Noelia Playa

We booked GF Noelia in Puerto de la Cruz for a peak August holiday, knowing that it was a 3-star hotel with fairly average reviews. We booked half board and weren’t expecting anything luxurious or fancy. What we did expect, however, was reasonably good, safe food and the basics you would normally expect from a hotel of this type.

I want to start by saying that the hotel staff were excellent throughout our stay. Everyone we dealt with was pleasant, friendly and very helpful, including room cleaning lady and the management. In my opinion, the staff were doing their best with what they had to work with.

Unfortunately, the food was a major disappointment.

We arrived late because of a delayed flight and a very long transfer, with GF Noelia being the second-to-last hotel on the shared coach transfer. As half-board guests, we expected the usual sandwich tray or something similar to be available for late arrivals. There was no food available at all, so at around 10:05pm we had to go out and find dinner with our children. That was particularly disappointing after a long journey.

Breakfast was very limited. There was usually one decent pastry, but it would disappear within minutes and often wasn't replenished. The other pastries were frequently stale, hard and unpleasant. On the positive side, the breakfast food we did eat appeared safe and there were enough basic options to get by.

Dinner was more problematic. Dinner started at 7pm, but when we arrived at opening time, several dishes were already empty. It could take until around 7:20pm for them to be replenished, and the only pizza option sometimes wasn't ready until around 7:30pm. This was frustrating because we wanted to finish dinner and take the children out to enjoy the evening and the beautiful sunsets, rather than spend a large part of the evening waiting for food.

There were two types of meat or fish cooked to order each night, which in principle was a good idea. Unfortunately, on several occasions they were undercooked. I repeatedly had to use Google Translate to ask the cooks in Spanish to cook the food properly. On one occasion the chicken was visibly pink inside, and on another occasion the fish was undercooked. There were queues at the cooking station, and it seemed to me that the cooks were under pressure to serve people quickly. I also didn't see temperature probes being used to check that the meat and fish were properly cooked.

For us, one of the biggest disappointments was actually something very simple: ice cream for the children. We never expected a huge dessert selection, but we did expect basic flavours such as vanilla, chocolate or strawberry. Instead, coconut and lemon seemed to be available most of the time, with strawberry or vanilla appearing occasionally and chocolate only rarely. Our children were very disappointed, so we ended up buying ice cream outside the hotel, at around €2.70 per scoop.

The yoghurt desserts were also often unpleasant-tasting, and some seemed very close to being off. The cakes were similarly disappointing. The bread rolls were extremely hard and there were only a couple of varieties.

To be clear, we were not expecting a luxury buffet. We knew we were staying in a 3-star hotel and were perfectly prepared for simple food and limited choice. What surprised us was the overall quality and, in particular, the lack of some very basic things that even inexpensive family hotels usually manage to provide.

My impression is that the hotel is under considerable pressure to keep its costs down. Whether this is because of the way package holidays are priced and structured, or simply the hotel's own budget constraints, I obviously can't say for certain. But it felt as though cost-cutting was taking place in areas such as food quality, replenishment and the number of staff available to prepare and serve food. It was a shame because the staff themselves were genuinely excellent.

We still enjoyed our holiday because we made the most of it and had decent lunches outside the hotel. Puerto de la Cruz is a lovely place, and we enjoyed exploring the area. Including going to loro parque the capital Santa Cruz and la Oro tava valley. Local taxis were around €5-6 to go to town center, you could walk one way and take the taxi back.

For us, though, the lesson is that we probably wouldn't book this hotel or this type of hotel again. Next time, we may look at cheaper destinations such as the Costa Blanca or Costa Dorada.

GF Noelia could be a perfectly adequate 3-star hotel if expectations are kept low, but based on our experience, I wouldn't recommend it when the food is such a weak point. The staff deserve praise; unfortunately, the food and catering operation let the hotel down badly.

It was out first time coming to this hotel, when arrived 9.20pm due to transfer taken a little longer after checking in the receptionist told us to head for some food but It shut at 9.30pm when we went into the restaurant not one member of staff said hello when asking do we take a seat a member off staff looked at there watch and went you only have 5min to eat which wasn't enough time so we had to leave and go out for dinner, I felt this was unacceptable as we thought something would be in place for late arrivals when travelling along time and already felt unwelcomed.

At start of our holiday we had a lovely older man who was the life guard he let us all go and have lunch and then return straight to our sun beds, on day 3 there was a younger life guard and honestly he was very rude who sat under a umbrella with head phones in or he constantly woundred off, when going for lunch he said you'll need to take all your stuff with you as we can't reserve them but we explained were just going for lunch and stright back, we didn't have this problem the day before, he looked at his watch and went you have 20min to get back or he'd remove our stuff with a attitude, my is partner type 1 diabetic and this isn't enough time, we went to reception to speak about it and even the person at reception was abrupt about it and how they don't have a snack bar and this is the rules althrough it's not stated anywhere and the life guard didn't say anything the day he didn't have a issue, this isn't our fault that you can't provide a snack bar and not like we were away out for the day. So I had to head back to the sun bed while my partner went to eat so I could ensure she had enough time. There was two sun beds with towels on them with no one on them for 4 hours but we couldn't go for lunch was absolutely shocking how does that make sense.

If you have “all inclusive,” be prepared to ask for drinks during meals we waited, but no one came to our table while selected pepole was served and at the bar, several times pepole would walk up and get served stright away while we were left still waiting althrough the bar person knew — we were simply ignored everytime. The food was exactly the same every single day and no kid options. I started to feel unwell by the second day and we both decided to eat outside, Another big issue is the attitude of some staff. The way they treat guests who speak Spanish is very different from how they treat those who speak English.

