Cala Llonga, Cala Llonga hotel

Stayed for two weeks arriving at 5am on the Saturday morning (28 June). The hotel is in a great location, hotel staff are excellent (comments about the reps later).

Best buffet food we have experienced - lots of choice and always plenty available. The lady in charge of the restaurant (Montserrat) was great, always smiling and she would lead customers by the arm to their tables. If you like a hot sweet with your evening meal it dislocated at the end of the hot buffet counter but not very noticeable - didn't realise until about 4 days into the holiday that it was there. Layout if the food was bit awkward - about 10 trips around the various areas to get everything for your meal, jostling with other diners, not a great problem once you suss out where everything is. Took me a week to discover the cold water dispenser at breakfast time. (Round to the right as you enter the dining room).

Hotel is perhaps a bit tired and needs a bit of a face lift. Spotlessly clean though. Pool looks bigger in the brochure picture than it actually is - not that many people used the pool - when we were there probably only about 10-15 in the pool at any one time. Sunbeds, plenty of them, some around the pool, most on terraces. Many beds booked early by people who plonked their stuff down and did not appear until hours later - despite notices saying not to leave beds unoccupied for more than two hours. Sun brollies were available but mad rush to get them as not enough.

Entertainment was a bit mixed - only saw one or two whole shows and caught the tail end of others. The lounge where the shows take place is not the best - lots of pillars so very few 'unrestricted views'. No outside evening entertainment - all indoors in a quite hot lounge - air conditioning not the best.

The entertainment reps were great - kept those (who wanted to be) occupied during the day and during the evening entertainment. Always cheery and would say hi in the passing - unlike other staff who seemed glued to his desk in reception for most of the time.

What the Thomson Gold brochure doesn't tell you - men must wear long trousers for the evening meal - I searched through the hotel details in the brochure before I left - could find nothing about this. I was prepared though, I had two pairs of long trousers worn only for the evening meal and then changed out of into shorts afterwards. There were however several guests who did not have long trousers - one couple ate out for their first two nights until the man managed to find a shop where he bought long jogging bottoms which are apparently acceptable but tailored shorts are not. Women could, and did, wear almost anything they wanted. If there has to be a dress code for the evening meal it should be smart casual upwards, shorts should be allowed but not football shorts etc.

The 'small' charge for the safe is 4 euros a day! It cost is 52 euros for our stay hardly a 'small' charge. The brochure where it states the room facilities mentions a safe - not clear enough that there is a charge. Other brochures usually state that there is a locally payable charge, lack of this in the brochure makes you think it is included in the holiday cost.

The brochure does not tell you that for a 10 euro deposit you can get beach towels which you can swap as often as you want. You only find this out if you are lucky enough to ask another guest who has the towels already. The picture in the brochure of the pool does show Thomson Gold towels on some of the sun loungers - but no indication is given of their availability. We used up valuable luggage space taking two beach towels each when we didn't need to.

Our room key did not appear to work after that time. Even if you arrive as we did at 5am in the morning and do not get picked up until 2am for the return flight. You can book a courtesy room for free - 15 minute slots to allow you to shower. You can get a late departure but that will cost you 46euros (if you read the hotel leaflet) 54euros if you enquire with the rep. We were not prepared to pay 54euros as we had not had the use of our room on the arrival date until 5am on the Saturday morning.

Asked the rep about the check out time in view of out original arrival time - asked him to find out if we were entitled to keep our room on later as two other people (on the same flight as us) had been told by him that they could. He said that he would find out - only took our room number. When the others had asked about the late check out -he had told them they would get it without even asking their names or room numbers. This was on the Monday - he had a day off on the Tuesday, we asked him if he had found out on the Wednesday - he said no but he would go and ask reception, after muttering about the courtesy room.

We would be out of our room at 12 noon and book a courtesy room to get showered and changed for the evening meal. For the remaining few days of our holiday he never got back to us to say if we could keep our room on, despite his desk being in the reception area which we passed several time daily.

The information on the board about departure times said 2.20am but to be ready to depart any time from 2am. This had been changed to 2.40am (no information about that until we checked with reception when the bus did not appear). Bus was 1 hour late-no communication to the hotel from a Thomson's rep, got to the airport, no rep there, others on the bus for a different flight got to the check in desk which had closed to be told they were too late.

Our flight was boarding - so no time to get duty free - get it before you go to the airport in case you are late in arriving. We thought that there would have been some communication for a Thomson's rep upon arrival to reassure people that they would get their flights OK despite the bus being on hour late.

We booked one of the tours - 82euros each for a minibus tour of undiscovered Ibiza - visited a vineyard, lunch included in the cost. Not the best value - You could do the mini train trips from Santa Eularia and Es Canar and go to many of the same places as we did (except the vineyard) for a lot less.

Don't just stay in Cala Llonga - hop on the bus to Santa Eularia (1.4euros) or Ibiza Town (1.8euros) and get a taxi back (buses stop at 8.30pm) 10euros from Santa Eularia. 18euros from Ibiza Town.

Enjoyed out stay but little niggly things annoyed us ( as mentioned above - towels, safe charges, rep who lacks social/customer relation skills - forgot to mention - the different information given by hotel and Thomson's - courtesy room available until 7pm or later depending on what info you read, late departure charge - two different costs) Also if you read the brochure - about the facilities you would think that everyone gets fresh fruit, bathrobes etc - this is only for those who book superior rooms - but this is not clear from the way the details are listed - look at the bullet points and you'll see what I mean.