Wyndham Garden Lara

My wife and I have just returned from an eleven night break here. ‘All Inclusive’ isn’t our normal choice but this was fairly last minute and , as the reviews were generally positive, we decided to give it a go. There’s plenty of positives. The staff work tirelessly and are a real credit to this hotel. We received a free room upgrade and it was excellent too - big comfy bed, beautiful bathroom and a lovely balcony overlooking the pool. Incidentally, the pool was huge- about 70mtres long with plenty of sun beds and a lifeguard on duty at all times.Pool towels are free and changeable whenever you like. Water slides which operated periodically through the day, and a separate smaller pool for very young children. Of course, I’ve yet to see any hotel solve the problem of ‘sun bed reserving’ but it’s wasn’t too bad here although you’ld be struggling for a bed after 10am, and of course, we were there at the tail end of the season. I’d describe the food as ‘standard all inclusive fare’. It wasn’t as excellent as some reviews maintain and was very repetitive. Remember, being a Muslim country, you’re not going to find bacon and sausages or anything pork related but we could always find something tasty to eat and the salad bar was always very well stocked . Ice creams were included too. The drinks were fine . Cant go wrong with Efes beer and the spirits selection was wide and with some recognised brands (Gilbeys gin, Bells whisky etc). The hotel is described as ‘beachfront’ and given a bit of poetic licence I suppose that’s true. However, the hotel sits (with many others) on one side of a very busy dual carriageway and the private beach is on the other side . We didn’t find that a problem though. It’s only a 5/10 minute walk and if you don’t fancy the walk, the hotel runs a free shuttle every 15 minutes! The beach itself is lovely and sandy with easy access to the warm sea. Each hotel has its own section of beach and, similarly, each has a short pier which runs out over the sea and has a bar and a few sun beds (get up early for those!) at the end. On the beach, there’s plenty of free sunbeds with permanent shade (and you WILL need that) , a free hotel restaurant for lunch, a large open air bar and a theatre alongside ,which has nightly entertainment ( it’s ok and much better than what’s on offer back at the main hotel - believe me!) But, having said all that, a word of warning and it’s NOT a criticism of the hotel but if you don’t want to be pestered with children and babies then this hotel will not be for you, especially if it’s ANYWHERE CLOSE to the school holidays. We went in the first week in September - in hindsight far too close to the school holidays especially as there were plenty of Germans there and it turns out that a number of German states have school holidays until the end of September. Most of the time it resembled a school holiday club and crèche! (Never seen so many babies under 1 year!) The hotel is geared to the ‘family holiday’ and that’s fair enough. Would we return? Probably, yes but October or May I think.

PS - from Antalya airport we booked a private transfer with SEJA Travel. Fantastic service!

We had a lovely stay at Wyndham Lara and would definitely recommend it.

The hotel is in a great location, right on the main strip, so you’re within walking distance of plenty of shops, bars and places to eat. The hotel itself was clean, comfortable and well maintained, and the staff were absolutely fantastic — extremely helpful, polite and friendly throughout our stay. They genuinely couldn’t do enough for us.

There were no issues getting sunbeds around the pool, which was a big plus. The beach is also within walking distance, although there is a shuttle bus running every 15 minutes if you don’t fancy walking. The beach area was lovely, with a nice beach bar and clean toilets, which made spending the day there really convenient.

Another great benefit is that you also have access to the Ramada Hotel across the road, so you can mix things up and use their facilities and food options as well. We really enjoyed having the choice between the two hotels.

The food at Wyndham was good, with plenty of choice, although as with most all-inclusive hotels, it can become a little repetitive if you’re staying for a longer period.

The only thing worth mentioning is that the music does get quite loud from around 9:30pm onwards, so this could be an issue if you prefer a very quiet evening or have an early night. However, this didn’t take away from our overall experience.

Overall, we had a great stay. The location, cleanliness, facilities and especially the staff made it a really enjoyable holiday. The staff deserve a special mention as they were brilliant from start to finish and always went above and beyond to help.