- Turkey Holidays
- Marmaris
- Grand Yazici Club Turban
The hotel enjoys a superb location surrounded by pine forests, overlooking the Bay of Marmaris. The resort of Icmeler is approximately 2 km away while its bigger sister, Marmaris, is 6 km away. Both are easily reached by public transport which runs from the main road in front of the hotel. Marmaris Castle and marina is some 5 km away. Rhodes is accessible by ferry in some 45 minutes. The hotel is set in large, pine tree forest grounds and has its own sandy beach and pier. The accommodation consists of a main building and villa-style blocks in the gardens. Guests have access to many wonderful amenities, including the Arcadia Spa, a 330m long private beach, sun-bathing platforms and lush gardens with opportunities to stretch out on a hammock under the trees. (Some facilities may not be open year round due to weather seasonal conditions).
Pamper yourself with a visit to the spa, which offers massages and facials. Water lovers can head down to the private beach, or take a dip in one of the 2 indoor and 2 outdoor swimming pools. Additional amenities at this hotel include complimentary wireless Internet access, concierge services and supervised childcare.
Due to the surrounding area and the number of steps around the hotel, it may not be suitable for those with mobility difficulties.
Three of my friends and I stayed here for 10 days, our first thoughts were purely positive; at first glance, it's truly a gorgeous hotel, and an absolutely massive one at that.
I'd like to start by thanking Ozy who typically works the main bar, he is truly an asset to your team, his English is superb and overall very friendly, thank you for your service!
However, we found a lot of drawbacks to this hotel throughout our stay, one of the biggest being the amount of trees around the complex... don't get me wrong, I love lots of greenery, but when it becomes a blocker for the sun from 2/3pm, they're more of a hindrance. Now, when we first realised this was the case, we thought of just going to the beach as there's of course no trees on the beach, but we were disappointed to find that the beach is pretty much full from 8am onwards (even though its an extended beach in comparison to other hotels along the Marmaris strip). But hey ho, not the end of the world.
Next, the AC, if you can even call it that, was pitiful, it was more like a fan blowing lukewarm air, we'd spoke to other guests staying in the hotel and they said the same. We also found that in both rooms, our "AC" was blowing faster on Level 1 rather than 3 for some reason, but again, hey ho.
It came to around the middle of our stay, we had a look at doing the boat trip as there's a stall on complex to arrange this. For a private boat (just the captain), no drinks included and no food included, for 3 hours, it was 15,000 Turkish Lira, or roughly £228 (GBP) as of writing this, steep. However, the stall, for some odd reason, only takes cash, so we were told to get cash out from a nearby cashpoint, with exchange rates thus totaling to £264. We organised a time (10am - 1pm), when the captain called the organiser at the stall, saying that he would like to rearrange it to start from 11am so he could "get some beers for us", implying that they're free, you would think? So, the next day rolls around and we get on the boat, we get 3 beers, have a great time sunbathing, swimming in the sea at the various stops the captain made, and then I went to get another few beers from the captain, and he said "would you like to pay for the beers now or after?"... I explained that he'd said he was getting the beers for us, as aforementioned, implying they're free. This situation escalated into something way bigger than it needed to be. But at the end of the day, I'm not paying for something I wasn't told was going to cost, especially considering the captain was going out of his way to get the beers for us. So later we get off the boat, and he expects us to go to the cash machine, we don't... the organiser couldn't understand why we wouldn't pay despite us explaining it. Until our last day, around 4 days later, he comes up to us (as we're sat at the pool bar) and berates us to pay for the beers, threatening to call the police at the airport so we would be stopped from leaving the country (all because of 3 beers by the way). This was an awful experience to go through, he'd fear mongered us into paying for something that shouldn't have costed in the first place; and of course, he would only take cash so we had to pay even more steep exchange rates.... absolutely disgraceful. I'd be ashamed to have this guy running this "service" if I was the owner.
Apart from the above, most of our stay was absolutely perfect, other than small things that are somewhat expected in turkey, and more specifically in All-Inclusives, such as the alcohol (spirits) were severely watered down, cocktails were inconsistent and the pool was shut for almost a full day due to a guest's excrement (of course, this is not in the resort's hands and I'm not blaming them for this). As for the food, I was pleasantly surprised by the quality, I would say the food was exceeding All-Inclusive standards so that was nice.
Overall, our stay was okay, but definitely not worth it for how much we paid (roughly £1200 per person for the Package Holiday with Jet2), would not come back.
Thank you for reading, hopefully this will give other potential guests an insight :)
Our fourth time at the hotel, I thought I had done a review when I was over but I hadn't. Fabulous rooms, good food, Italian and Chinese are excellent, top service. The ladies in custom service can't do enough for you, Resoul was also a star ⭐ sorting everything out for us and making our holiday special. Only one small complaint,the outdoor pools are freezing,can one not be heated? Saying that we will definitely be back again
We recently arrived home after 11 nights from Aug 29th-Sept 7th in room 3407. We would like to thank everyone for such a great holiday.
We have stayed in all inclusive resorts in Mexico, and this resort rivals them. For half the cost.
