Ten Bel Alborada Apartments

4 readers found this review helpful

awful state in rooms the facity is totally unacceptable when you save hard for a well earnerd holiday;
robbed on first night' got worse from then on............

15 readers found this review helpful

There's absolutely nothing wrong with this place except for some broken tiles around the pool. The food is great the drinks are plentiful and the pool itself is so large it's never crowded. I went with two small children who want to return asap! If you're after a quiet family holiday with sunshine and swimming it's fantastic. The little beach is right next to the pool so the kids can even build sandcastles without leaving the complex. I really don't know where the bad reviews have come from. I'm definitely going back!

4 readers found this review helpful

My partner an I took our two children for a last minute break. We checked the pictures on the website and were happy with the write up and images so we booked the holiday hastily as the price was excellent value for a family of four all inclusive. Although after confirming the booking We became quite anxious when we read the reviews about the hotel. We prepared ourselves for the worst.
We had read on the reviews that the building looked like a carpark, IT DID but it came in handy as we spotted our hotel a mile off (no confusion about been at the wrong resort). The building was quite imposing from the outside but once inside its not what we expected we were very suprised as it was clean, a little dated ,but you could tell it had been grand in its day. The room were clean and spacious, with a fair sized balcony. We all enjoyed the food, there was not a great deal of choice but we always found something to eat. The alcohol was of a good standard, (you didnt need to drink all day to feel tipsy) it was good stuff!
The pool was fantastic, We have never seen anything like it we were astounded by its shear size and the fact that it looks onto the sea. There was also a small pool with a fountain feature which the children loved! there were always plenty of sunloungers and parasols. The surrounding gardens around the hotel and pool were beautifully maintained and well established. beside the pool there was a small beach which was brilliant if you fancied a break from the pool.
The people in the resort and staff were lovely, everyone even the locals were friendly.
There were a couple of bad points:
we found a couple of cockroaches in the appartment, which were quite big.
There were a few broken tiles aroud the pool area, but whilst we were there they were carrying out maintainance.
we felt there werent enough snacks through the day, snacks were only available from half four til half five.
Overall if you are looking for a cheap holiday and arent expecting the ritz, then I would recomend this hotel . We thoroughly enjoyed this holiday, and would go again in future.
EXCELLENT VALUE FOR MONEY!!

25 readers found this review helpful

Went in April, 2011 for 10 day break. Had read previous reviews but went with open mind. On arrival hotel facade could look better but once inside presently surprised. We arrived at lunch time and check in was dealt with efficiently and promptly and we were informed that lunches would start in 30 minutes and we were directed to our room and advised where the resturant was. The room was large and airy, very clean and welcoming. The decor could do with updating but this is only cosmetic. The gardens were beautiful. The staff were polite and friendly and were always available to offer help and advice. The food was pleniful but choice limited. We never had a problem finding something we could eat. There was always salad and selection of cheeses,cold meats, etc as well as 1 hot meat dish and 1 hot fish dish at all meals. The vegetables and fruit were always fresh and plentiful. The only downside to the food was occasionally it was not hot enough for my taste but my husband felt it was fine, I mangaged though because there was a microwave that guests were allowed to use. The pool area was always clean but could do with a few tiles replaing. In the bar there was never a problem getting served helped partly I think as beer, wine soft drinks and coffees, teas etc were self service. the only downside to the holiday for us was the hotel entertainment was very poor and consisted of animal shows, bingo, quiz night and on one occasion during out stay a live music night.

8 readers found this review helpful

4 of us went to the ten bel, 2 adults and 2 children, the hotel is desperatley in need of renovation, we did enjoy ourselves because we made the best of it but the childrens park is very shabby, the pool is great in size but when its not hot the pool is freezing cold my youngest son spent his time around the pool a lovely shade of blue. The food is fine, plenty of choice, pretty standard for all inclusive, the staff in the restaurant were lovely and hard working. The entertainment was terrible, they all worked hard but the worst entertainment I have seen. To be honest it is a great shame because with a cash injection it could be a fantastic hotel. The rooms are clean and very spacious. I wouldnt recommend it even though we did have a good time.

4 readers found this review helpful

Where to start. Simply don't go there. Don't even send your worst enemy there. Yes it looks like a Car Park and frankly that’s what it should be.
During our holiday we heard rumours that it had previously been used as a mental institution and I think you need help if you go there!
We booked through an independent operator and were told that it would be 3 star! Well 0 star is closer to the mark. The hotel/apartment was shabby and clearly past its sell by date. Paint is peeling off walls, cockroaches in the room which when we complained were told that we had not disposed of our rubbish quickly enough! Piles of rubbish outside the maid station piled in the hallway.
The area around the pool is a hazard and we had to buy our 2 year old some cheap sandals to wear in the pool as we felt he would cut his feet on the multitude of cracked tiles if not.
The pool is huge and when waves come over into it it’s spectacular and you get good pics! But it isn't cleaned often and gets really mucky, plus when they do clean it it’s out of commission for most of an afternoon.
The surrounding town is however enchanting. Local shops open Spanish hours and are really helpful if you do try and speak Spanish! There is a great Pizza restaurant and some lovely places to go for meals out. We saw the hotel restaurant and were happy not to be eating there, especially when you see the chefs in dirty whites!
On a happy note the town has a Banco Santander which makes getting cash easy and cheap if you choose to be billed in GBP.
But all in all just don't go there!

