium as expensive there. its hot at night 30deg so you dont need a cardi ha ha air con great on 24hrs local rose wine lovely and the carte dor ice cream my advice is go may to july or sept unless your a teacher like me. the entertainment is a bit cheesy but improves after half a bottle of rose wine ha ha try to book a day flight coming back through the night is no fun and you cant always keep your room i would recommend this resort for singles and cuples with older children or for families go next door to melas holiday v illage bye for now sue and ender sahin jones wrexham north wales

Just returned from the Melas Hotel, apart from one bad apple on reception(Girl- pony tail) the staff were superb, they spoke little english but made up for this by being so polite and helpful(They really did try). Food was superb and there was plenty of it, including coffee and cake at 4pm daily. The Hotel was as clean as an operating theatre. The pools inc the indoor ones were also very good with modern adjustable loungers. The entertainment team were mostly Russian and catered mainly for the German/Russian guests.(There were only a handful of British families).Again they tried very hard and put on some great shows. The kids club had all kinds of activities on a daily basis inc darts water polo bananna rides etc, again mainly German /Russian kids so the British ones felt left out to a point. Over all this resort was brilliant, great value for money and I would reccomend it to anyone. Even the weather was fantastic, average 32 degrees.

The holiday overall was superb. the food plentiful with great choice and variety. excellent entertainment - the dancing better than anything I have seen before abroad. very clean everywhere and apart from the reception the staff were great. would highly reccommend. P.S. go to the hotel not the village, unless you have children.

We stayed at the Melas Hotel in September for 14 nights (well actually 11 nights, will get to that in a minute). We are well travelled and this was our 7th all inclusive experience so I had pretty high expectations. First observation was that 90% of the guests were Russian or German. The hotel itself is nice allbeit a little dark in in it's decor. The food was under average IMPO. The pool was far too small for a hotel of this size which meant loungers were very hard to come by and umbrellas virtually impossible (bare in mind +40 degrees. The Russian & German Guests insured they reserved these at the crack of dawn would then disappear till early afternoon. The beach was ok. It was wide & long. There was nothing caribbeanlike about it. Although it was proper sand as opposed to pebble or stones. The room was nice but again rather dark. House keeping was good. The staff were rather rude and pretty incompetant. In fact I would say they were the rudest I have ever come across. The entertainment was poor the best we got was a belly dancer from (wait for it...) Russia. I became ill on our 2nd day in the hotel but I plodded along as they say, by staying close to a loo and popping immodium to beat the band. After 3 days of this my appetite was completely gone and I couldn't even keep water in my body for more than a couple of minutes I also had a temperature of 39.5 so a doctor was called, within one hour I was lying in a hospital bed in Manavgat hooked to a drip feeling like I was having labour pains. To make a long story short after 3 days they discharged me but only after my insurance company faxed through confirmation that they would foot the bill (ALWAYS HAVE TAKE TRAVEL INSURANCE). I had a private room and was taken very good care of I have to add. Never found out what it was and never will I guess. I would not recommend this hotel for family or friends especially at the prices they charge.