“We liked the resort itself but we didn’t like the beds, the unusable heating or the hefty electricity charge”
When reading this review please remember that people will invariably have different opinions about the same thing and we also think the weather you experience colours your opinion. We were lucky, it was sunny most days. If you haven’t been to the Costa del Sol out of season before you need to know that in November when the sun’s shining, between 10am and 4pm it can be lovely and warm, hot even, but pretty cool or even cold in the evenings, at night and first thing in the morning. When we were there it went up to 24C on a couple of days at about 2pm but down to 6C or 7C at night, so you need to pack warm things as well as your bathers!
If you look at the photo of the resort plan we’ve uploaded, we believe that the majority of units in the “garden” phases 1 & 2 of the resort closest to the sea are privately owned so most holidaymakers will stay in the 4 storey “club” timeshare units in phases 3 to 7. The beach and sea is immediately to the right of the block called La Granja. We did a timeshare exchange for a week in November and stayed in a 2 bedroom, 3 bathroom unit on the first floor of Huelva block in phase 5. The roundabout outside the clubhouse and reception is right at the end of the bridge that crosses the main A7 coastal dual carriageway at the Elviria exit. You’ll see from the plan that a road cuts Alanda club into two – it’s a through road that serves all the Elviria urbinizacions between the A7 & the sea, the Don Carlos 5* Hotel & the Marriott Vacation Resort. As a result, the road does get a fair amount of use over 24 hours – if you’re not used to traffic outside your window, you’ll probably be quite aware of it, especially in bedroom 2. A lot of the Costa del Sol is ribbon urbanizacion developments along the A7 so being right at the end of the bridge over the A7 Alanda is well placed for walking 5 minutes down to the sea and 5 minutes over the bridge to Elviria’s Centro Commercial where you’ll find Supersol & Opencor 24/7 supermarkets and as well as a number of restaurants & a bank.
Some reviewers have mentioned the underground parking. There are actually some really good spaces if you’re lucky enough to get them but also a lot of really awkward ones. But there’s a choice of outdoor parking on the far side of the resort just as you come out of the garage as well and we just parked on the road outside with no problems at all.
We were very pleased with the layout of the apartment which was a very good size with balconies front and back, 2 TV’s with a good choice of UK TV channels, DVD player, plus a mini music centre. We probably wouldn’t think about watching TV in the summer but on cold Spanish autumn nights the TV and DVD player were a boon. The apartment also had a very comprehensive kitchen but, unfortunately, as we tend to find in most holiday places, previous guests had not taken care of the non stick pans and management hadn’t renewed them so they were pretty dire and stayed in the cupboard the whole week. The apartments also have a good size safe for which there is no extra charge and pool towels are provided. Towels and sheets are changed twice during a one week stay. Bedroom 1 and the front balcony looked east over the pool while the second bedroom & balcony looked west over the road. We could have had fantastic sun on the front balcony in the morning and fantastic sun on the back balcony in the afternoon but the lush planting is “mature” (ie it’s big), so gives plenty of shade at first floor level. Presumably, the balconies above on floors 2 and 3 would have had full sun – great out of season, but possibly too hot in summer? The pool area design was interesting and the planting was nicely maintained – there were lots of shady spots which would undoubtedly have been welcome relief in the summer but too cool out of season – in autumn and winter you’ll want to stay in the sunny spots. A few hardy souls braved the water but there’s also a small indoor pool if you really want a dip out of season.
The apartments have obviously had a face lift and, if ours was anything to go by, have been nicely painted throughout in pastel tones. But management clearly didn’t replace major fittings. The wooden kitchen units were pretty tired and the coffee coloured bathroom suites were very 1980’s, with taps that had seen better days. Bedroom 1 ensuite had a jacuzzi bath with shower over – the other two bathrooms only had showers. We have to say the excellent water pressure from a huge hot water tank on a utility terrace next to the kitchen gave a really good shower. Bedroom 1 had a super kingsize double bed and a small TV with twin beds and no TV in bedroom 2. We like a firm supportive bed but, unfortunately, these beds were like rock. We slept really badly all week and pressure points at the hip caused lower leg pain. Alanda management should have a look at the beds in the nearby Marriott resort where we stayed a few years ago. Now they’re really good beds.
The weather on the day we arrived was like British winter and we would have liked to have turned on the air conditioning unit to heat the apartment. Unfortunately, when we did so, it sounded like one of those old cross channel hovercrafts taking off. We complained at reception and to be fair, they sent a maintenance man very quickly. With a bit of a grin he shrugged his shoulders and told us the unit was over 20 years old and the noise was quite typical. Basically, in our view it was unusable. We dread to think what is must be like in the full summer heat when you want cooling in the apartment. If we were owners at Alanda club we’d be asking where our maintenance fees were going, and at Alanda they’re not cheap. So, with no usable heating we were particularly displeased with the standard electricity charge of almost €40 for the week payable on checkout. We’ve had to pay electricity elsewhere but it has usually been metered and cost about €10. €40 does seem to be excessive, especially if you can’t use the air-con units. The maintenance fees at our home resort are inclusive of electricity. If yours are too, then like us you’ll be paying for it twice.
Some reviewers have said the in house restaurant isn’t that good. We found it not too bad at all. You can save a bit of money by going for one of the set menus. The €18 menu was pretty reasonable but the 2 more expensive menus at €24 & €29 are probably not worth the extra money. All of the starters and 3 out of 4 desserts are the same as on the €18 menu and 3 of 4 main courses on the €24 menu are fish (2 of which are salmon). A very strange and ill thought out set menu choice we thought. If you haven’t been before, you need to know that it’s not very cheap any more to eat out on the Costa del Sol away from the main tourist places where prices might be kept lower due to plenty of competition. By way of example, you can get very reasonable set menus for under €10 up at Torremolinos or La Carihuela. Some people say that prices rise the closer you get to Marbella, which is a few miles west of Elviria. But if you don’t mind paying a bit extra, one of the best restaurants in the area that is simply called Restaurant Elviria is directly opposite Alanda club. It was superb in 2007 and was superb again in 2011. The club bar had a 2-4-1 happy hour between 6 & 7 but only on limited drinks that did not include cocktails, which meant they lost our custom. We believe there was regular live entertainment in the bar, even out of season, but we appear to have missed that so can’t offer any comments.
This is a nice resort in a very convenient location for local amenities and we’re happy to give it 4 out of 5, but because of the horrible beds and the electricity charge we personally won’t be booking it again.
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC
