Fantastic beach
Amazing weather
Great location
Nice hotel
Friendly staff at the hotel (except one grumpy man at reception)
Nice drinks at the bar
Ok-ish food, will make you smile at the randomness but wasn't bad
Quite expensive for spending money and trips etc (we were surprised at this)
Horrible mossie bites

Would recommend Varadero to anyone and everyone, it was an amazing beach to look at. Would recommend the Palma Real to friends like me who dont mind if they dont stay at a 5star hotel. Palma real was certainly the best looking hotel on non-5star end of Varadero.

Good place to chill out and see cuba, would go back again if it was closer. We went budget and paid for a non direct flight, we regretted that when we were in the air for so long.

This is a really good alternative in Varadero and will not cost you a fortune, as some of the other resorts tend to do. You will not get luxury but more or less "ordinary" hotel standard (although that is a very subjective statement, I know).

The rooms are nice and big. They get cleaned every day and are, in my opinion, spotless when it comes to cleanliness.

The location is great. It is 5-10 minutes by taxi from the Varadero busterminal for example and only a 3 minute walk to the beach.

The hotel has 3 pools and quite a lot of activities everyday such as mini golf tournaments, tennis, volleyball, dancelessons, spanish lessons etc, if you fancy that kind of stuff.

Food is ok, but nothing more than that. There is plenty to choose between for every meal but some of the dishes doesn't look very tasty or even taste very much. But let's face it: you don't go to Cuba for the food. Don't let the food put you off from staying here. It's gonna be more or less the same where ever you stay (if you don't stay in casa particulares where the food is in a toally different category).

I don't have anything negative to say about the service in general in the resort. The staff were nice and friendly and helped out with what they could.

The Palma Real is an amazing hotel. I recently travelled to Cuba with my parents, and it was my favourite trip. The Palma Real is not on the beach, but it might as well be. Literally less than a five minute walk. There's a bar on the beach that is also a part of the Palma Real. Granted the food is not the best, a lot of fries and eggs and the burgers are somewhat like spam, but everyone is so nice! The nightly entertainment is great! Singing, dancing, all around excitment. The pools were amazing, the one with the bar was even quieter than the other. The weather was so warm, even when it rained! There are some flea markets down the road, it's about eighty blocks to walk it, but it doesn't seem that far. You must be willing to barter with them if you want to find some good deals. Be careful when buying though, careful of the change they give you if required. There are two currencies in Cuba, and make sure you get the Cuban Convertible Peso. I most definately recommend this hotel to everyone, but be careful. You just might be a little surprised when you open the door to your room. They are not the nicest rooms, but they are very clean. The maids are very friendly, and appreciate small gifts such as used t shirts and pencils.

If you can survive on ham and cheese sandwhich for a week, go ahead this hotel is for you. The breakfast was the best meal of the day as I like eggs but if you are not a egg lover then do what my spouse did - wait till the beach snack bar opens which is 10:30 and go for the only thing they cant mess up - Ham and Cheese Sandwhich. The fruits were mostly on the verge of going bad.

The food in the Buffet and other restaurants was no good. The dishes always had excess salt, even the rice was half cooked 99% of the times. If you can survive without food then this is the place. Not a single guest was happy with the food. Majority of the guests ate french fries only at lunch and dinner at the buffet restaurant. On the positive side of this - I did not gain any weight with all the lazing around and my spouse lost a couple of pounds by forced dieting.

The reception staff were really stupid. Dont rely on them for any information whether it be bus timing or local information. Your best bet is asking another guest. The staff are good at passing the buck, nobody wanted to do take ownership of any task at the reception and would ask you to come back the next day to speak to other staff.

Every time I tried to forget the negatives and concentrate on enjoying the postives (the beach and the warm weather) another guest would tell us about their experience and it was the same thing again and again from different mouths.

We stayed for a week in Palma Real. The pools looked good but were mostly deserted as guests preferred the beach. The beach can do with some more palm shades, if you are not an early riser you will be in the sun whole day, which sounds good but keep in mind the sun gets very strong during midday. The beach was the best part of the stay.