Akyaka, Yucelen Hotel & Apartments Review

Overall Rating

Location, affordability, weather, people, places to visit, scenery and peace and quiet.

None but if you want lots of shops, noise and clubs don't stay here - go to Marmaris!

Yucelen Hotel & Apartments are very conveniently located within the resort of Akyaka, just a two minute walk to many of the restaurants located on the sea front and a five minute walk to the shops.

The shops are basic and will provide you with the essentials if you are self catering within the hotel appartments.

The resort itself is small and still quite traditional so there are not many souvenir shops - if you want markets to try out your haggling skills and bigger shops for clothes and jewellery you'll need to take a trip to Marmaris (a much busier,louder 18 - 30s kind of resort).

We stayed in one of the hotel rooms as opposed to the apartments. The hotel and grounds are beautiful - palm trees, a spring running through the grounds, ducks, fish and turtles - what more could you ask for! If you can get a pool view room - do. Our balcony was just above the area that the ducks and turtles congregate which was lovely. The ducks do give you quite a wake up call about 7:30 though! Not a bad thing as this is the time that you need to get your towels out! The whole putting the towels out before you sun bathe is not something we would normally condone but at this hotel, when it's busy, you need to get them out early to get a decent sun bed. Everyone does it so there isn't a problem with it at all.

The staff at the hotel are lovely, all very friendly and eager to please. The brochure we had mentioned an indoor pool, fitness centre, jacuzzi, sauna etc. At the time we visited the fitness cetnre didn't exist, the sauna was closed, the indoor pool freezing cold and in need of a little TLC and the jacuzzi was broken. We believe that parts of the hotel are still going through refurbishment and these things will probably be looked at shortly. DON'T let this put you off going to the hotel - it is lovely and the fact that these things weren't available did not marr our holiday in the slightest. There is plenty of shade if you need it around the pool and a nice touch is that there is complimentary tea and cake at 5pm each day.

The restaurants along the sea front sell a variety of very reasonably priced food - the drinks are a little more expensive compared to the food, especially wine. A basic meal (starter, main course and a drink) costs about £8 each. Our particular favorite restaurants were Yagmur on the sea front - the staff are so friendly and will give you a very warm welcome, especially if you take the time to learn a little Turkish before hand (we'll be puting a basic language guide on our website www.adamandlyn.co.uk before the end of 2005!) and ATI - a short walk up the hill from the hotel into the main square.
Anatolian Sky are a very good tour operator. On pick up from the airport in Turkey we received a complimentary bottle of water each - we thought this was a very nice touch as it was rather warm out! They offer plenty of trips - jeep safari (great fun), one day trip to Ephesus or a two day overnighter to Pamukkale and Ephesus (a little rushed but worth the while we thought), a moonlight cruise along the Dalyan river past the rock tombs with a visit to Caunos (a wonderful trip - do it on the Sunday, the day before you come home, it's a perfect end to the holiday).

We hope the above gives you a good idea of what to expect.

Do go to Akyaka and stay at the Yucelen Hotel, it's super!

Enjoy!