Olympic Palace Resort Hotel and Convention Center

I was here with my wife and we had a beautiful vacation! We loved especially Luca and his Pink Wave Team, the guys are the best!

We absolutely loved it here. The Hotel is amazing and by far the best part was the Animation Team. They were full of energy and our kids had a lot of fun here. Thank you Luca, David, Chiara, Tommi and Vicky!

It's very difficult to summarize this place. The first thing I will say is that it is 100% not a five star hotel, far from it. It is very clean everywhere but the building is clearly quite old and is being gradually renovated. It suffers overall from very small grounds as it is pressed up against a giant rock of a hill at the back, with very little space for quality amenities at the front. This hits hard with the pool area which is very cramped, and not very luxurious. The three pools themselves are not very large and sunbeds packed in like sardines around them. The pool bar is very poor, and the staff will not serve you, without you having to call in management if you (heaven forbid) try and get a drink from the poolside - quite ridiculous. The staff are generally pretty slow and spend a lot of time nattering instead of serving. Also issues are caused with speed at all bars as some guests are only half board so staff are having to deal with payments.

If you get a room on the back of the hotel, you will get a refurbished room which is actually quite nice, however you will get a view of said giant hill/rock that the hotel is pressed right up against - if you peer up, you can even see the sky... A room on the front has a nice sea view balcony however is extremely dated including a shower in a bath. The air conditioning generally works but I couldn't control it, and only engineers that we called in were able to do so, eventually and it still wasn't great.

The food on the whole, is fairly good, the main buffet restaurant is spacious and easy to get a table. The service isn't amazing though. The so-called a-la-carte restaurants are a waste of time. The Italian by the crazy golf was ok and the aquamarina restaurant next to the pool snack bar fairly good, but nothing outstanding sadly. Eating out of the hotel is recommended if you want an alternative from the buffet. In fact, speaking of the evening, the entertainment was generally horrific, either at the spacious but characterless lobby/lounge bar, or at the cramped roof top bar which was incredibly frustrating getting a drink. Kids entertainment and randomly organised football is all on the tennis court by the pools, with its various hazards. The wife did enjoy the entertainment team putting on stretching, yoga, aqua gym and pilates in the day time, and the German girl Liza was very chatty and pleasant.

The snack bar by the pool was pretty good and had good salads and varying dishes every day but the best tip was the Greek on the opposite corner restaurant on the other side of the pool opening at 1.30pm every day for a chicken or pork gyros in the shade to get (slightly) out of the carnage of the pool area. This doubled as a Mexican in the evening but we didn't bother eating there.

It just sadly has not got the right ingredients of a really classy hotel. There is a champagne bar for instance which doesn't open until 8pm, and is empty most of the time, and it feels just like it is plonked on a mezzanine by the never ending central spiral staircase. The drinks were dreadful. The hotel really needs a rethink to make better use of the space or it should be immediately downgraded so that people know what they are in for.

Don't forget the Greek government will rush you €15 euros a night when you check in, as they class it as 5 star, whereas it should be no more than 4* at best.

The hotel has a beach area across the road with comfy loungers, but there is no service for drinks and the beach is pure pebbles so wear beach shoes when going in the choppy sea. Water sports are available nearby.

There are a few sports bars and restaurants to the left as you come out of the hotel, which are quite good, but to the right are a few other bars and a nice Indian which are worth a look, we are there twice. Rhodes Town is a nice walk at 2.8 miles away to the start of the shops and is absolutely fabulous. We've been to Rhodes several times and always found it amazing, especially the medieval old town, for just wandering and finding shops and restaurants. The bus is a couple of euros each and every half hour, taking 5-10 minutes.

The whole experience was completely disappointing unfortunately and my recommendation is to look elsewhere for a holiday. However, the hairdryer was excellent in the room so perhaps all is forgiven.