7 readers found this review helpful

We went on holiday in Oct 2006 (4 friends aged 19-21). We had a look at some of the reviews of the hotel after we had booked it and were not as impressed as much as we thought we would be. Much to our amazement the hotel was really nice, modern, staff were friendly, your room was cleaned everyday and the food was really nice.
Not much nightlife but we knew it was a quiet and the staff still kept us entertained. The pool was the biggest surprise, absolutely huge and saltwater aswell. The waves actually went into the pool, which is how close you were to the sea. Very helpful when booking day excursions. We were also very impressed with the rooms. We opted for 2 double rooms but could of easily fit into 1 room altogether. Good facilities in the room such as kitchen(even though we were all inclusive) good sized lounge, sky TV, safe, balcony, dining area and a lot more, overall all we were very impressed and would definitely go back again.

11 readers found this review helpful

A group of 8 of us (3 adults and 5 kids - four under 9 and one aged 15) booked this holiday 5 weeks prior to departure, reading what reviews were available before we went. After all was booked and paid for I started to have a very bad feeling about the holiday we were about to embark on! BUT I remained positive until the taxi pulled up outside the building, which did in fact look like a multi-story car park - I did not want to get out of the taxi!!
Having read 4/5 reviews my thoughts and warnings on going to the Ten Bel Alborada Apartments are this:
All Inclusive at the Alborada Apts is AI on a minimal budget.
This venue is full of Spanish visitors, with a few French, Dutch and German as well, which I did not see as a bad thing, but the English were in the minority.
The food in the restaurant was ok, tasty, a bit repetitive but good enough to eat. Dining sessions were also uncomfortable due to no air conditioning. Look out for their many flies as well! Two of our kids experienced bad tummies. Take plenty of medicines just in case.
The provision of snacks in-between meals is a definite inaccuracy, as snacks (lunchtime leftover chips, burgers and frankfurters that are cooked at 3.30pm and served until 4.30pm each day - is the extent of snacks. NONE are available at any other time during the day. So if you arrived after dinnertime - 9:30pm there is no hope of getting any food bar going out and purchasing it yourself. Ice cream for the kids is available from 10am - 11pm which is normal at most AI establishments.
Reading another review before we went about the closure of the bar at 11pm each night, was TRUE despite checking with our tour operator that the publicity for this venue did say 12 Midnight. It was outrageous that after 11pm you had to pay for any further drinks you wanted including WATER!! Children were denied access to any form of soft drinks or refreshment after this time. Some of the bar staff 3! out of 8 were pleasant and friendly with the others barley tolerating the English.
We were allocated two apartments next door to each other on a low floor (1st) as requested when booking, so I was glad that this was actioned. The apartments were very spacious and well equipped - cleaned regularly - very good in my opinion apart from uncomfortable nights due to heat and humidity with no air conditioning in the room! Uncomfortable when trying to dress and constantly sweating as well.
Our apartments faced out onto the main road - but there was no noise disturbance of any kind.
Yes the appealing aspect about the Alborada is the spectacular 3/4 acre freshwater swimming pool. The views into the sun beds were on terraces, which was good and there were enough sun beds for all at any time. The only things that spilt the pool were the large number of broken and missing tiles around the pool area - dangerous for the kids and uneven tiles with large grouting which caused numerous toe injuries to those unaware of the condition under water. Not very good in my opinion, which was also the view of the majority.
The pool is cleaned once a week (could be cleaned sooner than that as you get seaweed and sea grime in and on the bottom of the pool) SORT of and is great to watch - believe me, empty or full, the pool is spectacular. The Life Guards and Security men were friendly and always on hand to administer any first aid.
I am desperately trying not to write war and peace, so my advice to any one offered and thinking about this accommodation should consider all reviews, consider what you will be getting for the money you will be paying.
We made the best of our holiday as that was the right thing to do, and went into Los Cristianos (20 mins away on bus) and Playa das Americas (50 mins away on bus) to find any more excitement when we needed it. With the kids it was not always best to venture too far. The evening entertainment was pretty poor, especially if you have young children. The mini disco was mini with the Animation Team of 3 trying their best to provide sufficient entertainment for them. The adult contingency had a few opportunities to get involved in interactive games, which did at least bring the different nations together, not bad but not brilliant either BUT we did have fun as we joined in and had a laugh - we were on holiday after all.
On this note I'll end my review and hope that other British tourists are sent just as I felt to grab our money and send us to a place that had not been thoroughly checked for suitability for families and young people. If I had paid a bit more for our 12 nights away I would have been very disappointed. The night before we left, two young girls were asking to be moved to another hotel! They were not happy at all, on the night staff were rude and failed to acknowledge their distress.
I had noticed that only zoomed out views of the Alborada are available on most sites, so if I am able to upload a few more I have taken as a record of our visit to the Ten Bel Alborada, I will do so. Please look about for them. Also one more thing, if you need to use the internet there is an internet cafe next to the perfume shop to the left of the building where you can pay one Euro for 30 mins as opposed to one Euro for 10 min in reception.
My rating of 6/10 is reasonable, based on our 12 night stay.
Thank You.

