My wife and I visited the Portofino Complex in Margarita for our honeymoon. It was indeed a very romantic and scenic resort. The outdoor areas were beautiful and there was access to a public beach contiguous to the hotel. It was romantic. Unfortunately that is where the accolades end.

Bad Food
The food was horrible. Good food is what I have normally come to expect in Margarita resorts. Not at Portofino. The food was tasteless and bland. I believe that the chefs deserve an award for their special ability to make anything taste bad. Would you believe they even made water melon and popcorn taste bad? Our only consolation is that there are starving children in Margarita who would give anything for that food. For people who have tasted good food in their lives, you will be disappointed in Portofino.

Poor Hygiene
In addition to the bad food, the hygiene in the restaurants was horrendous. The restaurant areas were littered with flies. We have pictures of flies on the vegetables, fruits and desserts. There were stray dogs in the kitchen. We even have a picture of some of the guests feeding these dogs in the restaurant. This is not what I expected from an all-inclusive resort.

The water in the faucets reeked. It was an ordeal to even brush our teeth. We had to smuggle water into our rooms from the bars and restaurants. Do not drink water from the faucets!

Poor Service
On the third day of our stay, my wife developed food poisoning. We’re still not sure what exactly caused it because anything could have. The staff promised that they would send a doctor to the room. We never really believed them, and not surprisingly no doctor came. This was not at all atypical of the service that we received.

On the first night, we noticed that there was no hot water in the shower and the water was freezing. Needless to say we did not make love that night. We called the front desk and guest services at least 10 times. They kept promising to send someone from maintenance. Again they never came. It was only when we were lucky enough to meet the manager personally, that he arranged for maintenance to fix the problem.

Recommendations
If you plan to visit Portofino, we have a few helpful suggestions to make your stay a more pleasant one than ours.
1) Learn to speak Spanish or bring with you some translation software or gadget. The hotel staff does not speak English, perhaps because most of the guests of the hotel seem to be from Latin American countries. Even the entertainment and shows are in Spanish.
2) Beware of pickpockets. On one occasion we had a fellow hotel guest follow us back to our building. We suspected that he was trying to pick our pockets or something like that. We suspect he was one of the local guests.
3) Bring your own shampoo and conditioner, since only soap is provided in the rooms – “solo jabon”.
4) Bring insect repellent or a bug spray, since there were mosquitos in the room. Luckily this only bothered us for one night since I was skilful enough to kill all of them. There were also mosquitos in other parts of the complex including the lobby.
5) Please bring a mop with you, or at least be very careful how you walk on the floor in your room. Condensation appears in the room overnight. I’m not sure how, perhaps dew. Keeping the AC on should help dry up that condensation. Just be careful!
6) If you can, use the stairs as much as possible. The elevators are old, dilapidated and unreliable. We found it a spiritual experience traveling in those lifts because we were always praying not to get stuck in them. On three occasions God did not answer those prayers – however we got out.

After several bad online reviews we threw caution into the wind, and went anyway. the distance from the airport was about 30-45mins, a cool drive which lets you see the island, but it seems long when you are leaving to go shopping. The Hotel is beautiful with its own private beach, several pools with activities for adults and kids, fun nightly entertainment. the rooms where simple and where cleaned everyday. Only problem we had was the elevators were'nt working when we got there but was repaired next day. helpful staff and good food, all in all we had great time

We stayed at Portofino Aug 15-19 2010and made an excellant choice.I consider myself very particular when it comes to room cleanliness and at this hotel I was impressed.The food was good,wide variety though we were english speaking and had a bit of problems finding out what certain dishes were.I suggest that the restaurant put labels as to what dishes they are serving in english.We would sometimes meet a guy in the restaurant whom would tell us what is what but that area is so busy it's hard to find him 3 times a day.As for persons who like shopping,from the hotel a taxi cab cost 90,000.00 bs for the whole car which is pretty good as we got 7000 bs to $1 usd.One must also visit the waterpark,15 mins away from the hotel by taxi cab costing 40,000 bs and $98,000 bs for entry.All in all the hotel was wonderful and will be visiting very soon again.Thanks to the wonderful people at the hotel.Hats off for a great stay.

Well i like the nature! I Like to walk on the beach ! Every morning 530 ,i saw the sunrising. and i was not alone, i walk whit four nice dogs, They dont smell ,they were not
sick og hungry,i think the hotel feed them! I felt like they think,wee schall take care of
this women.. So pleace take good care of my animals freinds ,they er beautyfull.
In the morning you meet at lot of singing birds , and the pelikans is fiching ind the sea.
and the lizzarts try to get he first sunligt to warm there body up! i i think paradise would be like this place..
around 8 i go to one of the the nice reaturant ,to eat breakfirst. And there i a lot of food.
eggs ,bacon , chikken bread jam. fruit and i could go on and on and on.
Tre times evry day,you can eat her, and betwin the dinnertime,you can go to the snackbar
and have a snack... You will newer need to be hungri here!
And now the Bar s.
I love Max bar,becauce the peopel who work there ,was soo nice..
thank you Hector ,peter,and wilmer! You make mee feel like a diva!
but i got good service in all of the bars. Yes you dont have to walk long,to get something
to drik.. And it is all free!
there is severel big pools..
and if you like to work out or learn to dance or surfe, you just sign in at the instuktor!

and if you like marked shopping, you can buy pearls ,dresses,souviners, ect.at the beach.,for neerly no money!
At the hotel there is a tour guide ,,who will help you to arang. trips , I was swimming ,whit the delfins!!
I would like to go back here every year !
thankyou fore a wonderfull time