Baia Hotels Lara 5*

Katrina Latyshava

· 6 July 2018

I should say 'thank you' from the whole of our family as we had a lovely stay in BaiaLara from the 22nd of June till the 3rd of July. We really felt like home. My husband stayed in 13+ hotels in Turkey, all of them being 5+ stars, while for me it was the 2nd time only and still we both came to the conclusion that it was the best stay ever in Turkey.

What can I say about the hotel? The whole of the territory was clean and tidy. There were quite a few swimming-pools to choose from, which was very nice. The food was quite good, my favourite being lamb and beef though. I was happy to see okra on the menu, but it would have tasted better in some curry with minced lamb, not just okra in butter ) By the way, lots of interpretation into Russia was not true to life I would say as 'Okra in butter' is not 'Масляная окраска'. It is ' Окра с маслом' or ' Дамские пальчики в масле' as the 2nd name for okra is 'Ladies fingers'. Sometimes beef was interpreted as turkey (in Russian). Overall, I was reading English titles as those were real to life )

Then I have found 2 coffee machines (in the bars near Kid's club and White bar) where the coffee could have been prepared by the staff. I was dying to get some nice cappucino or even flat white... that's the end of the story really, as I tried 4 times and gave up: the staff did not know how to cook the creamy milk for cappuccino, nevermind flat white. After all my favourtie bar was the Lush bar, next to the restaurant. And the best barmen were Durmush, Okan, Ahmet and Ayshegul. My favourite team who always served perfectly well very tasty drinks. Thank you,guys! )

I was amazed by the work of kid's club: kids were always busy. All the members worked hard. That's really something to be proud of, as not many hotels can boast such a variety of entertainment for kids. Well done! I've already recommended the hotel to those who have kids, as it is very important for them to have GOOD KID'S CLUB working at the hotel.

Me and my husband - we both went for massage. And bless Rasim - he is a great manual therapist. Thank you to him as well!

Our housekeeper was a nice, diligent woman - thank you Leman. As there were days when different house-keeper was working and she wasn't as attentive as Leman.

Reception wise - there was Irem, who helped us a lot and some other nice guys as well. Once I even forgot my D&G sunglasses in Mall of Antalya. But the reception called the numbers I asked and helped to find the lost sunglasses, as they were quite an expensive item to loose.

Restaurant wise, my favourite was Safiya. She was always sincere and helpful to us. thank you for that, Safiya!

My favourite chef was Ilmaz, as he was always cooking delicious pasta! I had a bad experience with the chef who burnt our pasta with the pesto sauce, but Ilmaz was the one who never burnt anything and cooked just the way me, my husband and my daughter liked. Thank you,Ilmaz!

Entertainment wise, Zhenya was the best. She was always very helpful and was providing the right information whenever needed. Thanks to her, I got to Kangoo jump! Unfortunately, I was late for underwater aerobics with bicycles. And that was something I really wanted to try. I really regret that activity was only once during our stay and I did not try it, but what to do...

And Guest relations did a marvellous job for us ) Great guys in fact ) Just at the end of our stay I decided to leave some sort of 'wish' for the hotel. Well, my husband does not drink alcohol at all, thus we were looking for non-alcohol beer everywhere, including outside the hotel. When I finally gave up (we did not find any) I popped in at the guest relations and asked to introduce non-alcohol beer into their list of beverages. I was really surprised that later on in the afternoon we found a bottle of non-alcohol beer in our room ) and then evey day onwards till the end of our stay. that was a very nice surprise! Very efficient work I should say. Well done and Thank you! )

One of the minuses for us was living next to the smoking room, as we had to close balcony every time the neighbours were coming out to the balcony. And people were also smoking in the swimming-pools. That was not nice at all. I guess, if there were non-smoking swimming pool area it would have been better, as kids do not smoke and it was disturbing for me to inhale that smoke when I was sunbathing next to the swimming-pool. If there is smoking free area in the restaurant, there could have been smoking free area in the swimming-pools as well, at least, some of them.

Another wish from us is your employing more staff speaking English. I am not even asking those who speak Russian, but at least English would be great. Because not even all managers understood English in the restaurant, never mind staff... And we could not get our usual breakfast at 6:30 in the morning (departure time) as there was no croissants(chocolate croissants we do not eat, sorry) and fried eggs. Nevermind.

Overall, we really enjoyed our stay and might be coming back even. Let's see. But I've already recommended the hotel to good 50+ people with 2 of them promising to get there this year.

Thank you for everything.

Katrina, Andrew and Sabrina.