In our opinion, this hotel has been superb, in the past! But not now! It is all falling very much to rack and ruin! Paint is peeling, tiles are missing and the pool area isn't cleaned regularly at all. Yes, the rooms are very spacious, yes the sea pool is enormous! But it is only cleaned once per week and on the sixth and seventh day it can become very dirty. But I must say gorgeous straight after it has been cleaned and a joy to swim in. Like swimming in the sea but without the sand!
The hotel itself looks like an old car park, masses and masses of concrete. A good coat of white paint would make it look 100% better. We booked last minute and went with our two teenage sons (14 and 17) and they were bored stiff. In our opinion there is nothing suitable for them to do, only 3 very shabby pool tables (at extra cost) and 1 table tennis table.
The entertainment at night is definitely not for teenagers. The mini disco though is loved by the 10 year olds and under. An entertainer/ magician/ contortionist one night was about the high spot, the "live music" consisted of a male vocalist on an organ which, in my personal opinion, would have been booed off the stage of my local flea-pit pub! And the "bingo" saw us leaving the bar area very early that night. There is a daily entertainment programme which comprises of rifle shooting, water polo, water basket, aqua fit and French boules. Quite extensive but again the teenagers were not interested and other than the French boules and rifle shooting the under 10s got everywhere. (One father went totally over the top when the water polo rules were not being obeyed to the letter!)
Luckily the hotel provided TV's in all rooms and at the extra cost of 35 euros for the fortnight (£24.50) we were able to get a few English channels and a film channel. Unfortunately the reception on a couple of the channels was a little dodgy but we could, if we wanted, watch a film each night. Not ideal, but better than yawning all night having exhausted the card games. The hotel shuts down totally at 11.00pm so if you are night owls, you have to go out into the village itself and spend extra money. The village/town, Las Galletas, has a very small beach frequented by the locals and has the obligatory black sand you expect in the Canaries. At the weekend the locals flock to this "beach".
There are a few restaurants on the beach front "the Carnivale" at the end of the parade being the best and very reasonable. There are quite a few little bars and restaurants in the village, the Bar Rocamar run by Jimmy and Sharon was by far the high light of our holiday, obviously we had to pay here for drinks which was a little annoying seeing as we were on an all inclusive board at the hotel. The hotel it appears, was once part of the large "Ten Bel" complex, but the other three hotels in the group have seemingly been sold off allegedly to time share. We could walk to these hotels (via a rubble path) but it was definitely a ghost town situation. Not what you would expect in the height of the season.
The hotel reception was always open and the staff courteous. A walk into Costa del Silencio itself takes approx 20-30 minutes. The food in the hotel was very, very plentiful, if a bit samey. You could always get a full English breakfast and plenty of continental choice. Even at the busiest times there were no queues at all!! The bars themselves only served alcoholic drinks, all the soft drinks were dispensed from self service machines (with plastic cups for the pool bar and glasses for the dining room) which meant there were never any queues for drinks. The rooms were very spacious, but no air conditioning at all, were cleaned daily (sheets changed once a week and the usual thin towels) and the maids were very efficient and polite.
We asked on several occasions during the week if we could keep our room longer on our departure day as we didn't fly until after midnight only to be told on the last day "sorry we are fully booked and these rooms have been booked" The courtesy room was, without doubt, an absolute joke! One two bedded apartment with one bathroom for everyone leaving that day to use! The living area was a storage space for TV's and there was little space to maneuver for all the stored cases.
The bathroom soon turned into a lake and on the last day of our holiday it really miffed us off! With a couple more rooms and a little organisation this could have been easily avoided! If you have already booked to come to the Alborada on an all inclusive basis, plan on taking a little extra money and visit the Jungle Park at Arona, an excellent day out but don't wear your best clothes for the jungle raid. Rope bridges etc are great fun. The birds of prey are excellent and the commentary is in Spanish, English, German and French. If you haven't booked yet, read our opinion on the hotel and see if it is still for you.
All in all quite adequate if you want to simply fly and flop! Bring plenty of reading material.

2 readers found this review helpful

A party of 8 of booked this holiday 6 weeks before departure, and I must admit the moment I paid my money and read any reviews, I knew it was too late and we had made a wrong choice!
I am writing this review at the accommodation we are staying at. My problems are this holiday does not meet what it says on the tin for the following reasons:
There are no snacks for the children all day - only between 3.30 - 4.30 from the restaurant
The bar does close at 11.00pm and not 12midnight as advised. You have to pay for drinks from 11pm - this is not all inclusive to me The entertainment for children is poor - not a good venue for families with children.
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