Not many Brits Abroad, which was nice. We met some wonderful guests from Turkey, Russia, Hungary, Bulgaria.
The cleanliness of the resort was fantastic, the food was amazing, the entertainment was fab…but above all, it was the staff that made our time there so pleasurable.
We did NOT encounter one member of staff “having a bad day”, from entertainment pool side, restaurant workers, cleaners, maids, pool staff, bartenders. Truly amazing.
The A/C was freezing in the room…so nice to come back to a cool room!
The pools were cool, but very clean. Lifeguards on duty, sometimes as many as 3 at the main pool. Music was a bit repetitive, but not horribly loud all day!!
Waterpolo was fun. Well organised.
We would like you to let a few of your special workers we encountered and pass on our heart felt thanks to them personally please.
Sam at the pool. Erin and the young lady at poolside entertainment. Ozzy in the pool bar lounge area But especially these 3 guys…who worked their socks off day in day out on roller skates delivering drinks, watermelon, water and finding chairs. Batuhan Ugur Berk Will be back next year for sure.
Flights on Jet 2 from Leeds were awful times!! (Only downside)
Overall, everything was great: the hotel territory is vast, green, and well-maintained, and the food is really good.
However, the main disappointment was the severe lack of sunbathing space on the beach and piers (excluding the pier by the restaurant). Interestingly, the umbrellas by the pool and on the platform near the restaurant are adjustable and foldable, but we came here specifically to enjoy the open sea, the sunshine, and the breathtaking mountain views. Unfortunately, all the other beach and pier umbrellas are fixed straw/thatched ones that cannot be folded or moved. They create constant shade, forcing guests to constantly look for and switch sunbeds as the sun moves throughout the day. Considering that available sunbeds are already quite scarce, finding a sunny spot to relax with a view becomes nearly impossible.
A sincere recommendation to the hotel management: please consider replacing some of these fixed straw umbrellas on the beach and piers with adjustable ones (like the ones by the pool and the restaurant platform), or create dedicated open-sun zones for guests. Honestly, this is our first time in Turkey encountering a situation where it's physically impossible to adjust or fold a beach umbrella on the pier or shore.
Fixing this detail would make the overall guest experience truly exceptional, and we would love to return!
We last stayed here two years ago and were so pleased with our stay we decided to go back for 12 nights this September. The hotel however has DEFINITELY changed for the worse. The hotel is extremely busy and exceeds a capacity that makes it comfortable. I would also say the hotel is now is now definitely more aimed towards Turkish guests and all the entertainment is in Turkish.
Do not visit if you are a non smoker - as a non smoker the amount of people smoking absolutely everywhere was a massive issue which was never a problem before. In the smaller restaurants we had to move pretty much everytime we visited to avoid being sat next to entire tables smoking and in the whole resort there are only two tiny outside areas dedicated for non smoking. One small area (about 6 tables) next to the coffee shop and a central area of about 12 table outside the main restaurant. On 4 occasions we had to ask people to not smoke in these areas. On one occasion we have asked a Turkish male guest right next to us in the coffee shop if he could not smoke in the NON SMOKING area next to the cafe. He has then decided to ignore this and has become extremely rude and hostile towards us (both females) to the point I have then asked the male manager of the coffee shop if he could speak with the male. The manager said that is fine because it was raining, completely backing up the male guest. I then asked the manager if he wanted me to go and get someone from reception instead to intervene, as the NON SMOKING area is tiny where as the smoking area is probably about 6/7 times the size. It was only at that point the manager has intervened and asked the male to move. The male guest then became verbally aggressive towards us, swearing at my mum, and which I strongly believe was because we were both female and he was trying to intimidated us. This totally ruined our day and what is the point of having non smoking areas if your managers are not going to enforce it? The a la carte restaurants could easily be split to have non-smoking and smoking areas, however when this issue has been raised its seems like it's not a problem and no one has ever heard of second hand smoke at this hotel 🤷🏻♀️
AWFUL SUNBEDS - when we stayed two years ago the adult only thermal pool had a number of extremely comfortable days beds - on of our main reasons for wanting to come back. This year they have replaced them with sunbeds, which is fine, but NONE of the sunbeds on the whole complex have padded covers. So you're literally lying on uncomfortable metal and mesh beds all day. We even went to Migros to buy cushions as they are so uncomfortable. Not sure why a 'premium' hotel can't buy some padded sunbeds covers that even budget hotels appear to be able to have???
Facilities - The hotel is too busy for the facilities. Any meal time in the main restaurant was ABSOLUTE CARNAGE. It was far too busy and you often risked getting food spilled down you as there were so many people trying to get to the buffet.
Cleanliness - the main restaurant has padded seat covers on the outside seat. These were absolutely filthy to the point you didn't want to wear anything nice to dinner in fear of sitting on something.
The adult only thermal pool floor didn't appear to ever get cleaned and was covered in ants trailing from the sticky residues in the pit bins next to the table.
Overall I wouldn't recommend the hotel. The only plus point was the nice coffee in the coffee shop and the quality of the food was good.
Sadly it appears management has changed and it has since gone downhill, which is a shame as the complex has so much potential.
WOULD NOT RECOMMEND
