One of the best hotels we have stayed in during holidays. We stayed 10 nights. Rooms are excellent in size and very stylish - we had a junior suite which offered two rooms separated by a hall, semi open kitchen, bathroom. Two flat screen tv's, large balcony with table + 4 seats + 2 lounge seats. Beds were quite tough (as in many Southern European countries) but the positive elements of the room made up for this slight discomfort. What surprised us is that the majority of guests in this season (last days of July, first week of August) were families with children in range of 0-14 years old and the hotel is very child friendly. Many guests from Belgium, Switzerland, Netherlands, Germany, UK in fact a very nice European mix. We stayed in a half board package from TUI which was excellent. Half board means starter and desert buffets (with plenty of options), 2nd course pasta/soupe a-la-carte, main course (4x fish, 4x meat) a-la-carte. So plenty of choice and on Monday a grill night in the roof restaurant and on Thursday a Tusan night at the pool. Sparkling/still water and coffee are free. Wine list is fine and affordable. When booking half board, it is possible to eat at the roof restaurant at a surcharge (in fact you receive discount of EUR 20 pp on your check). Cocktails and oysters with champagne on the roof are definitely recommended! Breakfast is excellent as well with everything you can imagine including fresh juice bar.

Pool is really great with sufficient seats / beds around and in garden. Unfortunately as in many hotels, some people queue up before opening hours to reserve the best spot at the pool or one of the "lounge double beds" to go for breakfast afterwards and not leave their seats/beds for the full day. Very hard for pool attendants to manage this, so I really cannot blame the hotel. It is all about a lack of social skills of some groups of tourists and you can only decide not to follow and we were perfectly happy in our "2nd best seat" the beautiful gardens, only a couple of meters away from the pool.

Beach access. The hotel has arrangements with some of the beach clubs. We visited Pardini (accross the road from the hotel) who offer full day umbrella + two chair + 1 bed for EUR 40 (10 discounted). Extra bed is EUR 5. The club offers beach guard, showers, facilities and quite a lot of space around the umbrella. Pardini is very nice and offers great and affordable lunch options, ice cream and drinks. Public beaches are a walk away but crowded and with no facilities.

Sight seeing: Lucca is closeby (30 minutes) and so is Pisa (40 minutes). Other Tuscan sites (Florence, San Gimignano) are quite a drive but doable. We loved to combine beach days and culture days and did not mind driving a little. Portofino (1h20m drive) is also worth visiting!

Other: internet - indeed quite slow but it was there and it was free for 60 minutes (and you could use the vouchers partially to reactivate them afterwards, even after days, so I really used to update mailbox or download a paper). So for me it was perfectly ok, especially as this is not a business hotel or area anyway. So no temptation to work all day. The bikes are really nice - it is a nice drive to Forte dei Marni and Viareggio with bike lanes next to the beach road.

Overall: I do consider this a 5 star-level accommodation for European standards and was really impressed by the quality offered.