Rehana Sharm Resort

We just arrived back on 2nd December and we had an amazing time! First of all I can't believe the reviews for this hotel are so bad!
TRANSFERS: After getting off the plane we took a transfer to the hotel, we had no transfers booked but you can pay £4pp at the last minute desk for a transfer or alternatively taxis cost about 40 or 50LE (4 or 5 pounds) but you will have to haggle hard and maybe walk out of the airport to get one this cheap!
HOTEL/ROOMS: After a 5 minute drive we pulled up to the hotel which was absolutely beautiful from the outside, all glass walls, and marble floors. A member of staff was at hand straight away to help us with our bags and show us to our room. The room was gorgeous although it was a twin not a double room, we were given the opportunity to move to a double, but we decided to stay in the twin, as the view from our balcony was fabulous so the two beds were pushed together for us.
There is a mini bar in the room which contains 2 cartons of fruit juice and 2 bottles of water (complimentary of course), it's worth hanging on to your water bottles afterwards as there are water dispensers around the hotel where you can fill up, we brought some plastic beakers too which came in handy!
The hotel was very clean, I saw people cleaning the pools and filters every day as well as staff mopping apartment floors, mowing the lawn every day. The cleanliness was to a very high standard. I don't think that the hotel is as new as it states, probably a few years old.
POOLS: The hotel pools were fantastic, about 8 in total, some of these children's pools. We didn't get a chance to swim in the pool but I dipped my legs in and the water seemed fine, not warm but I'd say probably the same temperature as the sea, so not too cold either! The crepe bar by the pool was great too.
RESTAURANTS/FOOD: The restaurant was fine, we always found plenty to eat every day, and the food varied too it wasn't all the same stuff all the time. There's plenty to choose from with a salad bar, hot food canteen, soups, freshly made pasta, chips, a desert bar, lots of bread and fresh fruit. Watch out for the Russians as they will try and barge you out of the way to get to everything! Burgers and chips are served late afternoon at the pool bar if anyone is an extremely fussy eater!
For the Italian you have to book reservations a day in advance, we did this but then our reservations were lost and we went down only to find out that we didn't have a table! Very annoying but they were very apologetic and booked us in for the next night. To be honest the Italian restaurant was pretty bad, no a la carte menu at extra cost, only the set all inclusive menu which changes daily but you only have two dishes to choose from. My partner ordered fish and I went for the safer option and ordered pizza.
When our food arrived my pizza was covered in some dodgy brown stuff, looked like some sort of fish, whatever is was it tasted really sour! My partner's fish was pretty gross too all dried out and shrivelled! Needless to say we couldn't eat any of it!
DRINKS/GLASSES: I brought a set of plastic wine glasses with me after reading the reviews about lack of wine glasses and dirty glasses; I didn't even need to use them! I was always given a nice clean wine glass, in fact I don't think we drank out of a dirty glass the whole time we were there, and clean glasses were constantly being brought out from the kitchen. The only place where we had to drink out of plastic beakers was the pool bar during the day, which makes sense, as glass around the pool could be dangerous. The drinks were fine, wine, and beer tasted good!
BARS:The upstairs hotel bar was fairly basic, a few plastic chairs and tables, looked a bit like McDonalds! We only drank here once as it was a bit chavvy and full of people chain smoking! There's a disco room up there too that's open late but we didn't go in there.
We weren't allowed to drink in any of the Prima Life bars which was annoying.
BEACH: We spent a few days on the beach, the tunnel isn't finished yet but it's only a 5 or 10 minute walk, not as far as people make out! Just past the hotel pools and across a road. The beach is quite small but I think that's because they are in the process of building the other half as it is all fenced off.
The sun beds were all taken up by the Russians but at about 1pm they all leave to go and eat their lunch and literally the whole beach empties! Very funny! This is the best time to grab yourself a sun bed! Don't lie on the sandy part next to the beach with no sun loungers on as this is apparently a “private beach” and we were quite rudely kicked off by some grumpy man!
The sea is amazing, watch out for the coral though it will hurt your feet, we wore flip flops but lots of people were wearing water shoes. Grab yourself a snorkel from the shops (about 40LE) as the fish are amazing. You can walk to the end of the coral and then there is a huge drop, incredible.
EXCURSIONS: We went to Naama bay to book our excursions as it's much cheaper, shop around to get a good price, here's the excursions we tried Ras Mohammed by boat – booked with “Pisa Moto” we paid £17pp but later found out that you can get for £14pp – this involves a boat trip from 9am till 5pm into Ras Mohammed national park, 3 snorkelling trips and lunch on the boat. We really enjoyed ourselves and the weather was great, we didn't see many fish though, not nearly as many as we saw in the sea, one of the taxi drivers told me that this is because the boats tie themselves together and play loud music and it scares the fish away and that if you go by car and then swim then you see a lot more.
Quad Runners – we paid £15 altogether for a double quad booked with “Pisa Moto”– they sell scarves for £2.50 each to keep the sand out of your face, sunglasses are a good idea too as its very dusty. If you're concerned about safety then it's better to book through the hotel tour operator as we had no helmets and went pretty fast whereas the hotel groups were all kitted up. Also funnily enough there was a huge sticker on the quad saying, “never carry passengers”! It was great fun though we really enjoyed it! There's a stop at a Bedouin camp too to drink Bedouin tea. Altogether takes about 2 hours.
Camel Riding – we paid £9pp – all I have to say is OUCH! We actually went through a different excursion company for this one which wasn't as good. The trip is meant to be 1 hour long, 40 minutes on a camel and 20 minutes at a Bedouin camp. In our case it was 20 minutes on a camel and nearly 3 hours at a Bedouin camp watching other people eat! And that’s not including the 1 hour transfer from the hotel! By the time our return transfer arrived we were very pleased to get away! This company was called L'aube Voyage, avoid them like the plague! The camel riding was fun though but it's so uncomfortable your bum will be sore for days after! Haha!
SHOPPING: Shopping was great, although you have to be prepared to haggle hard, even to the point where they get really angry with you and start swearing at you in Arabic! Haha! Don't pay their ridiculous prices; we bought a fake big Louis Vuitton bag which they tried to charge us £65 for but in the end got it for a tenner, the guy was almost crying by the time we left. The prices are really high so only pay what you think it’s worth; we didn't buy much because most things (even after haggling) were more than you would pay in England. Do all your shopping in Old Sharm as its cheapest here, and when your haggling don't start at 50% off the original price, more like 90%!
And don't fall for their little tricks like “come in and I give you free gift / business card” as it’s all a ploy to get you to spend money! 200 Marlboro lights are about 60 or 70LE in Old Sharm
NAAMA BAY: Naama Bay is a great night out and again watch out for the hassle, we ate at TGI Fridays one night and the food was beautiful there was so much we couldn't eat it all! It wasn't that cheap though, £30 for two people but well worth it! Listen out for the funny phrases that the Egyptians say to the English like “cheap as chips” and “asda price” and “lovely jubbly”.
LEAVING THE HOTEL: They tried to charge us £10 for a bin in the toilet that was already broken when we arrived so make sure you report anything that’s broken as soon as you arrive. Also there was no bell boy available to take our luggage to reception but the cleaner saw us struggling and came to our rescue! There is a £15 charge to keep your room after 12:00pm.
TAXIS: Here are the prices that we paid while we were on holiday...
Naama Bay – 40 – 50LE (only ever 40 on your return as there are so many taxis lined up)
Old Sharm – 60LE
Airport – 50LE.
You can probably get them even cheaper than this but don't pay any more! And make sure you agree on the price per car and not per person as they will try and trick you!
I hope all this helps, we had such a great time, and we are going back again next year to stay in this hotel! I will post some photos soon; if I can help with anything just ask!

