Сказочно-волшебный отдых в прекрасном отеле. Fantastically magical stay in a beautiful hotel.

Travel time: 18.08. 2012 - 01.09. 2012, traveled with my wife. We write joint impressions.

The review is intended both for those who have already been in Egypt and for those who travel to this hotel and country for the first time. All comparisons will be based on a previous trip to the Swiss Inn Dreams Resort (Taba region). We are not whimsical people and do not complain, we just express our opinion about the hotel, resort, region and country as a whole. I took a lot of photos, I can't put them all here. Therefore, if anyone wants, I will be happy to send additional photos to e-mail, or I will put them here as a separate photo album. For convenience, I divided the entire review into “sections”. Everything I write about here, you can see in the pictures taken. So...

HOTEL SELECTION.

We didn't actually go to this hotel as it was very expensive.

But they really wanted to go to it, because: it was built in 2011, so it will not be shabby and will be well-groomed; cleanliness and good design of the rooms were important for the wife; for me, the presence of fish and coral reefs (plus a sandy entrance to the sea) was very important, and here it’s not just fish, but the Abu Dabab reserve; remoteness from the airport, which in itself reduces the risk of meeting with the "tagil".
Every day we looked on the Internet for prices for the hotels we were interested in, and there was a good discount for the Hilton, so we went.

TOUR OPERATOR PEGAS AND HIS REPRESENTATIVE AT THE HOTEL.

This year we again flew from Pegasus, as I repeat, the price was good. Representatives of Pegasus meeting and seeing off at the airport are all standard. We were met, put into a bus, taken to the hotel, and taken back in the same way. Drivers, as always in Egypt, drive fast and carelessly and dangerously.
We read a lot in reviews about representatives in hotels from Pegasus and were always horrified, and we ourselves got the same “frame” last time. BUT! This time we were very pleasantly surprised. Representative Pavel (Russian) turned out to be a very good, understanding, responsive employee. He treated tourists like a human being, did not sell trips, but on the contrary, told where it is better to go if we want. If he could help, he helped in our questions, always responded to our requests and was at the hotel every day.

HOTEL STAFF (except waiters and bartenders) + ACCOMMODATION.

The hotel has a Russian-speaking administrator Maria. We read that you can contact her for any questions. So it is, they addressed with all questions, but they could not always find her at the hotel. For example, the wife was bitten by ants and her legs were a little swollen from this, to which Maria said that this had not happened to her, but if necessary, you can open insurance and call a doctor.

We complained about the work of the waiters - also did not give any result. There is a printer near two computers with free internet, which first ran out of toner in the cartridge. They asked to fix the problem. After 8-9 days they just did it. Paper ran out the same day. They asked to put paper - and did not wait. On the other hand, as soon as they settled in the room, they asked us to send an electrician and fix the air conditioner (it worked according to an incomprehensible principle); they changed the cream in the standard coffee set, and some other little things, I don’t remember exactly what. All these requests were fulfilled on the first day.
We were settled in room 2507. We did not give any additional payments, we just filled out a questionnaire and we were taken to the room. They did not notice that only Russians lived in our building. On the contrary, the Germans were nearby.
The reception staff are always very friendly and helpful. Any requests in English are answered.
Asked for a set of needles and threads - please. My wife and I had a wedding anniversary, I wanted to congratulate and asked if it was possible to somehow decorate the room and turned to the reception. Barbara deals with such issues there. She said that there is no problem, it will all be free and they will decorate the room. Plus, they gave me a cake with an inscription. One evening, purely by accident, I lost the cover of the camera. Went to reception the next morning. They said they didn't find anything of the kind, called the chief cleaners, told him something in Arabic and asked me to come over after dinner. I come - I found a lid (it was very nice). Upon check-in and check-out, you and your belongings will be taken by electric car. We left at night and an employee came to us to wake us up and pick up our things. Do not be afraid to give, they do not steal here and everything will be delivered to the address.
The hotel has a machine for wrapping bags with film, but it is not known whether there will be film.

ROOM.


