Jandia, Ambar Beach Resort and Spa

We booked a holiday for two via On The Beach. The hotel itself is very pretty, with 2 nice adult swimming pools and a childrens one. The animation team were very friendly and the food was ok, although very repetitive. The beach is not very far, about 10 minutes walk down the mountain, however the walk back is quite a struggle. Althugh a nice enough hotel, there were a few things that dissapointed us:

1. The 'garden' faced the path (as do all the ground floor rooms apparently), there is no fence, just a few shot plants. It felt quite public as people would look in when walking past, and could see everything inside.

2. Only one animator spoke English. The main languages were German and Italian, which was obviously catered for its main clients.

3. The room was cleaned and the twels were changed every 2 or so days. For a 4 star hotel it seemed a little bit rare.

4. The main issue I found very hard to deal with is its very strange, and I'd say discriminatory nature regarding shower gel and shampoo. We arrrived late in the evening, and after going to our room we noticed there was no shower gel/shampoo or any toileteries whatsoever. For a 4 star, all inclusive hotel we were hoping for at least the little chates, especially since carrying liquids through the airports is difficult unless you have check-in luggage. When we went to the reception to enquire, the receptionist said he needs to make a call. He spoke in another language, and mid conversation stopped and asked us where we were from. We said London. He carried on speaking on the phone, put the phone down and said to us: "Sorry, it's for Germans only. We wil give u some tonight since you have arrived late but tomorrow you will have to buy some". Coming from London where comments of that nature are unacceptable, this really shocked us. They should really state on the brochure that all-inclusive hs a different menaing depending on your nationality.

Other than that, it was lovely. I'm sure this hotel is heaven for people of German nationality.

First let me say while we are discerning in the holidays that we choose, we are not by definition persistent complainers; meaning our review is made from as an impartial point of view as possible. However we do know good standards when we experience them and certainly when we don't.

We traveled to Fuerteventura for a week's winter holiday from 27th Feb - 5th March 2008, staying at the Playa Esquinzo area situated near to the small resort of Jandia (pronounced "handia").

We used the Internet company "on the beach.com" to book our 4 star holiday and saved a great deal of money in doing so.

We flew from Bristol using XL airways, which was part of the package, and found the airline to be entirely adequate for the short flight we took.

Hiring a car for the week was also easy and we used "topcar" at the Fuerteventura airport and we hired a Nissan Micra for £60 for a week.(pre booked on the net)

Our hotel was The Hotel Ambar Beach which is a German owned hotel that caters in general for German clientele. For us that meant no drunken badly behaved brits to ruin out precious weeks holiday that was set in a quiet area on the top of a hillside with excellent views of the sea below.

The hotel was beautifully laid out with a nice garden path leading from the main pool area and meandering through the grounds to all the individual rooms. Our room was very nice with good quality beds and furnishings, nice drapes and bedding and a well appointed bathroom with shower, bath and WC.

The public areas include 2 very attractive outside pools, softened by rocks and vegetation. There were plenty of sun beds, all in good working order and "no" we didn't find towels left on beds overnight by German residents during our stay!!

The reception is an impressive structure of glass and wood and cool marble floors, with nice quality seating set around. The resort also has a great indoor pool, sauna, gym, and a bar that has a very nice outside balcony area with wicker furniture.

Also during the day there is an outside bar near the pool that should serve drinks from 10am until 5pm with snacks at 4pm daily. We found however that the bar was often left unmanned and so guests were having to reach over and help themselves to the drinks which formed part of the "all in" deal. A shop is also on site and sells everything from flip flops to bottled water at sensible prices.

The catering arrangements were where this very nice hotel let itself down. While the food was eaten in a very nice environment it simply didn't come up to par. There are two restaurants which comprise of a large well set out main area with an al fresco part, and a tapas restaurant open to us during one of our evenings, this was very nice indeed, but these standards after our visit on the first night were short lived!! Generally at all mealtimes there was a superb choice, and it was certainly not all bad, but the Japanese chef seemed to take delight in overcooking everything so that very tough meat and fish was the norm. The puddings were of very low standard with "chocolate slop" and bowls of lurid coloured pudding being the low points. However not even the Japanese chef could ruin ice cream and fresh fruit, although the choice was limited considering what fresh local fruit is actually available.

The food is perfectly safe, but our view was it was good ingredients coming in one end which was badly cooked by an incompetent chef. This was an echoed complaint by most of who I spoke with both German and English alike.

On another "up note", the "animation team" there to entertain us were excellent, "look out for Allesandrio and Magdelana".

The hotel bar is the focal point of the evening with something laid on nightly as entertainment, this ranged from a superb "flamenco show" to a really awful singer who was hilarious because he was so bad.

We enjoyed our nights in the bar, which were fun and again we enjoyed free drinks from the bar until 11pm.

So there is our review, which we know will reflect accurately what we found on our holiday, unless of course the Chef is replaced and someone more capable replaces him.

Would we go back.......we probably would, but out of season, when the hotel is quiet and without a doubt if the catering improves.

The hotel is probably not ideal for anyone who has mobility problems although there are lifts both in the main area and between pool area and rooms.