Very poor resort. On the surface it looks quite nice with the all the pools and nice marble finishing in the main hotel area. Don’t be fooled. This hotel is a 2-3* maybe, but that really isn’t the problem either.
I witnessed dirty glasses being re-used. The food is awful. Poor quality produce that is not prepared to any standard. I stopped eating the hotel food on our third day.
There were 6 guests in our party. One was ill for the last 3 days of the holiday. On our last night we ate in the "Italian Restaurant" (I wasn’t eating). My girlfriend ordered a cheese and tomato starter, that looking back was preprepared. We ate at 8.30 and they opened at 6.00 - I’m sure that the dish must have been sitting there for that duration. At approx 1.30 that night she started being sick and having to make regular trips to the toilet. I had reception call an emergency doctor. 45 minutes later I returned to reception and made him make the call in front of me. 20 minutes later the doctor arrived.
Our flight that day at 5.15 was a definite no go. She was a very poorly girl. The doctors call out and revisits cost £150 but were worth every penny. We got on a flight to the UK almost 3 days late and couldn’t wait to get away from the place.
If you are mad enough to make the trip to this resort after reading the reviews on this page make sure you have sufficient insurance (its saved me approx £600).
Things like the VERY cold pool water, no tunnel to the beach, lots of grumpy Russians, poor entertainment and poor quality food are all important features of a holiday that this hotel falls short on.
Please stay away.