The room is simply gorgeous, there is nothing more to say. Everything is in perfect condition, not beaten, not broken, not scratched. The design of the room is simply luxurious. We had a room with a sea view, but the sea itself is not visible, but only a fence, behind which there are sands and even then the sea. But we did not change, as it is better than looking at the pool. The room has a plasma TV, 3 Russian channels, and there is a USB-input for a flash drive, where we watched the pictures taken in the evenings, and you can also watch video files. The wife still cannot calm down, what excellent mattresses there were. Soft, pleasant, sleep very well. The room has: safe, tea / coffee set with cream, sugar (even brown), kettle, hair dryer, scales. The bathroom has a set consisting of body gel, shampoo, lotion and balm. Gel and shampoo only for men - for women the smell will be sharp.
They change all this beauty every time you use something. Cleaning every day, with the change of towels. Linen was also changed periodically. Towels are white and not washed. The distance to the restaurant is not far. To the sea, if you walk without a train, 12-15 minutes to the entrance to the sea, and 7-10 minutes to the beach, in a calm, measured pace. At first, we woke up very early in order to have time to look at the fish, until the water was rocked. But the train only runs from 8 o'clock, and we went to the beach a couple of times - we were tormented (we swam a lot in the water, and therefore our legs got tired quickly). They didn’t do it anymore, so that rest would bring pleasure and not be work.

CLIMATE, WEATHER, IMPRESSIONS FROM THE REGION OF HURGHADA.

In general, I didn't like it very much. The region itself is clearly worse in comparison with Sharm. More dirt, rubbish, rubbish and sloppiness. Excuse my French, but you can guess what is floating in the toilet in the airport.
The toilet itself is terrible and scary. Better be patient. Customs officers are also arrogant, climbing to women, regardless of whether they themselves or not. The same applies to some hotel employees who only dream of getting a “kiss”.
All the time of rest it was warm, hot, in the shade 33-36, the water was about 26-28. But to endure this heat is much more difficult than in Taba. It is very stuffy, you sweat, you drink a lot of water, despite the fact that the wind is constantly blowing (which sometimes even interfered). It is impossible to sunbathe, it is very hot, you always want to go into the water. Humidity is greater than in Sharm.

The sea is extremely salty. Very very salty. This has never happened in Taba. In the morning it eats away at the eyes and it is very difficult to breathe through the tube when snorkeling. Lips were constantly swollen, because of the salt. But at the same time, the healing properties of water are also worse. Verified. With my psoriasis, after taba, there were no problems for a whole year. And this year, psoriasis appeared 3 months after the rest.

ANIMATION, HOTEL CONTINGENT.
Animation is, and not counting the Russian-speaking girl - excellent. Only this girl, whom we don’t even know her name, didn’t approach anyone, didn’t communicate with anyone, didn’t even translate into Russian at competitions, I had to communicate with a French animator. But the rest of the animators are great! They work smartly, and amuse people and frolic themselves, and they know how to get the audience, and hold contests, and fool around. And the kids love them! They are really very good with children, it would not be scary to leave a child. Evening animation: Very often "artists" come who perform classical belly dances and men's dances with twirling skirts (this dance has already specifically nailed us =) ); in the evening, wild African dances are dancing on the beach near the bar. The animators also hold karaoke evenings, evenings with guessing music from films, the Miss Hilton beauty contest, etc.
The entire schedule of activities of the animators is located near the steps that lead to the restaurant.
In the morning, animators conduct water aerobics, step aerobics, water polo, exercises, belly dance, yoga on the beach, bochu, volleyball, etc.
The public in the hotel is different. 80% Italians, and periodically this figure changed to the French and Poles. 10% Russians. 10% Germans and the rest. Italians scream and talk terribly loudly. Very noisy, feel like home.

PURCHASES.

The hotel has shops, but everything is standard there: souvenirs, papyri, perfumes with oils, paint pictures. There is a shop with "hot items" such as cigarettes, water with juices, souvenirs, sunscreen/sun creams, fins with masks. Let's say right away that it is better to buy masks with fins there, as they are cheaper than in Ukraine. For example, we bargained for two pairs of flippers for $35 (I wanted $50). One pair broke on the 10th day, they changed it without any problems.

