Apart Hotel Playa Blanca

The staff were willing to help and kept coming into the apartment to try to sort out the problems, but they never managed to fix the locks, stove, or Wi-Fi. It feels like this might have been a lovely place twenty years ago. I’d stay away if you have another option. Casa 7 was in rough shape throughout. The bathroom sink needed repair, the kitchen sink was leaking and hanging loose, and the ceiling shed sand or other material. We had only lukewarm water. The Wi-Fi usually failed or crawled along; replacing the router three times made no difference, so we ended up using the weak signal from casa 8. They also swapped a working but rusty fridge for another rusty, dirty one without asking. There was one roll of toilet paper and an empty soup bottle in the bathroom, but no salt or sugar, no dish soap, and the kitchen towel was filthy. I gave another guest our salt when we left. The toilet made a ship’s-horn noise after flushing, and we once got locked out of the upstairs bedroom when the wind shut its door. We had to climb onto the terrace, open another faulty terrace door from outside, then open the bedroom door from inside. The stove was especially worrying. We were given matches, but there were no labels to show which knob controlled which burner, so we had to guess. There was no safety valve to stop gas if the flame went out. A child turning on a knob could leave gas flowing, which could be disastrous. We also couldn’t lock the apartment because the terrace-door lock was broken, leaving it open to a possible burglary. The property is a group of apartment houses spread along a long strip of land, with reception at one end and the pool at the other. The apartments sit in the second row from the sea and seem to have at least partial views. A local road runs between them and the first row of houses, and traffic can get busy. It’s at the western end of town, about a 10-15 minute walk from Bahia Inglesia’s safe beach, which I consider the main attraction. The closest beach was closed when we arrived for bird and environmental protection. During our stay it was also full of jellyfish. Locals crowded into a small lifeguard-protected area, trying to avoid them and even tossing them onto shore or rocks. By Western standards, it wasn’t a beach for swimming.