Food bad always cold and looked horrible! They could not even serve cucumber without it being dried out. Rooms were nice apart from you did not get towels till after you had showered at 6pm. No tunnel to beach a 20min walk instead, when you got to the beach all you could hear was noise from machines on the building site near by. Glasses at hotel was always plastic at the bars and dirty at that, then cleaned them by running them under water. Sharm a very nice place but not this hotel at all, I would say it is a 2 star hotel not 5.

Complex looks good at first but the food is awful and luke warm. None of the glasses are clean, run under cold water. There is nowhere to sit and have a coffee or drink in comfort.
Sitting having dinner and listening to birdie dance etc every night is not entertaining to us & certainly not 5 star. The cleaner kept coming into room with key and asking us how many towels etc.
We couldn’t relax. We wouldn’t recommend this hotel to anyone.
Oh the tunnel to the beach was not open, had to walk on roadside and the beach was like building site.
It was horrible, don’t go there.

We have just returned from our Honeymoon which was arranged for us and therefore, reading the reviews before we left - we were VERY worried and concerned - to the point that my new husband even spoke to the travel company 10 mins before our flight left to try and change hotels.
I would just like to say how pleased and happy we were with the whole experience. I would recommend this hotel 100% and have already done so - we only arrived home at 1am this morning and was determined to post our review to squash the bad reports that seem to be everywhere.
We went there expecting the worse and all I can say is that everything was great. I genuinely feel that people are arriving at the Rehana Sharm with their expectations way too high. Can I just say (without offending anyone) that yes, this is advertised as a 5* resort - and no it probably isn't what us Brits would regard as a 5*, however surely if you really, really wanted a "British" 5* you would have paid approximately more than £1500 EXTRA than what you paid at the Rehana and booked into the Hilton/Marriott etc.
We were expecting Honeymoon upgrade and admittedly no such thing existed - but this wasn't the hotels fault - this was misselling by the travel company. However, they went out of their way to give us little extras - fruit, wine etc. We also pointed out that we had 2 (large) single beds... great for the honeymoon...!
As soon as we went to Reception they found 3 other rooms to show us for us to choose from, but to be honest our room (ok single beds) had the most spectacular view (looking over the pool and you could see the sea) so we chose to stay where we were, with that they arranged to have our beds pushed together so we were happy!! Our rooms were always cleaned - if we wanted them to be - sometimes we just wanted to sleep in afternoon... however the guy cleaning was great and always polite and helpful - and made great things out of the towels etc.
The pools were lovely - although VERY cold and I couldn't face the freezing water but that suited me... it was funny watching everyone’s faces as they tried to get in without looking shocked at the cold!! The guys behind the bars were always helpful and we just used straws rather than drinking out of the glasses directly after hearing the reports of glasses not being clean. You could ask them for any combination for a cocktail or let them make them up - which was always interesting... and very strong!
The food was fine - ok not 5* but we never had a problem with any of it - even on Sunday they did their version of a roast, so not sure why people were complaining - it's not British food but you're not in the UK so you have to make allowances. The desserts were always interesting and therefore had to try them all...! There was always rice, chicken, beef or fish - which on one occasion there was only fish - and as I don't eat fish proved interesting but I just moved on to the pasta bar instead.
During the day the Crepe Station opened and if you love our pancakes - you'll love these. Also around 3.30pm the pool bar serves snacks of burger and chips - so you can always get by.
There are loads of Russians around and yes, the majority are rude and arrogant unfortunately - no please/thank you - even to us! You do need to tip and this goes a long way to making your stay even better - just £2 gets you friends for life.
The Egyptians will try and rip you off and bartering is their way of life and this can get tiresome but stand your ground and only pay what you want - and if it's too much just walk away - you'll soon know if they want your business.
When visiting Naama Bay be very careful not to get "kidnapped" as one of the other guests put it! You have to really visit first during the day and find your bearings before going there for the nightlife - then you know who is trying to take you to their shops before demanding you buy something!
Where all the taxis gather is the start of the shopping not where they try and take you too. Just stand your ground and be polite, smiley and finally just walk off - that's what we did and we never had a problem - you come across as weak and they will pick up on it and harass you constantly.
All in all we had a fantastic time - yes the area the hotel is being built in is up and coming but we did not have any issues at all. One last thing - take a jumper for the evenings as although it's around 23 degrees the wind makes it chilly.
Don't just take the bad reports for this hotel - we loved and would definitely recommend it.

