SOL by Meliá Pelícanos Ocas

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1000/5 – An Absolutely Wonderful Holiday!

This was my first time ever going abroad and my first time visiting Benidorm, and I honestly couldn’t have asked for a better experience. My stay at Sol Pelícanos Ocas was exceptional and absolutely wonderful from start to finish.

The whole team were fantastic. Every member of staff was so friendly, welcoming and willing to answer any questions we had. You could really see the effort they put into making sure everyone had a brilliant holiday, which put both me and my family member completely at ease throughout our stay.

The hotel itself was lovely, with exceptionally high cleaning standards. Everything was kept clean and well looked after, which made such a difference to our stay.

The food was extremely good, and there was plenty to enjoy. The pool area was absolutely amazing and was one of our favourite parts of the hotel.

The entertainment was also amazing! There really is something for everyone, with plenty to keep guests entertained and make the evenings enjoyable.

The location is ideal too, making it easy to enjoy everything Benidorm has to offer. As someone visiting Benidorm and travelling abroad for the very first time, I absolutely loved the atmosphere and the whole experience.

We enjoyed ourselves so much that we are already looking at coming back again! I would 100% recommend Sol Pelícanos Ocas to anyone looking for a fantastic holiday.

Thank you to the whole team for making our first holiday abroad so incredibly special. ❤️🌴☀️

Piscina

Black mould covering air con unit ,never seen anything like it

We are just back from a weeks family holiday.
Honestly you could not pay me to go back. We went 11 years ago pre children and there has obviously been no money spent on it.
Positive points:
Staff are lovely and cant do enough for you and wow do they work. Entertainemnt team were especially good.
Very central to everything.

Negative Points:
As everyone has mentioned the lift situation is disgusting. We were on the 11th floor and only had access to 2 out of the 5 lifts, the other 3 were constantly broken. We saw families trying to get down 13 floors with buggies and wheelchairs struggling to get anywhere. When you were lucky enough you were met with the spanish saying only 3 people could go in at a time when it was designed for 7 people. It was very aggressive and on one instant my daughter got so upset with the way some people reacted she wouldnt get in from being scared. It got to the stage once we came down from our room we didnt want to go back up as we were put off by the fighting and waiting.

The turntable door into the hotel was also broken so everyone was having to go in and out of the emergency access.

Food was cheap cuts and repetitive. My children and I struggled to find stuff to eat - ive never eaten so much tuna and salad in one week. In addition the allocation of tables was aggressive and un-organised. On one instance I was given a table and then 4 spanish men had a go at me saying that I had taken their table it was very intimidating until my husband turned up. For the record I hadn't. Coness need to be given or something so the servers know the table that are being used

Pool was unsafe for children. The sides were round and provided no grip. I am 5.6 and couldn't stand so how are children meant to? Life guard on "watch" but he is sat behind the sun loungers and cant see what is going on. On one instance we are convinced the life guard was asleep......

Children play area. Very small and again no money put into it. During the day it is fine but come night time there is no lighting. There are trees around it, lights could be twisted around it it to light it up. My two girls met two friend and by the end of the week they had all fallen and hurt themselves. The play park is in the dark surely this is health and safety???

Electrics: the plugs in our room were coming out the wall everytime we removed the adaptors. My husband found wires hanging out the wall in the men's toilets. Everything is falling off and exposed...

Bedrooms. We booked for 2 adults and 2 children (7&9) and arrived to a double and single bed??? We had to ask for a second bed for the second child
The room was pokey and the wood above the wardrobe was falling off
Toilet paper was never topped up we had to request for it to be done
Plasterboard was falling off all over the place, it actually looked like someone had hit the wall outside our door.

Women toilets. In one of the toilets there is a washing machine and tumble dryer. So you come out of the toilet cubicle and meet a bloke doing his washing.....

Every meal time you are accosted by staff wanting to know if you are having a nice holiday. What feedback you have etc. I get they are trying to show they are interested but every meal time?? We are having family time wait till we leave and send a survey but let's be honest they aren't really bothered anyway.

