Aquila Rithymna Beach

The photos in the hotel are sooo good go to Victoria she will help you a lot and take a very good pics of you

Stayed at the hotel for 10 nights with my husband and x2 girls age 11 and 12 mid August. I will start with the POSITIVES The location of the hotel, on the beach is amazing, the sunsets are out of this world. Sitting with a cocktail at the beach bar, watching the sun go down, was one of our favourite things to do. You definitely need water shoes/rock shoes for the beach/sea otherwise it is really painful on your feet. The food was incredible. The only time you could ever say anything bad about the food is if your a picky eater and junk food is your main diet. I wish I could have passed on my gratitude to the chefs because what they achieve for so many people is astonishing. Lunch at Mournies has to be booked but is a MUST. It was the only part of the hotel we dined at where you order from a menu rather than a buffet. It was like being at a fine dining restaurant 10/10. The hotel grounds are absolutely immaculate and are maintained to a very high standard. The grounds are picture perfect. I will attach a selection to my review. There are 3 pools. The big one where you can join in aqua aerobics etc was fabulous. The cushioned sunloungers are nicely spaced apart and the have a towel policy which is quite effective. The waterpark is very new and so much fun. The girls absolutely loved it. The lifeguards all did a great job to keep everyone safe apart from one with red hair, who blew her whistle for absolutely no reason, strutting around like she owned it. NEGATIVES Well there aren't many......just two but one of them was quite significant for us. The room. We had a family room, it was tiny, worn, outdated and simply needs a full refurbishment. The air con didnt work properly which made the nights quite uncomfortable. I know you may be thinking "Why didnt you ask to move rooms?" but I had already read a lot of the rooms had the same problem and because we arrived at 11pm after travelling all day, I had already fully unpacked and gone to bed before we realised there was a problem. The thought of packing everything up again to be moved to a room very similar didn't appeal to me. The lowest temperature the room went to was 24 degrees, this was when we returned from being out of the room all day. In the night it was much hotter. The floor of the room was always wet, I'm not sure why. It was a real struggle to dry anything I had washed. I have never shared a shower with a tap before. It was so bizarre. If I had to rate the hotel purely for the room it would have to be 2 or 3 stars maximum. I have included photos. The maids were brilliant but as the British saying would go "There's only so much you can polish a turd". The entertainment was very poor for a 5 star hotel. Normally you would see external acts come into the hotel for example acrobatic acts but not here. Everything was very low key. The queuing system for the buffet wasn't great but it didnt bother me too much. Would I recommend this hotel, yes 100% but only if the rooms were renovated.

We recently stayed at Aquila Rithymna Beach and honestly, we didn't miss a thing during our holiday. The hotel has three beautiful pools, and the food was absolutely on point, we were genuinely surprised by how tasty everything was, way above our expectations for a hotel of this size. The only weaker point was the room, which felt a bit old-school and could use a refresh. Also, our room wasn't quite what we had arranged with our travel agency beforehand, though that was partly on us, as we arrived quite late and, traveling with tired small children, we just didn't have the energy to sort it out at the time. On top of that, our room happened to be right above a loading ramp, where delivery trucks came every morning at 5 am, which did wake us up more than once. What we really want to highlight though, is the KriKri kids' club and especially the Czech animators Dory and Oli. They made sure that not just our kids, but we as parents too, will remember this holiday for a long time. Our girls were never bored for a single minute, there was a program every day, and the week wrapped up with a lovely theatre performance. You can tell Dory and Oli genuinely love working with children and they were fantastic, and a huge part of why this trip was so special for our family.

We have never been to Crete before and our first stay did not disappoint! The transfer time on the coach is the only thing (2 hours) wishing it was a bit shorter from the airport, but if we had taken a private one, it would have been much less (40 mins). However, we travelled through the night and so it didn't bother us too much. The first impressions of this hotel were great. Everywhere was spotless, the reception quite grand, staff friendly and informative. We had a ground floor family room (511) which looked out straight onto a pool and the beach. The air con was very good and the room a good size. We were All Inclusive Premium and so we had a mini bar which was restocked every day. The beds and towels changed every day and room cleaned. I didn't notice any noise from other rooms to be honest, the sliding doors were good and did keep the noise down when the hotel next door had music on. There are a few different pools, the largest family one was quite lively and think they had games and entertainment sometimes but we only used this once. There is a restaurant next to it for drinks and light meals in the afternoon, the food was really good. The pool by us also had a snack bar, the ice cream from here was really nice! The water park is brilliant, just the right size, not too big or too small, with a good amount of slides and something for everyone. There is a bar with drinks and pizzas available. Again, this area was so clean all of the time, immaculate. We used the spa for treatments, we were both pleased with how good they were, although we didn't use the facilities they looked amazing. The main buffet restaurant always had such good food, lots of choice and changed daily so it didn't feel repetitive. The Italian restaurant next door was lovely, beautiful views onto the garden and the sea. The main lady manager here was excellent, I wish I had gotten her name. Pretty much all the staff at all the restaurants were amazing and always very helpful. Mournies restaurant was fabulous, we went on the BBQ night and the fish night, the food was superb. You do have to book. We were able to go twice as there was no availability for the other al la carte restaurant, which was disappointing but at least we could go here instead. We loved the beach bar and the cocktails were great. There is a nice bar in reception and another by the shops although we didn't use this one. On site shop has pretty much everything and the prices are reasonable. Water sports on the beach were good. Lots of loungers available on the beach. I brought beach/swim shoes for us which we were really glad of, as it is quite rocky and it made getting into the sea so much easier! Beach is sandy and pebbly as you get nearer the water. All in all, we loved our week at the hotel and we weren't ready to come home. I would definitely recommend! Especially All inclusive; it was worth every penny. I just wish I had taken more photos...

hi everyone! i want to recommend this wonferful hotel and its great personnel and team. everything is pleasant, cosy and relaxful. six pools, amazing water park, great animation team etc. we had this vacation with my wife and two daughters age 4 and 7 and it was perfect. thanks a lot for everything, we had much fun Tamir