Rhodes 2023

This trip to Rhodes was a family trip and the kids first time on a plane. We used On the Beach for this trip and flew with Ryan Air from Birmingham. This meant our hotel and flights were booked separately through a 3^rd party but still ABTA and ATOL protected. We paid for Parking at Birmingham Airport through Holiday Extras. This cost £54 for the 7 days.

As we didn’t book directly with a travel company, we had arranged for our own transfers which cost £110 return for 5 people through Rhodes Airport Taxis.

We stayed at The Delfinia Hotel in Kolymbia which was roughly 45 Minutes from the airport.

On arrival the Hotel looked relatively clean and tidy. The reception area was open but small with the restaurant at the back on the right and the pool area off to the left. There was a little shop at the front left before you enter that sold snacks, drinks, inflatables, sunglasses and souvenirs.

We stayed in 2 rooms, which were at the opposite end of the corridor to each other. We were located right by the pool area. The rooms were basic with a double and single bed in each, a small sitting area and a balcony. The bathroom was small with a shower and a bath. We did have a bit of difficulty getting in and out of the bath as is was quite narrow.

The pool had 2 slides, 2 children’s pools and then a larger pool. There was a bar that only had drinks and no food. There was a small children’s play area that had a darts board and various other activities.

The pool bar was decent, it had soft drinks, hot drinks, beers, wines and cocktails. The cocktails were amazing! The Delfinia special was by far the best and they were not averse to taking requests – Troy had a banana colada. The kids absolutely loved that they could go and ask for mocktails 😊. Layton especially loved that he could get hot chocolate after being in the pool.

The restaurant offered Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner with a different theme every evening. There was a wide variety of food to cater to everyone. They had a separate Gyros area that also offered burgers, hotdogs and crepes. This area was also the snack bar throughout the day. The food was okay, but nothing really stood out. On the BBQ night we had to complain to the management as Rubi went to bite into her chicken kebab and I noticed the chicken was still raw. Troy had already eaten 2 by this point. Luckily no consequence to that. The kids seemed to really enjoy the Nutella Crepes and ice cream. Troy really enjoyed the Gyros eating at least 3 a day. Elia bar served ice cream and cakes as well as the same drinks as the pool bar.

The evening entertainment varied throughout the week, and we had to check the schedule to see what was on. We did win the quiz though and the DJ was amazed at how quick we could answer questions!

Again, venturing out was easy as the bus stop was a few minutes’ walk from the hotel. We also visited 2 beaches. One was a 15-minute walk, and the other was 10 minutes.

We decided to take the kids into the old town. This was about 40 minutes bus journey and cost 4 € each way per person. We did the same museum ticket as our previous trip and the kids loved it. They got to see all the historical artifact (which Layton was learning about at school), and Rubi got to take loads of photos. We went to Hans & Gretels which is the most amazing, sweet treat shop. We had chimney cake with bueno sauce and banoffee ice cream 10/10! We still crave this now. We also went to Starbucks and Ellia got to try the Blue Raspberry Cloud Frappe. Troy found the McDonalds and we had Spring rolls.

Overall, it was a good experience. Probably wouldn’t go back to this hotel as they had recently refurbed during covid and there were a few issues including the TV not working and Rubi finding a pad saw down the back of her bed. Other guests of the hotel (family & friends of the owner) causing issues such as throwing darts at Rubi – which resulted in us contacting security, incidents with drunk guests walking round naked (which made it into my Trust Pilot review) and a poor guest falling down a manhole after the cover broke. The total cost for this holiday (not including spending money or transfers) was £1643.97 for 5 of us all inclusive.