We arrived back from the Rehana on 11 Nov after spending one week AI there.
The rooms were clean on arrival, tidied every day (but not cleaned) and are modern with an excellent shower. We had a good view from our room and the grounds of the hotel are nicely laid out and we had no problem getting sunbeds - even if we didn’t arrive at the pool until 10am.
The food was, in our opinion, good and varied - particularly at lunch time ...wonder if other people have just looked at the food labels or actually looked at and tasted the actual dishes to determine the choice and quality of the food?
However, there were cleanliness issues as reported in previous reviews around the pool areas (spilt drinks not cleaned up and general grubbiness) and the pools got cloudier as our week went on so they obviously were not being regularly cleaned.
Also, pool glasses, suggest take them to your room and wash them as they are often dirty.
We kept hold of the same ones all week so that we knew they were clean. This was the only element of our stay at the Rehana which was not at all satisfactory, but we still had a good time.
This hotel is 3* standard not 5* but please be realistic about what to expect when it is a cheap holiday (given that the flight costs a fair proportion of the total cost). I think the new hotel as advertised is still under construction over the road.

I have been to Sharm 4 times now so when it was rated as a 5* I automatically thought 4* at best. After being there I would rate it 3*+.
The bad bits were:
Complete lack of hygiene in the bars, restaurants, and food outlets. Chefs wore thin rubber gloves but handled both cooked and raw meat with the same gloved hand. They used chopping boards etc for all foods without changing them. The ready prepared food was not kept hot enough and was often cold.
There were some strange combinations of foods and the accent seemed to be on many and various very very sweet cakes, desserts etc for every meal. Fruit was usually unripe and even though I like my fruit a little unripe I found them too sour/hard.
Any fruit at all was quickly snapped up by other nationalities at the hotel and placed on their table in huge mounds or popped into their bags! And I don't mean the odd banana either.
Plates, cups, and glasses were in short supply and were just rinsed under a running tap and used again - even plastic ones.
When we arrived we were sent to a room that hadn't been cleaned from the last occupant. This was quickly organised but then it transpired that the staff expected my 15 year old son and I to share the same bed. We then had a sunbed put into the room for the other person. After complaining we were moved to another room with two proper beds but that was after two sleepless nights. The sunbed was HARD.
One of the pools that was in the Rehana Prima Life hotel where the water slides are, has a huge sharp metal object bolted to the floor of the pool which my son lacerated his foot on. I believe it to be the remnants of one of those mushroomy shower things that pools have in them. Very dangerous but when I complained to the management there was a complete lack of concern one way or the other.
For the first 3 days of the holiday we were unable to get sunbeds around the pool at all. We found that people arranged to have their pool towels put onto the beds by the staff. These inconsiderate people didn't even use them. I believe the management stopped this but we were still unable to get sunbeds - maybe because as we found out, many people had them in their rooms to sleep on at night!
The beach is a long hot walk away and frankly looks like a building site without any building going on!
Entertainment (?) not really worth bothering with although the team do try!
Pools need cleaning more regularly. The sides are coated in suntan oil etc and there are lots of foreign objects in the water (i.e. hair grips, stones etc.)
Good bits are:
Staff very friendly and they do try to be helpful on the whole.
Transport arranged by the hotel was usually on time.
Could usually find something to eat.
Tea was not that bad!
Max the barman in the pool bar worked like a Trojan.
The coral at the beach was good but you need beach shoes.