It feels like thet are still living off the kudos of having Benidorm filmed there and feel that is enough but it is not!

If you are a hen or stag party it is probably perfect as its somewhere to just rest your head but I wouldn't recommend for families.

Nada

LA PISCINA

Las piscinas

We’ve just returned from a week here, a holiday is what you make of it and we were a large group so made it a great time.
However if I was to solely base it off the hotel I wouldn’t recommend.
Positives: food we found okay, always found something to eat but it was repetitive. Main pool is nice and some activities throughout the day. Room was a decent size and had everything you need.
Negatives: same as other reviews - the lifts are really horrendous, we were put on the 13th floor with a pram and spent a lot of our holiday waiting for lifts, they really are ridiculous and should be sorted. We found quite a few of the staff to be rude, it would appear they are much friendlier with Spanish guests over any English guests. A simple smile, hello and thank you really aren’t much to ask. The pool area is extremely slippy and broken tiles, we saw multiple adults and children slip whilst there. Really don’t like the token/cup situation, if you are all including I don’t see why you need to carry tokens or cups around with you all the time.
All in all we had a good holiday as we made our own fun, tried to be positive, and visited places outside of the hotel. However I wouldn’t recommend this hotel to any of my friends and I definitely wouldn’t choose to return. I think there are nicer/better hotels nearby so similar or cheaper prices. As a large family we paid quite a lot for our stay and don’t feel it was value for money with this hotel and service. It needs renovation and updating as well as an overall of the service provided.

really dislike leaving negative reviews, but this hotel needs to be highlighted for what it is really like.

Check-in takes an age, and there is little to no air conditioning throughout much of the hotel.

The rooms are very basic and are in serious need of renovation. Even getting to your room can be a challenge, as the lifts are incredibly slow. You can press the button and genuinely wonder whether the lift will arrive in the next 14 days!

The food in the restaurant is another major disappointment. There is very little variety throughout the stay. I do love a good beef goulash, but having it twice a day for four days suggests either extremely poor menu planning or very strict menu control from management.

There are, however, some positives. The hospitality staff around the pool and in the restaurant are fantastic. They are friendly, approachable and always happy to help, and they are easily the best part of the hotel.

The pool itself is a good size and there are plenty of sun loungers, but even this area is in need of investment. There are numerous broken tiles, both in the pool and on the surrounding floor, which really lets the area down.

This hotel desperately needs to move on from the reputation it gained from Benidorm being filmed there. The building and facilities are now in need of serious renovation and investment, and sadly, judging by the current state of the hotel, I can’t see that happening anytime soon.

If you’re considering staying here, I would strongly recommend looking at the Ambassador Playa around the corner instead. It has recently been refurbished and looks 100 times more modern. It shows exactly what can be achieved when money is invested into a hotel and improving the guest experience.

Overall, the friendly hospitality staff are a real credit to the hotel, but unfortunately they cannot make up for the outdated rooms, poor food, painfully slow lifts and general lack of investment. For me, there are much better options in the area.

Las instalaciones

When we arrived no one told us where to go or where we are staying.
The staff are extremely rude if you are English. Throw drinks at you at the bar, completely ignore you if possible. When a Spanish family come up they are lovely to them but treat you like rubbish.
No lifts work except one in the whole hotel (11 floors) I waited 20 minutes for a lift with a buggy.
The whole place stinks of the drains. You want to relax by the pool? It will be ruined by the constant smell of poo.
The restaurants are very chaotic. We got down at 10 with two children to be welcomed to all the hot food being taken away. Very disappointing.
We paid £7000!!!! For this holiday all inclusive and it was the worst holiday we have EVER been on due to this hotel.
The entertainment was good I suppose if you like rude staff and smelling poo!!!
If management read this please give extra training to the old miserable lady in the in and out bar with red highlights in her hair and the even worse miserable teenager with glasses and dark hair you have behind the bar in the Terrance. Extremely rude individuals. If you don't like tourists do not work in a hotel. Will not be returning and telling everyone to steer clear of this hole.

