Hotel Club Med Da Balaia

The Club Med is located at Albufeira, 19 miles West from Faro International airport (40 minutes by car).

If you wish to spend a relaxing night, avoid rooms overlooking the pool, above the hairdresser (No 31, 32, 33) and those near the entertainers units.
No child supervision or nautical base.
The clientele is 70% French and almost all of the staff speaks French.

The Club Med is made up of three 4 to 9-floor buildings with 70's architecture and no charm. Inside, the furniture and bright walls in the common areas make the place attractive despite everything else. The institution has a huge 15 hectare property planted with maritime pines and lined by a beautiful lawn opposite the Altantic and the beach below. The games field is a true paradise for "Gentils Membres" ( guests) with playful and sport-oriented interests.

The hotel has 387 rooms ( including 4 suites) which were renovated in 1999. They are equipped with individual air conditioning, international direct telephone, satellite television, (19 channels ), safe, full minibar (on request). The standard rooms are about 25 m² in area including the terrace. Choice between two "filling kits" for the minibar (extra charge). The bathroom has a bathtub, a double sink, and a hairdryer. You may borrow an ironing board and an iron. All rooms have a seaview except the first and second floors of the "Pyramid" and "Tour" buildings. Balconies have a comfortable size and a wrought iron furniture - café style. Regarding decoration, it is plain white wood in "Golf" and "Pyramid" buildings, and darker wood in the " Tour" one.

This is real Club Med. The main restaurant buffet is luxurious. The culinary theme changes every day, for lunch and dinner : island, Portuguese, local, oriental, Chinese... All is designed so that those who stay two weeks do not eat the same thing. Dozen of dishes are nicely presented, breads are homemade, cheese French. In brief, you have too many food options. Two regrets : you have to file in to enter the room and the room is badly set up for self-service - the setting is quite trivial. Two other restaurants are open at night only, you need to book a place there for no additional fee. The "Piri Piri" has Spanish, Portuguese cuisine and the "Yasmina", Moroccan cuisine in a nice oriental setting. The inside bar is open until May, the pool bar starts in June.

The Club Med has a 2000 m² area on the Da Balia public beach at the foot of a cliff - some minutes on foot on a path. Deckchairs, sunshades and towels are available. The beach is supervised from May to October. The sand is cleaned up, the setting quite pleasant : ochre cliffs, cut coasts and maritime pines here and there. But do not look for water activities except some catamarans. At Da Balaia, they would rather play golf.