Mark Warner Phokaia Beach Resort

We have just returned from a week at this hotel - 4 adults. Key takeaways: 1. Turkey is more a lot more expensive than our last trip. A glass of house wine is £10. A bottle of house wine is £35. A beer is £6; 2. the hotel is very nice, although the rooms are slightly small. All of the staff are excellent, especially the room service; 3. we found the the Spa treatments to be both excellent value and quality. We booked 3 massages and were given a healthy discount - £55 per 1 hour massage; 4. the bikes were very well maintained by Gary and Jason. Much better than at other resorts. The road cycling is not amazing - busy roads - but the rides are well led and it is nice to get off the resort; 5. we have never stayed anywhere with so many sun beds, cabanas etc; 6. the main pool is unheated and was super cold. I expect in July and August, this is lovely, but we all struggled to stay in for more than a minute or two; 7. the food is typical buffet style, with a good selection. However, if you are vegan or have allergies, you will need to be very careful. The chefs do not appear to have fully worked out the importance of food labelling. There is a "vegan corner", but that only applies at dinner time. The hot vegan selection was extremely limited with the same dishes produced each day. This became a source of some frustration. Overall, the hotel is really well run, and very pleasant, but felt expensive. There are also lots of other guests (not Mark Warner) arriving over the weekend when noise levels really escalate. We had a good holiday, but will probably not return here. There are other (smaller/exclusive to MW) resorts we prefer.

We have visited the resort on many occasions since Mark Warner took over the resort a number of years ago and have always had a great experience. Great site with lots of activities and normally fantastic variety of food, even for a vegan/vegetarian. We had visited Phokaia in June this year and had a five star experience as always but this time the food did not live up to previous experiences. The quality and variety of the food had deteriorated on this visit since the last visit. Unfortunately on this visit the staff didn't seem to understand what vegan/vegetarianism is and thought meat was suitable for vegans/vegetarians on more than one meal sitting. After many happy and relaxing visits the resort definitely deserves a second chance.

We have just come back from an excellent week in Foca. A MW rep was in Gatwick to ease matters and the trip was well organised. The flight was pleasant, and on arrival in Turkey we were met by a rep and shown to our coaches. The transit was 2 hours due to traffic but otherwise pleasant. Cases were taken to our rooms, which was a nice touch. The rooms were lovely, well situated in beautiful gardens, and a 5 mins walk to everywhere. The pool is huge and many beds and cabanas around it and in the grounds, No early rising needed to beat the neighbours! The food and restaurant were first class. Lovely Turkish and Med dishes, great coffee and excellent staff. I never had any problems being understood. We went straight to bar to get drinks having read other reviews and the team were very helpful. Learn a few Turkish words and they will do anything for you. Lunch and dinner had a charcoal BBQ and amazing flatbreads too. Amazing kebabs, and fish - it was wonderful. The water sports were superb - we had 4 days of cat sailing with a superb instructor called Cody - what a great guy, and instructor. The wind got a bit fruity and we went like the wind. I relearned so much sailing and he was only 19 but you’d never guess. Other reviews mention the booze prices. I think a little context is needed. We paid a £1000 for the week each and got 19/21 meals for that with amazing facilities and water sports. Other resorts are ½ board (14/21 meals provided). 5 meals would cost £60 each for a week. Our 4 adults that is £240. Turkey has high inflation and so foreign drinks will cost a lot. Our overall room / bar bill was £580 for 4 adults. We didn’t spend much more so I think it is reasonable. Booze prices in town weren’t much different and a bottle of duty free gin and some locally bought tonic smoothed the way. The spa - just wonderful. We had a free 10 minute taster and the masseuses spotted all of my old rugby injuries and one new injury immediately. The same for my wife. The came up with a programme to treat and I have never felt better. They sorted out a foot injury I could barely walk on when I arrived. They were absolutely superb. Prices were about half that of the UK. Entertainment was really good too, and the MW staff were all excellent. The local Turkish teams were too - really friendly. Some people have mentioned parties. There was a wedding whilst we were there but no different to any other hotel we have stayed in. Music and laughter were in evidence, but no boorish behaviour. Overall, we have had an excellent holiday and would throughly recommend the resort.

A very well situated resort on a nice beach, with good water sports, decent food and an excellent entertainments team. Very noisy at night, as most of the guests are Turkish and they love to party till all hours. After a lot of argument we managed to move rooms to a quieter area, and then it was fine. Good sailing and windsurfing facilities and beach crew. Mostly no problem finding a boat or a windsurfer. Well drilled safety procedures. Charming cycling team (Luke excellent) but it’s not a mountain biking resort as there aren’t any off road trails, and it shouldn’t be advertised as such. All the hills around the resort are within a military zone, off limits to the public. Lots and lots of food, good quality but a bit samey, would be a good idea to have themed nights for different cuisines. Drinks expensive, even water, but no one seems to mind if you bring your own water bottles and fill them up at mealtimes. Enthusiastic fitness instructor (Lucy). Fantastic entertainments team (Hiro, John and Alim) constantly dreaming up way to amuse the guests, including pétanque, water polo, volleyball, karaoke, dancing, fire shows and talent contests.

The resort is nice with good facilities. Staff are friendly food is ok. Rooms are fine and cleaned well. Main problem is that they have corporate events at the hotel which go on til very late- there were people singing in the pool at 2 am. Also bar prices are ridiculously high.

Third time at Phokaia with Mark Warner and our sixth Mark Warner holiday over a 15 year period. Phokaia has a beautiful leafy setting and you will be able to find a sunbed somewhere in the resort, either by the pool or along the beach. Nearby Foca also has its charm, whereas some of the other Mark Warner resorts felt more characterless and barren. However, this year we were hugely disappointed compared to our visit here last year. Whereas the saving grace was the teenage club for our boys run by Mark Warner, the part of the experience that did not work well, was the part under direct control of the Turkish management of the hotel. The biggest shock this year, was the spike in alcohol prices in resort compared to last year. Lame excuses are given of inflation in Turkey and saying the nearby village charges the same. Nothing excuses £20 for a small glass of prosecco in a buffet setting. Or £150 for a basic wine you can buy for £15 in a UK supermarket or £70 for a Turkish wine that should in theory be very cheap with the current exchange rate. Prices were at least a third more than the nearby village. (so Mark Warner's unsurprising latest marketing email saying you could get £50 bar credit for October bookings at Phokaia, will not go far!) Furthermore, the waiting staff in the restaurant no longer speak basic English and even though they use google translate which is annoying, they do not know the menu e.g. Does fries come with the steak? We were told no, and then ordered sides of fries, only to end up with fries with the steak as well. This leads me on the other frustrating matter. A few issues arose and any dispute on the bill, takes three days or more to resolve as no one in management can make this decision apart from the hotel manager, who hides in his office and bats things over to Mark Warner management, even though the issues that arose are directly under his control and jurisdiction. There were observations that Turkish guests are given preferential treatment and I experienced this when the Mark Warner guests filed in to watch a show with the understanding that the best tables are for those who arrive first. Two minutes before the show starts, a waiter whisks a table right in front of all the other tables and seats a Turkish family there, which completely blocked the view of those who had arrived early for good seats. This year they have also cut out the barbeque buffet they used to have at the beach restaurant due to increased costs. As we have been here before, we knew to expect the local weekend pass visitors, resulting in increased smoking around the pool and beach, the tacky pool party with loud music, but this year, we felt like the second class guests, the sitting ducks being fleeced. Whereas I do not blame the Mark Warner staff on site who gave their all, I do hold Mark Warner head office accountable for not challenging the hotel management's latest pricing decisions and for the lack of basic standard expected in the