Villa El Yarey Hotel, Granma Cuba. 2 stars.

Awfull NewcastleKatherine

“Survived to tell the tale ”
We have just spent a week in El Yarey. It was supposed to be a a special birthday treat to myself after a difficult year. It was awful and quite creepy. I have never been so relieved ever to leave anywhere in all my life. From the description on the Travel Collection/Kuoni website, we were expecting it to be fairly basic and rural - but clean. I've lived most of my life in very rural Northumberland, am very used to roughing it, and certainly wasn't expecting luxury. However, what I wasn't expecting were electric sockets hanging off walls, leaking roofs and accommodation so dark (the curtains were pinned to the windows) that we couldn't read. Our room (and we were upgraded) also had mouldy walls and smelt bad. An ancient empty, rusting fridge stuck in the middle of the room wouldn't stand straight, and even though this was billed as "all inclusive" we had to pay for bottles of water from the bar (only open at set times). It certainly didn't help matters that the weather was awful and it rained practically non-stop. As many of the trips were cancelled because of the weather, there was simply nothing to do but read or drink, as there was no provision whatsoever for wet weather. Nobody even had a pack of cards. The nearest "shops" if you could call them that, were about 100 km away, there were no taxis available and we were discouraged to go out on our own. Another problem was that in the rain, there was nowhere to go if you did want to read - the "reception" was usually full of noisy, clattering, shouting workers, another covered area was filthy and its chairs were always damp and stinking (there was a massive termite nest about a metre round upstairs) - the pool bar roof leaked, and our rooms were too dark even in the middle of the day. I did venture down to the swimming pool one cloudy day when it was drizzling, but was stared at so much by all the "workers" hanging around, that I eventually started to feel quite intimidated and returned to my smelly, damp, dark, depressing room complete with wonky, rusty fridge for the rest of the day. There were only eight of us imprisoned there, which meant that all meals had to be taken together at the same time. Fortunately we all got on reasonably well, and we were all fairly sociable people, but I normally prefer to choose who I spend my precious free time with - especially on holiday. Hello to great couple, Marcy and Joe, by the way, whom we met the following week! The food at El Yarey was pretty dire - probably more the fault of the political set-up than the cooks, who I think were probably trying their best. They did make me a lovely birthday cake on my last night which was really kind. However, most of the time there was very little variety and few fresh vegetables - it was mainly just meat, eggs, rice, cucumber and beetroot. Sometimes it was quite inedible. On the plus side, the main staff team there were friendly and tried their best to be helpful - the rep (Nelson) was particularly knowledgable and did a good job under very difficult circumstances. The bus driver was also very good. What we couldn't understand was the hordes of other "workers" who would be hanging around all day, sometimes in the bar - looking sullen - the swimming pool seemed to be in a permanent state of maintenance with 3 or 4 blokes wielding rods and hoses inspecting pumps - when the rain did stop now and again, it wasn't really conducive to taking a dip as you had to circumnavigate a giant hose. The trips we did manage to go on were interesting. This part of Cuba is very very poor and it certainly opened our eyes to what we take for granted in the UK. All in all - not a great experience. I'm not well off - this was one of the most expensive holidays I've ever taken in my life. I am only allocated 4 weeks holiday per year and to spend one of those weeks in El Yarey at great expense, was a big mistake.

Poor QOpera

“A different view of El Yarey ”
We were really disappointed with El Yarey after all the glowing reports on Trip Advisor. We had no problem with it being basic - I have spent a couple of holidays camping in the rainforest in South America just with mosquito nets. But the rooms in El Yarey were pretty filthy. The food was very average too - we'd expected fresh juices and fresh veg after our South American trips. But the juices were all from longlife packets and we got served canned vegetables and canned sardines! On one occasion, our packed lunch consisted of hot chicken which had been kept in plastic bags in the back of the bus. Most travellers declined to eat it. The cocktails all tasted the same - the menu showed a nice variety but these were disappojnting in reality as they simply didn't have the ingredients or know how to make them. The location was a disappointment. Whilst the gardens were ok, we were expecting El Yarey to be situated within a forest environment with nice walking trails. I'd call it more scrubland. The trips were a disappointment too. The birdwatching walk was simply a walk down the road and we often felt our itinerary was being made up on the spot. On the plus side, the pool was nice and big and seemed fairly clean. The trip to La Plata (Castro's headquarters in the Revolution) was amazing though this was an extra $60 each and the musicians were great.