Sheraton Fuerteventura

We spent four nights here in December 2019. For the first three nights, I thought this was a very quiet hotel. On the fourth night, however, I left the balcony door open in order to cool down the room and found myself listening to a young family (and their crying baby) as they sat on their neighboring balcony. They woke us up at sunrise the next morning with a repeat act (parents trying to shush an unhappy baby). Thus, the amount of quiet seems to depend in some part on who is staying next door. The hotel grounds are very pretty with big gardens and several pools. You can walk outside of the gated property and stroll along a paved promenade that gives you access to the public beach (very large, nice sand, safe swimming). If you head south about 1/3 of a mile, you will come to a small shopping mall with a grocery store, some clothing shops and a couple of restaurants. There is a MacDonald’s located close nearby. If you head north, you will come to Caleta with its many restaurants located within a 15-25 minute walk. The city of Puerto Rosario is about a 20-minute drive away and the airport is about 15 minutes drive away. There is plenty of free parking. Others have taken note of the airplanes that flew relatively close overhead, but the noise did not bother us. The Wi-Fi worked slowly but acceptably in our room, but did not seem to work on the balcony. I have Platinum status, but did not receive an upgrade and there is no Executive lounge; when I asked about drink vouchers, they said none were available. I had requested a room with a king bed, but we received a room with two twin beds pushed together; each bed was comfy, but made up with twin sheets, which defeated the purpose of being close with my partner at night. Bonafide king beds are available in the hotel; so it was odd that our request was ignored. The room came with a small refrigerator and an electric pot that heats up water for Nescafe or tea. The bathroom was very spacious (two sinks) and included two separate small “rooms” for the toilet/bidet and a huge walk-in shower (very nice) and a large tub. There is no door to the bathroom space, however, which means turning on the light could disturb someone at night. Additionally, the opaque glass door that shuts off the toilet area does not run fully from floor to ceiling nor close in a secure manner—and so one does not have full privacy when using this space. On our first night, I found hair strands and a hair clip from the previous guest lying on the bathroom floor. The maid must have cleaned them up the next day because they were gone when I looked again, but this made me wonder about the overall cleanliness of the floor. The beds were very comfy and the room itself was large, has an overhead ceiling fan and is nicely decorated. It must be noted that the thermostat for the room is pre-set and when I asked for help in cooling the room, the front desk informed me that the temperature will not go below 22 degrees Celsius (71.6 F) because “this is the law in Spain” (probably not the case). When I asked for a portable fan, I was told none was available. The good news is that in December, the outside temperature is cool and it is possible to leave the balcony door open and cool down the room without bugs coming in, however, this might not be enough in the summer (and as noted above, one may be woken by noise from one’s neighbors). I offer this information not to criticize the hotel, but to warn my older female brethren with similar physical challenges that they may need a colder hotel room than is available here. Overall, the hotel has a lot to offer in terms of location and access to beach, shops and restaurants. There is lots of space to walk around or simply read in one of the many quiet corners of the hotel. We did not try any restaurants other than the location that served a buffet breakfast and dinner; both were fine, but not very good in terms of quality of food or service. The staff was very friendly and gracious; that said, there were several times when I asked them for assistance with an issue and it took several requests to obtain follow-up. This was particularly the case when I needed a copy of my final hotel bill after I had left the hotel; it took four different requests to get one emailed to me. If we return to this island, I will look at alternative places to stay.

We came back to the Sheraton as it is a lovely place to spend a week in the sun during the Xmas and New Year break. I wrote last time that the holiday had been spoilt by the sheer amount of young kids present. There were still a lot, and the noise at breakfast was still unbearable, but it was much better than a couple of years ago. Not only the kids made a racket at breakfast, the staff also seems to do their best in pulling chairs over the tiled floor, clanking plates and throwing dirtly cutlery as loudly as possible into recepticles. Children were playing with the toasters, burning bread, or drinking directly from the caraffes, nobody cared, neither parents nor staff. The staff at breakfast was super hectic, taking speed for efficiency. The head waiter (Diego or Diogo or something) contributed massively to the general nervousness. One day he was off, and everything was calm and things went smoothly. We only booked B+B this time as we like to enjoy our meals (the food was good in the Sheraton though) quietly. We noticed that the hotel shows same signs of age, the carpet was threadbare or has come off, some of the curtains had holes, the outside wall on the promenade seriously needs a lick of paint.... It still is a very nice hotel, and in genera thel staff is nice, it is all quite clean, the pools are lovely.