If it is normal to communicate with the owner of the shop and only with him, and not with the sellers. For example, the seller sold me two packs of cigarettes for $ 2 more than the owner. Naturally, the next day I went up to the owner, and he changed my cigarettes. I bought an underwater camera case at home, paid $30. In this store, such a cover is about 12-18 dollars, plus you can bargain. Do not be afraid to take any cover of any company, there is no difference, I myself was convinced. Cigarettes from more or less normal brands (Marlboro, Davidof, Lucky Strike) cost from $5 and up. We ran out of cigarettes, had to buy. By the way, at the airport no one looks at the suitcases and examines them in detail, there the customs officers only dream that the entire plane of tourists has already left as soon as possible. So you can safely take 3-4 blocks of cigarettes, just divide them into packs and shove them between things (hide them inside things). There will be no problems.
So.
Do not buy cigarettes from this store. Egyptian cigarettes are bad, very strong and bitter. For example here he wanted $50 for Malloro Gold block. BUT! On the beach of Abu Dabab, and the Solymar Hotel (Sol Y mar Abu Dabbab), which is located next door and can be seen from the Hilton beach, and so there the same block of cigarettes is sold for 30-35 dollars. In the Solymar hotel itself, they bought a block of cigarettes and several magnets, so the seller gave us 5 small magnets for free. As for clothes/clothes/bags/purses, everything is of terrible Chinese quality on the beach and in the Solymar hotel. In the Hilton, in the souvenir shop, they also bargain well, normally discount prices for magnets / lighters and so on. But I beg you, do not buy anything in Egypt, except for magnets. Just save your joyful emotions, which can deteriorate after a certain time. In the taba I bought myself a bracelet (moreover, directly from the seller from my hand) and a ring, supposedly silver.
A year later, how many peeled off and became covered with such nonsense, as if he had been doused with acid. The bracelet fell apart, I am now sure that it is made of simple steel. It's the same this year. We bought lighters for relatives and ourselves. None of them work, all are broken. The photo frame is only good, with turtles, and probably didn’t crumble due to the fact that I don’t use it, it still lies on the table; )

BUT! There is a guy in the Hilton who sells leather bags of excellent quality and design. Genuine leather, not leatherette, you can see immediately. I bought my wife there for $ 35 a very, very beautiful handbag. The seller is trading weakly, but I don’t feel sorry for him, he really has very high-quality things. If you see a good thing from him, try to buy right away, as people can buy earlier (it happened to us with the first handbag). The hotel has an ATM, but it works with very occasional success. The airport also refused to change the currency.

In Solymar, there was also no exchanger at the reception. So we passed with dollars.

NUTRITION.

The food at the Hilton is excellent! Simply beyond praise. There is everything and a lot of everything. For breakfast they make: eggs (omelet, boiled, fried, scrabbled eggs); a bunch of salads and cutting vegetables; sausage, which by the way is very tasty (which is rare for Egypt in general); buns with bread; portioned oils / honey / jam, there is portioned processed cheese “cow” (very tasty); toaster for toast bread; thick pancakes are fried, which can be poured with sweet sauces and chocolate.
For lunch + dinner: 2 types of soup (as always in Egypt, it's just a sip, no more); a separate workshop where 2 types of pasta are prepared and for them you yourself choose one of 3-4 types of sauce, and if you want, you can choose an additive to the sauce (chopped pepper / sausage / onion, etc. ), everything that you chose with you immediately fried in a pan and spread on a plate.
They make panini: they put sausage / tomato / cheese of your choice in a bun and press it to a special grill. Constantly a lot of meat, chicken, something new every day and the menu starts to repeat itself for 10 days. They make themed dinners. For example, in the Chinese evening there was even sushi, but we did not eat. A huge range of dishes is always difficult to explain and describe, you have to go and enjoy the taste of their cuisine.
The most important thing is seafood. I was just shocked at how tasty squid, octopus, crabs and other marine life are cooked there. The only pity is that 2 times there was an evening with seafood. But believe me, it is so deliciously prepared that only because of the seafood you can safely choose this hotel. Although before, I never paid attention to the assortment of the restaurant.
And further. Packaged juices. I have never drunk such delicious juices in my life either in Ukraine, or in Slovakia, or in Hungary, or in Germany.

CRAZY delicious mango juice. I just drank it there all the time. There is also guava, orange and apple (also very tasty) and some other, but they are all very sweet. Like nectar.
I didn't really like the pastry. 90% everything based on honey, which I don't like. Very reminiscent of Turkish sweets, but still you can choose delicious treats. But there are practically no cakes with cream.
In the restaurant, we collected huge plates, and many people looked at us like dinosaurs. It's just that no one knew that we would feed the 4 cats that are there =) they were constantly fed in the evening, no one told us anything. And some vacationers even joined the process.
We didn’t go to a la carte restaurants, because: 1 - the menu of the main restaurant was enough; 2 - those dishes that were on the a la carte menu sooner or later ended up on the menu of the main restaurant.

WAITER AND BARTENDERS.

Well, here it is, the only negative of the hotel.
I repeat, we are not picky and capricious people, but the waiters really do a lousy job. With bartenders for a couple. I won’t write for a long time, but it has already been noticed that this is a typical situation for Egypt: you have to wait a long time for drinks if you order through a waiter; tables on the street are not served with anything at all (after our long demands and even sometimes indignation, on the 11th day they explained that they did not do this because the wind was outside); we constantly sat on the street and almost always I took salt and pepper in a restaurant, since waiters rarely go out into the street. What is most annoying is that they treat Europeans in a completely different way, they are always glad to see them and smile and serve them faster, they generally creep like Italians with Poles. At the bars, the system is generally incomprehensible, they do not know what a queue is, they serve whoever they want.
Cocktails are a mess too. What bartenders wants and does.
They don't always have a cocktail menu, and if they do, they either don't have the ingredients or they'll make a cocktail anyway.

