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same as you going in jan 2007 been told it is a new hotel dont know if that is good or bad lets hope we get some feed back

we have booked to go on 21st august so only 4 weeks till we find out !! i do know that its a good hotel chain and a 5 star i have this link www.solymar-hotels.com/mirabel/index.htm and i havent found any other info ( apart from thomson ) so will post review and photos when i get back

that would be great look forward to your review and pictures and hope that all goes well ( like you say they are a good 5 star company so all should be good fingers crossed)

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Just back from the Sol Y Mar Mirabel beach (this morning). Although Thomson told everyone it opened in May 06, in fact we were the second family through the doors!

The Mirabel Beach is a 600+ room hotel, beautifully finished (nearly) with delightful staff. Food was superb, pools were nicely laid-out and there will be several pool/beach bars - when they're open. They're having teething problems - vicious mosquitos; bar/restaurant staff did not understand 'all inclusive'; 'animation team' were inanimate, that sort of thing, but I'm sure these will all be fixed in the coming months. However, once anything like full-occupancy is reached it will be very crowded!

The beach/coral reef were very dissappointing. The beach swarms with sun shades. There is no jetty (yet?) so you either walk 5/10 minutes to the next hotel, and then walk out from the end of the jetty to the reef (??), or you brave hundreds of sea-urchins in knee-deep water for about 800 meters until you can insert yourself. It takes about 30 minutes from the beach to get to snorkel over the coral. If you do snorkel, it's worth doing it at least once - a steel ship wreck lies just off the reef.

Thomson didn't tell us so much was missing: Dive Centre, Internet Cafe, International Restaurants, Kids Clubs, Disco, Health Spa, Entertainment, Beach / Pool bars, Shops - in reply to dozens of complaints they offered a free meal in the Hard Rock - but pay for your own drinks!!! If you're booking I'd recommend checking with your agent - I don't think it will be ready for a month or two yet.

Richard

PS - Just a word of caution about quad biking out there - on one excursion three separate incidents produced a broken arm and a leg fracture, a badly grazed leg and sever burns to an inner-thigh.

going in jan 2007 so hope all is running well doesnt sound to good about the beach hope they have this sorted out soon ! apart from the small problems would you recomend this place? are the food places good? and how many do they have? hope you can help with a few answers thanks

The hotel is quite beautiful and the staff were incredibly attentive (mind you, I think there were 25 staff per guest when only 4 families had booked in). Once the facilities are all in place I am sure it will justify 5 stars - however, I do think it will be crowded. The buffets were marvelous but the 'international restaurants' that had been promised still had builders in, so we were unable to try any of them. I certainly cannot recommend Thomson - their handling of complaints was far less than satisfactory, in fact selling the holidays when they did and then doing as little as necessary to temporarilly appease each booking individually, rather than as a group, was disreputable to say the least. Richard

I have now cancelled my booking and am going elsewhere. Thanks very much for putting me in the picture as I don't think it would have been my cup of tea.

we are supposed to be going in 4 weeks time - do you think all will be done by then ??????????????