Just returned from a 2-night stay over the July 4th holiday. This is one of those hotels where the brochure looks great but it's a real belly-drop when you get there.

We had to change rooms both nights! First time because the toilet in our "Garden View Room" wasn't working. Second time because the room had ants!

We finally got upgraded to an ocean front room which was much nicer than the standard room. While there were still problems with the "upgraded" room (non-working balcony lights, towel racks coming off the hinges, etc) it was better and had a great view. It was on the top floor.

DO NOT book a room in the Garden View area!! Even though it's cheaper. You will be very disappointed. Loud window-unit air conditioners will keep you awake all night. "Screened-in balconies" have holes and tears in the screens and bugs come in. Very worn carpets, filthy bathtubs, and faded bedspreads. The front door has huge gaps of open air where anything can crawl in. These are the kinds of rooms you don't want to take your shoes off to walk around in. PAY THE EXTRA MONEY to be oceanfront. Otherwise you will wind up leaving early.

While the staff was sympathetic, and did give us a slight discount for our inconvenience, they really should have comped us 1 night since we had to move both nights. I was with my 77-year old mother and she is not very mobile.

Also, the $18 daily "resort fee" is a rip-off.

We flew out on Saturday 10th June. We arrived at Chesapeake at approx 7pm. The whole motel (its not a hotel) is outdated and worn. The reception is unclean, scruffy and tired. The staff, though pleasant enough, looked scruffy and uninterested.

When we were given our keys we were also given a list of local points of interest. This included a BurgerKing and a drugs store. We knew we were in trouble!!

We booked over the telephone via Virgin Holidays. We asked for, SPECIFICALLY a beach resort. Well, where's the beach?? Chesapeake even give out a brochure advertising 700ft of white sandy beach - what?? 17ft maybe.

We had paid an upgrade at the time of booking of £310 for a luxury oceanfront room. The room was a disgrace. Worn carpets, worn out furniture, rotting front and rear doors, leaking and rotting fridge, cracked bath that had rusted. We tried to contact Virgin to move to another resort, but there was no-one there. We tried again the following morning, but they are closed on Sundays.

As part of the deal we got a complimentary "Continental" breakfast. When we found where this was (in a shack!!) it was unmanned, and had a choice of 2 types of danish pastry, an apple muffin or a bagel. We could have cereal, plus coffee and/or orange. All served up on plastic plates and plastic knives/forks/spoons.

We left straight away and flew home. We are awaiting a response from Virgin right now. This holiday was a disgrace, we were missold and ripped off.

And the reviewer from Epsom - you got our room!! Sorry about that. Hey - wasnt it luxurious!!

I can't believe Virgin Holidays still send people to this dive. It isn't a resort, it's a motel - there's not a single restaurant on site and you'd be lucky if you ever catch the bar open.

The place is shabby beyond belief (see pics) - ripped, holed and stained curtains; worn out carpets; rusty fixtures & fittings; wood-effect fishbowl TV - the last time the decor was updated appears to be 20-odd years ago.

We saw all 3 room grades during our stay and all the rooms are as foul as each other:
- originally allocated a "Garden" room which we rejected as it was a twin with 2 very small double beds (it was our honeymoon!), it was also very dark - note that all but 3 of Virgin's rooms are twins and the nearest rep is in Miami!
- we immediately upgraded to a "Luxury" ocean-front room at a cost of $40 extra as a Virgin room with a king bed wouldn't be available until the next day. On seeing the room we were surprised that it could even cost $40 a night to stay there it was so tired and dated.
- the next day we were given a free upgrade to a "Deluxe" room instead of getting the Virgin king room. It was in identically poor condition to the "Luxury" room - the only variation seemed to be an extra sink!

Luckily we had made plans to spend most of the 3 days elsewhere as the pool was dirty and was just painted concrete, not a tiled pool - needless to say the paint was also dirty and flaking off. The loungers by the pool were also old and tired.

Breakfast was a joke, danish and bagels left sweating in their plastic wrappers, no bagels left after 9am, and you have to stand to eat unless you're lucky enought to grab one of the two available tables.