I have just returned from staying at Rehana Sharm and if I am honest I was quite disappointed.
In my opinion there 5* is equivalent to our 3*.
The grounds and the rooms were lovely and most of the staff were polite and pleasant, however there were a few major things that let it down.
The first was the food, I found there was little choice and the same things were being put out day after day. As a vegetarian there was no variety and I found it frustrating that most things were not labelled. Both me and my partner and bad stomachs throughout the holiday and for a week when we returned. It seems there is too many guests for the staff and we often had to wait around for cutlery and drinks.
The second thing was the number of sunbeds, there were clearly not enough for the number of guests, and to get somewhere to sit for the day you had to either get up at 5.30am or have to lay on the grass which is just not acceptable when you are on holiday to relax.
The third was that the beach, which is a good 10 minute walk from the hotel, is not very nice and certain restaurants the brochure promised within the complex were not available.

We was informed that in fact this hotel was not new but refurbished, however the rooms were amazing. The cleaners did a splendid job and you could not fault them.
The restaurant staff were pleasant and very well mannered. The food was of a choice and there were many different things of all cultures.
The hotel was amazing, however there were issues with the glasses. There was hardly ever any clean glasses therefore you would either have to wait or have a little white plastic cup.
The cutlery was always clean along with the plates.
The pools were amazing with a waterfall in which you can swim behind spacious and jus spectacular. In all I was pleased with this hotel along with its many facilities and activities you can do with them.
Like day trips and overnight trips to Luxor, Scuba diving and what I did quad biking in the desert. It was fantastic beautiful and half way through the quad biking you get the choice to ride a camel through the desert. At the end you get a picture and a DVD which you can purchase. I enjoyed it.
It was a well spent holiday.

On arriving at Egypt we had no taxi and had to wait a long time.
When entering the hotel it looked very nice, but when we got to our room our bed sheets had not been changed from the previous occupier, there was diarrhoea on the toilet seat and the lid, plus there was no bed for my daughter so they brought up a sun lounger.
When I complained about the diarrhoea the staff got some tissue and dipped it down the toilet, then wiped the seat and thought he had done a good job.
My daughter who is 10 years old pulled the handle off the door (at this NEW HOTEL).
This was our first family holiday together in 4 years. I booked it for me, my husband, daughter, and his parents what a disappointment. This hotel is not new, the food was crap, but the Russians loved the food.
My daughter ate chips, egg, and toast every day, because the food was so disgusting. I only ate in the hotel for 4 days. The plates were dirty if there was any and so were the cups and glasses.
Because it was meant to be a 5* I thought the hospitality was going to be good. Half of the staff were nice and helpful ,however others were rude. The best thing throughout our whole holiday was the sun, the pool and at Naama Bay were there was restaurants like e.g. Fridays and pizza hut.
Also there’s a loud generator there, furthermore the whole 2 weeks we had to suffer low noisy aeroplanes. Plus we were all ill.