“all inclusive” at this hotel does not mean comfort — it means constant asking and repetitive food, we’re not the only ones who felt this way as we spoke to many other lovely guests from the uk who felt excatly the same and we were all counting down the days to get home. This really spoiled the overall impression of the hotel and the vacation we had been waiting for all year, We will never be back to this hotel and area as we felt so unwelcomed and we really felt like we got ripped off with how much we paid to come here. We went on the submarine trip which was amazing and got took to las americas for a few hours and I couldn't believe the difference of how suddenly I felt so welcomed and everyone spoke to use like we belonged there, totally different to how we got treated in the north within the hotel and area as we got over charged at local bus station and when asking about this they said if we don't speak spanish then they can charge any prices they wish as we aren't being respectful which I've never had problems before of many European city's I've visited.

GF Noelia full, detailed review. Please read before booking.

All inclusive:

The all inclusive option comes with free drinks, free breakfast, lunch and dinner. The hotel claims there is also free snacks you can get throughout the day but we never ordered these so can’t give and opinion.

Drinks:

The drinks menu looks great however the cocktails are very watered down and the bartenders go into the kitchen to prepare them so the customers never see what alcohol is being poured- if any. The pina coladas are very sour/sweet tasting and are juice based rather than creamy. Tasted like pineapple juice and coconut water.

I recommend avoiding the cocktails if you plan to get drunk. For example order a Malibu and pineapple juice rather than a pina colada. You won’t get real Malibu though as you are limited to local spirits with the all inclusive deal so you will instead get Malu - also nice.

Food:

The breakfast is alright but very standard. The best things on the menu is probably toast, eggs, bacon and pancakes. Not a lot of variety at breakfast. We also witnessed one of the chefs drop the entire basket of bread rolls on the floor and proceed to pick them back up and serve them which put us off quite a bit. You have the option of fruit juice, water or milk with breakfast.

Lunch had a bit more variety with things like fish and meatballs but none of it tasted very good. We found ourselves having to force down a not so nice tasting piece of fish or meat every lunch time so we could at least have some meat in our diet. You have the option of fizzy juice, fruit juice, beer or wine with lunch (cocktails not allowed)

Dinner was much the same as lunch so by the time we walked in for dinner we were already fed up of the same, not so nice tasting options. You have the option of fizzy juice, fruit juice, beer or wine with lunch. (Same again no cocktails allowed) If you like canarian potatoes with mojo sauce or plain old chips then you’ll at least manage to stay fed for the trip.

The room:

Upon arrival we were glad to see we had gotten one of the more modern rooms, however, upon closer inspection it appeared my bed sheets hadn’t been changed and someone had shaved in them before leaving! There were lots of little black hairs under the top sheet and we didn’t arrive in until 11pm at night so I slept on top of the covers the first night. Thankfully they were accommodating and changed the sheets the following morning. The cutlery was also dirty and the bathroom floor too but we looked past this as we didn’t plan on using the cutlery and just put a towel on the floor.

The staff:

Most of the staff were very nice and accommodating however a couple of them were quite stern and unhappy in their approach towards customers. All of the front desk staff were very nice.

The area:

The area is well situated, a 20 minute walk into town and a 20 minute walk to Loro parque. If you don’t feel like walking it is approximately 7 euros taxi in either direction. There is a hiperdino (supermarket) located a 3 minute walk away also. You are also 3 minutes walk to the bus station which means you can get to the south of the island fairly easily. For 12 euros you can get a tourist travel card which allows for unlimited bus travel for 24 hours! We got a bus from the bus station to the Santa Cruz bus station and from there we got a bus to “Magma”, a stop located just a five minute walk from Siam mall/siam park. A more expensive but easier option is a direct bus from the allua hotel to the south of the island. This costs 28 euros per person and can be booked at the tourist excursion shop just across the road from Noelia. There aren’t many appealing food places near to the hotel but Uber eats and Glovo work! The town centre is covered in jersey sellers, bag sellers, hair braiders, and caricature drawers. There is one man who does the caricatures who is both hilarious and terrifying-definitely a highlight from the trip. However if your German id definitely avoid as he, for whatever reason, HATES German people.

Itenerary:

We were there for 5 days and would reccomend doing the following,

Day 1: get settled in the hotel and have dinner before going to explore the town for ice cream and views.

Day 2: have breakfast and lunch in the hotel and maybe have a dip in the pool. Go to Loro parque then go for dinner in the town. Allow at least 3 hours for Loro parque.

Day 3: have breakfast in the hotel then go to the lago martianez. It’s absolutely incredible and we spent most of our time here. I’d recommend spending around 4-5 hours here as there is bars and food places situated within the grounds. It closes at 5 which is the perfect time to go home and get settled before having dinner in the hotel.

Day 4: take the bus trip to the south of the island for Siam mall and Siam park. It’s 2 hours travel there and the same on the way back. You can have breakfast in the hotel this day before leaving. If you’re taking the cheaper method of transport google maps/apple maps will be your bestfriend this day as it will tell you what busses to get and what time they arrive at. I would recommend end heading home around 7pm as this will allow you to get in just before the all inclusive bar closes.

Day 5: if time allows for it, another trip to lago martianez! It’s truly brilliant.

All in all the hotel is situated in a great spot but I’d definitely avoid the all inclusive option if possible as you won’t get your moneys worth. You’ll spend most of your time outwith the hotel and you’ll end up going out for meals as the food is lacking.

If we had booked this hotel as a non inclusive I’d rate it around 4/5 but with the all inclusive package I’d say around a 2/5.

Review based on young couple.