There would be much to say about the Florida Keys in general and the chesapeake resort in particular. Other reviews on various local hotels describe the situation rather well. Refer to them, positive or negative, there is a lot to learn from them.

We stayed three nights at the chesapeake resort and it has nothing to do in glossy paper vacation catalogs of luxury resorts.

If you want to approach some sort of “cosy standard” you’ll need to book one of the ocean front rooms. The garden view rooms are very very “basic”, old and worn out so they can’t even compete with most standard Holiday Inn, Confort Inn, Best Western that you would find anywhere in California, for instance.

The airco is an old noisy (but efficient, in March) unit, good thing that it was not needed at night and that we could sleep with the slide door open. The terrace is equipped with a small mesh net that prevent any mosquitos or flying insects to come in. Positive. It’s not the case for the ocean front rooms and suites. But if you’re a light sleeper beware of the overseas highway noise : you get it through your front door and from your balcony. Something again, that you would avoid by choosing a ocean front room.

There is a free safe in the room and a small refrigerator, both positive. But there is not closet for your clothes, just a tube when you hand them at.

There is no beach (so don’t believe catalogs that would pretend there is) as mostly on the Florida Keys - forget about swimming in the sea - and it’s located on the atlantic side. So also forget about the glorious sunsets if you are an addict of that (we are not). Most hotels, motels and tourist overnight facilities are rather old buildings and often ridiculously overpriced. You really pay a lot for the local site and nature.

The most provocative factor is "breakfast", which is really an open air counter located in a little hut ("SpoonBill café") on the marina. You help yourself to juice, coffee, muffins, rolls, all of them wrapped in a transparent plastic bag (straight from the factory) and not worth very much. Luckily there wa also cereals and (some days) yoghurt. Totally unsatisfying and unacceptable. You stand eating that or you sit at the campground table or you go at the second floor if you find a decent chair (a challenge).

The grounds are not really covered with white or yellow sand but more with the type of industrial “sand” that you use for non tarmac roads. Does not hurt if you wear any type of light shoes.

There are two small swimming pools, one of them being a bit heated. To be forgoten if you’re a “swimmer”, unless there is nobody else and you want to make a lot of turns at each end (I did). The sunbathing area around the pools is something like what you get in most Best Western’s, nothing to do with a caribbean resort in the Dominican Republic for instance. The jacuzzi is OK.

We hardly had a smile at the reception desk during the day (the gentleman on evening duty was much friendlier) although the explanations that we got there were complete and correct.

The sunbeds were OK and although there were not that many, always free at any time, as if not too many people were staying there during the most part of the day but were travelling around (what we mostly did). Forget about umbrellas, but this is common in the US, among other places. There are a few “huts”.

The place has a little marina which is pleasant (you can book a fishing ride there) and a lot of pelicans and other seabirds that you can easily photograph. They are local residents and familiar visitors of the so called “whale harbor” located next door. Parking is free and you get towels.

On the whole, we did not expect very much of our stay at the Chesapeake. All the reviews about Fl. Key hotels had disappointed us (too expensive and too many critiques altogether). So we finally planned a shorter three nights stay over there to allow us more time elsewhere in Florida. Knowing that, we finally made the best out of it, staying not too long at the hotel itself and visiting around. Because of the proximity of nature (you are really on the edge of water, the marina, the pelicans, the palm trees...) the availability of sunbeds, the little expectations that we had, we still had a brief but relaxing and pleasant visit in Islamorada.

If you are not living in the US, be aware the the cost of living is high again, especially in the Florida Keys hotels. High to very high rates in most cases. This one was moderate (so to speak) with 132 EUR per night and per room. If you take the place (nature, location, seaside), the time and what we got for the price into account, maybe you won’t get the impression to have been ripped off. You might also like to check the Hampton Inn, further down the road. Much more modern.

A good advice : be sure to reserve early at local restaurants if you go out for dinner. Waiting time is unbearable if you don’t. And think of the “whale harbor” restaurant located next door even if it would not appear on lists that you receive on the spot.