With the arrangement of people on the tables is also nonsense. At the entrance to the restaurant, people stop, and each time there are specially 1-2 people who seat people at the tables. This process generally turned into nonsense. The “hostest”, as he sees people, his eyes widen, filled with horror, and in confusion he begins to look for a free table, of which at the moment there are always at least 20. And as a result, near the entrance to the restaurant there is a queue of people who could quite successfully and choose your own table.
In general, there is room for improvement in this direction.

SEA, REEF, ABU DABBAB.

The main plus is why we went here. The fauna of the underwater world is simply magnificent. There are a lot of fish both in number and variety. Everything is so beautiful, you get into a fairy tale.
Be sure to buy fins, because the further you swim, the more beautiful everything will be. I strongly recommend fins, I used to swim 1-1.3 kilometers from the entrance to the sea along the line of the beach, past an abandoned boat and to an old building, and even further. You can swim near the shore without fins, this is also not a problem, as soon as you enter the sea and immediately there are fish. BUT! With this option, the corals themselves are not so beautiful. And the further you swim, there are just coral gardens, you swim straight and you can see all the beauty of the underwater world, which has been created for millions of years. And yet, the closer to the shore, the more groups of tourists who swim in groups and will definitely hit / hit / prick you with flippers. This is very annoying, so it’s good to swim until 11 am, then the water is not so muddy and there are no tourists.
Advice. Before departure, at home, deal with the mask so that it does not sweat with you.
What I just didn’t do, and spit on her, and dried, and soaked with cola, and washed with soap - nothing helped. She was constantly sweating, because of this, all the pleasure was lost.

The reef near the Solymar hotel is also very good and only there is Nemo fish (clown fish, it seems). Plus, all divers swim there to see the dugong (sea cow). I also tried a couple of times, but it did not work because: 1 - to see a dugon, this is very, even extremely rare; 2 - it is located at a depth, and you need to swim in special equipment; 3 - near the solimar, TERRIBLE waves are constantly. Even in calm weather, it is very seasick and blows to the reef, so be careful and vigilant, especially when it is windy and restless in the sea (I don’t even recommend swimming near Solimar at all in such weather).
Turtles. Before you go to the hotel, do as I did: study the map on the wikimapia website (here is the link if the moderators do not delete it http://wikimapia. org/#lat=25. 3368871&lon=34.7383393&z=18&l=0&m=b&search=MARSA%20ALAM %20NUBIAN%20RESORT ).
Here, clearly and specifically, some kind person painted where there are fish and what kind. Everything is 100% true. In general, in order to see the turtles, you need to walk along the sand of the beach to the white flag of the diving center, go into the water and swim forward, to the depth, while constantly deviating slightly to the right. Guaranteed to see turtles, they are at the bottom all the time. Do not touch them, they can swim away from you and generally get scared. Watch each for 10 minutes, and see how it floats up to take in air. The spectacle is indescribable. If they like you, they will swim next to you, spin around you. It happened to us from time to time. The biggest one is Masha Turtle. That's what they called it, and they're really huge. They are all insanely beautiful!
Low tide. For the first time I saw the ebb and I can say the following.
From the point of view of aesthetics, this is bad, since it is not very beautiful to see coral bare from above, plus, as I understand it, it dies from above when water does not protect it from the sun. BUT! In terms of snorkeling, this is everyone's dream! Why? Because at low tide, all the depth at which only divers dive becomes available to you. Much more corals become visible and you can even dive to them. Sometimes, at low tide, there was even an impression that you were on a radically different reef. Therefore, I strongly recommend swimming with fish at low tide, this is the best time.
I photographed on a simple Casio Exilim Z60 soap dish, through a water case. Advice. It is best to take pictures in the water when the sun is behind you (as well as simple pictures). Then much better, cleaner, brighter and richer photos are obtained. That time is after lunch.

And before lunch, in order to take a good photo, you need to turn around a little back or 90 degrees as you swim, and then take a picture.

Also, in addition to photos, I will add a video of the underwater world.

Sorry for such a long review, but I wanted to tell you as much as possible about this wonderful place to stay. I recommend it to those who love peace, tranquility and beauty.