Just got back from 11 nights at the Domina Coral Bay resort in Sharm el Sheikh. This is a massive resort and is a combination of 6 hotels in one, we were in the Oasis (which is the lowest class), we also went just B&B as we wanted the freedom to leave the resort and travel to Cairo and Luxor, which we did, but beware !! Dependant on which class you stay in you are limited to which facilities you can use (most of the pools are off limits to the Oasis class). The hotel is fairly expensive too, a bottle of local beer costs £33 EP (Egyptian pounds, about £3 English) and there are no places to get a snack, you have to buy a meal and that costs at least £90 EP for a burger. Since we were just B&B we had to buy meals in the hotel which were £150 - £180 EP. The hotel was about 60% Russians, 30% Italians and 10% others and was set up to cater for these guests. The hotel is also a taxi ride away from Naama bay (it costs us £53EP there and £30EP back), but a meal in Naama bay costs £60EP and a beer was £20EP. If I was going to this area again I would try and get a hotel closer to Naama bay (although if your all inclusive this is not that bad).

On a final note, the beach at the hotel was great (plenty of space and beds), there was a coral reef next to the beach which provided fantastic snorkeling. The rooms were clean and spacious with new sheets and towels every day.

Just returned from holiday at the Domina Coral Bay and we just thought we would write something to combat some of the bad reviews, as a large majority were based on one off experiences.

The hotel complex is huge but manageable and although there is a bus available to take you round the resort it really is not impossible to walk around the whole of the complex (as long as you can manage steps!!). The swimming pools are all lovely and the snorkeling is absolutely fantastic. I would perhaps say that the resort as a whole is not perfect for small children as you cannot go in the sea straight from the beach but only from a floating pontoon but this did mean excellent snorkeling for us.

We booked bed and breakfast but upgraded to half board the day after we arrived. There is an excellent choice of restaurants offering all kinds of cuisine but be aware that they do charge extra for all other restaurants other than the Coral restaurant but that didn't bother us as we didn't go to that one anyway. If you are wine drinkers be prepared for high prices, and I am afraid I cannot comment on the standard of the cheaper Egyptian wines!!! We found the prices very similar to the UK so although many people had said that Egypt is cheap the resorts are not really.

All of the staff were very attentive and friendly without being overpowering and even the Security Guards smiled.

As someone else had said most of the guests are Italian and Russian/Eastern Block? but as far as I am concerned that is better than being in a "little England" after all thats one of the reasons you go to a foreign country on holiday as well as the sun, which incidently was very hot, drink lots of water and buy it from the supermarket as its is much cheaper.

All in all a great break from the cold weather in the UK.

The hotel is good enough for 4*. The sea is beautiful (although it might look dirty-only happened 1 day but it is not, those are corals that died off or smth-belive me we touched it :) ) . The rooms are big and spaceous and quite clean, so no worries here (and I have high standards for this :) ). The taf-taf wich are used for driving around the complex are quite regulair but don't stop always (not at every station) unless you tell them to, "STOP PLEASE" is enough. You can also rent golf-cars for around 30EUR per day wich is not much if 2 pairs (2 rooms) take it.... Now enough with the description and on to a few small problems (there might seem to be many but they are small and do not get in the way that much). Fisrt of all in the room: when you open the water, let it run for a bit as it turns brown sometimes (let it run for about half a minute) and gets better later, also sheets are not changed daily. Now to the beach and taftaf issue-make sure to know where you stay as sometimes it is more simple and faster to go on foot. Furthermore the taf-taf doesn't go directly to the beach but get's you close to a 2-3 minute walk wich is not bad unless you go around noon - when's the heat is peaking. Carrying on to the food - it is O.K. - nothing special but nothing bad as well, just a bit repetitive, so don't go for full board or AI.
Otherwise the staff is friendly but not intrusive, like in some egyptian resorts.
All in all recommended, although nothing special.

A.C. from Slovenia

Dear all

I have never written a holiday review prior to this one and I would 1st apologise for my 1st being so negative and distressing to any visitors planning to stay at this resort. For the entire two weeks of our group's stay we had nothing but problems including accidents, ill mannered staff, and the experience of staying at a hotel clearly run by absolute amateurs!

This will tell you how bad the complex is…. The First Choice rep that looked into and tried to sort out some of our problems said in his 7 years of working fro First Choice he had only ever filled out 2 customer complaints sheets. He went on to say that in ONE WEEK alone he had completed FOUR ENTIRE PADS each having 50 complaints records.

In our two weeks let me simply summarise the experiences we were put through:

The baby pool had wiring come lose and 3 of the kids in our group received fairly serious electric shocks. Further to that when this pool was finally closed a few hours after the electric shocks had taken place the customers were advised to use another pool. We tried this and the pool attendant looking after that pool told all the kids to ‘go away go away’ we do not want any kids in this pool. The attendant told me as a Mum that it was HIS pool and he would choose who used it and that he decided no kids were to use it as it was for adults ladies and men only. It appeared he just liked to look at the ladies bodies! Perverts I think this is called in the UK! I stood next to him and put him well and truly straight and told him for the two weeks we are all there we basically pay his wages and that I would decide which pool my grouped used and just try and stop any of us using the pool. He walked off with a sour look and I took this to the management and I believe he lost his job as his aggression and anger showed towards me was witnessed by around 30 guests who all made statements!

The children & women in our group were more often than not refused any service at the bar – the only reason being we were children or women!

My husband picked up a bread roll – bit in to it and found a 2” metal strip in it which cut in the inside of his mouth. When I spoke to the restaurant manger his words were ‘ohhhh don’t worry don’t worry – its just a piece of the bread making equipment’.

The hotel has a very very very serious issue with mosquito’s and the hotels way of dealing with this was to spray smoke once a day but only near the restaurant area. Many people were receiving very serious bites and no help or effort was made to resolve this matter. Of course we understand no one can decide where these blighters go and who they attack but the hotel could have applied more effort and used the smoke repellent across the entire hotel rather than just the restaurant area.

The Irish Bar…. We all know our Irish Bars to hold tradition and style – this bar was an absolute embarrassment to all us English & Irish people. The name well and truly takes the pi88 out of the Irish!

Most of the two weeks the entertainment consisted of the First Choice reps dancing on the stage and attempting to sing. Two nights in 14 we saw good shows from people they had brought in. The rest of the time it was First Choice Rep Karaoke and Bingo! What a JOKE!

I'm not in anyway a fussy person and I fully understand we are going into totally different cultures when we travel. However First Choice will advertise clearly this is their hotel and it’s run to British standards. WHAT A LOAD OF ABSOLUTE CR8P!

In 11 years of travelling this holiday was by a long long way totally disappointing and the experiences here cost us our health, cost a lot of money and left 17 people very very sad upset and beyond disappointed!

On a good note the weather was fabulous! Very very hot and the clear waters were stunning – totally magnificent! That’s the only good thing we can add about this holiday other than when we got on a flight to come home.

Be warned!