Location is in the heart of everything. An indoor market next to the hotel and a massive outdoor market 10 min walk away on a Wednesday & Sunday - worth visiting.
The hotel is huge and lifts can be a lengthy wait we were on the 10th floor in the Ocas side and often have one out of service. Rooms are spacious clean and all what you need however, no kettle but a few to hire. The mini fridge is satisfactory and better than none but not the coldest. The value for money overall was acceptable but frustratingly the hotel staff couldn’t even provide is with a bottle of water on out 03;45am departure despite asking day before for a breakfast pack as we had paid for breakfast but the early pick up didn’t allow us access to normal breakfast due to the very early pick up for our flight.
The entertainment in the day by the pool was limited and repetitive and the swim up bar don’t open til 12 midday and carrying cash or a phone to pay isn’t the best in water - this day in age you think you could have a tap wrist band system and pay daily or on departing.

We had a good time at the Sol Pelicanos, everything was pretty much inline with what I'd expect form a 3 star hotel.
Check-in - There was a relatively large queue at check-in, but we noticed a QR code on the wall for online check-in, so I used this, easy to fill in, basically names and passport details for all members of your group - This informed us our room wasn't ready yet, but we were then able to go to the empty on-line check in queue and get our wrist bands and dump our bags in the luggage storage rooms - Room was available at 4pm as per hotel advertised check in time.

We stayed half-board, we asked how much for our room (2 adults, 2 children) to upgrade to AI would be and was quoted 935 euros! even the staff member said that was unusually expensive, but it fluctuated on hotel capacity etc.. we declined!

Food - Breakfast, get down early if you don't want to queue - anytime after 9am, you'll be waiting. We got down before or around 9 every day and had no issues.
Breads, fruits, meats, cheeses, cereal, cooked breakfasts, tea coffee and juices. Standard 3 star stuff.

Dinner - We only snacked during the day, so were generally at dinner for opening time at 7pm, so no queue and full selections available, we could see queues developed later on.
Food selection in my opinion was great and inline with a 3 star hotel, plenty of choice and different daily specials. Particularly enjoyed the beef cheeks, and lamb stews.

Drink prices - 4 euro for a large beer, 2.65 for a small beer, house spirit and mixer was about 6.50, coffee 1.95 euro, soft drinks similar (these are approximate, beer was definitely 4 euro though) We had a few things from the poolside snack bar, chips, burgers etc.. all reasonably priced and ok.

When we were there, I'd say the hotel was 60-70% Spanish holidaymakers, the rest English with a sprinkling of French.
Entertainment was spoken in English & Spanish.

Kids club, My 10 year old only went for the last day, to be part of the talent contest, she was one of only 2 English kids who went that day and from the looks of things over the week, there were no or very few English children in the clubs.

Pool funs - Water carpet, Aqua aerobics, Water volleyball, Water Polo, all great fun for the adults, with the volleyball and polo being the highlight of my day!

Areas around the pool can be slippy, particularly the tiles around the tress, take caution, make sur your kids don't run.

If you want to be a muppet and a mug, queueing up for beds in the morning, that's your problem, we never had an issue finding a bed or two after breakfast or later in the day. They do remove towels, we saw it daily, if the beds are left unoccupied for too long.

My Daughter had a 24hr sickness bug while there, she couldn't keep anything down during that time, its difficult not to think it was something she ate as it struck straight after dinner and we hadn't left the resort at all.

We were in the Ocas and one of two lifts was broken for two or three days, which did cause issues, we were on the top floor! I took to walking the steps, but this is not possible for those with buggies, young children and walking difficulties, as such huge queues and delays did form at the lifts at certain times of the day.
They tried to fix immediately, but it needed a part, which took a day or so to be sourced.

Check out was a simple case of handing back key cards. We were being collected early, so booked in for an early breakfast, which was limited to breads, cereals, small selection of cheese and salami & some breakfast cakes, tea, coffee juices etc...

All in all, we enjoyed the stay here, great pool and the staff were and entertainment crew were great - it really does help if you try to speak a few words and phrases of Spanish.
Beach 5 minute walk away, strip starts a few minutes away.

Nada