As a pair of 60 yr olds who enjoy getting out and about we decided to try cuba to learn about its culture and see the historic city of havana so we went to varadero. Woops big mistake.
Complex sirena la salinas very nice if all you want to do is lay in the sun, eat, drink for two weeks however if you could overlook- noisy canadians through too much drink, (but that can apply to brits) mosquitos in abundance (everyone bitten) flys all over the food and birds flying into the dining room standing on the food islands then this was the place for you.
Outside of the complex nothing.You could not take a walk to anywhere. You pay £10 for two for a days use of the bus into varedero - nothing to see there either
We decided to pay the £300 and go to Havana for an overnight stay and 2 days sightseeing as this is what we had gone to cuba for. Well worth seeing especially if you get a tour guide like we did. Learnt that much and saw that much he was brilliant but definitely a "paid up member of the party" The Tropicana show was just great in Havana something you must see.
Wouldnt go back to cuba as they say been there bought the t- shirt not our favourite holiday. Total cost of the holiday was nearly £3000 - last year cruised on the Princess for just a little over that and saw 11 Carebean islands thats what you call value for money and we could have done that again for the same cost

We were at La Salina for our wedding during the week of April 6-13!!! Our trip couldn't have been better!!!! The Resort is AMAZING!!! The grounds are so well maintained, and the garden staff are SO SO nice and they work SO hard. We enjoyed the walking, the size of the resort is nothing to complain about. Its actually better, especially after the amount of food there is to eat! The buffet always had good food (especially the YUMMY ribs) The snack bars were great. The a la cartes were soooo yummy!! The beach is beautiful!! The staff were super friendly. Absolutely NO complaints. Our wedding was amazing!! Couldn't have been better!! Definitely worth getting the cuban band to play!! The Wedding cake is DELICIOUS!!! Susana is GREAT. We had our own arch constructed for our ceremony and the guys worked so hard to get it the way we wanted it!!! Kudos to them!!! They were awesome!! Now the arch is permanently at the beach for everyone to use!!!
The activity pool is SO much fun!! Especially the waterslide!! What a hoot!! Even for adults!!

A few tips:
Bring Bugspray!! its not just this resort, its cuba in general.
Don't just tip the maids. They get most of the stuff. Don't forget the gardeners and the other staff as well.
Bring a sweater. Its kinda cool at night
Book your a la cartes the day you get there. The Japanese and Steak house fill up!!
Be considerate, and don't 'reserve' beach loungers.

Not one single thing to Complain about!!! Enjoy your trip!!!

Hotels are old and run down. Cities also run down and dirty. Was there two weeks...would never go back. I feel sorry for Cuban people.

I visited Varadero and Havana in February and was amazed by the friendlynest of the Cubans.After reading some of the negative reviews I went without much expectations.

The hotel in Varadero ' Palma Real' was what I would expect of a 3.5 star, but the staff made our stay a dream. Unfortunatly they couldn't do much about the loud guest in the hallways at 3am.
Notice to fellow travellers " a hotel is not your house, try to be quiet in public areas after 10pm" .
The best surprise , was the fact that you do not get attacked by sellers & beggars as soon as you step foot outside .

The prices on liquor was best at the airport.& what a surprise to be able to take liquids in our carryons from Varadero airport.