Ponient Dorada Palace by PortAventura World

Coming near the end of our 2 week all inclusive stay. We booked with TUI, cost a fortune for a family of 5 all inclusive - had to book 2 rooms. 2 adults and 3 children. They don’t use their own planes in Belfast Int- they use Fly4. Saw the TUI rep floating about ONCE! Rooms were basic but clean with good AC. Upon booking with TUI we requested a low room floor with pool view - we got a fourth floor room with a road view! Wasn’t happy but that’s al they had apparently. Food was ok, different themes each day but pretty much the same food on offer. Outside pool snack bar food was dreadful! The ‘mixed’ burgers were like rubber the chips cold and hard, the cold salads were warm and the hot foods cold! The cocktails would blow your head off especially in the evening for some strange reason. The staff are wonderful, friendly and always offering to help, definitely service with smiles throughout the hotel. The hotel housekeeping employees look miserable - possibly over working and under paid. my child’s teddy from a very young age was mixed in the bed linen and taken to an external laundry, everyday we’ve been to the reception desk asking if someone can please locate it and return to us but all we get is ‘no sorry’ ‘no one has found it sorry’ ‘sorry no it has not been found’ ‘sorry no’. My child’s has been distraught on this holiday. The daily sun bed pool race each morning is a health and safety issue, there must be a more manageable and fair system put in place to reduce the high possibility of injuries. The men just bull their way through, it’s a disgrace. Kids club is great for the kids but repetitive but the team are fantastic with the kids, no complaints there. I wouldn’t choose this hotel again as I don’t believe it was worth what we paid. Just ok food, basic rooms, dodgy lifts, pigeons flying around the pool and pool snack bar.

Review We have just spent one week here overall we have had a good holiday. It’s also a pluss having the two day pass to the theme park. It’s a lovely hotel well maintained. The staff are all friendly and accommodating and hard working The negatives Food is not great and often cold. The options are also very repetitive. The pool bar serves burgers hotdogs and chips which is good.. The room is adequate for your stay can’t fault this. The walls are thin be prepared to hear your neighbours conversations I have never stayed in a hotel where your room is not cleaned daily. In the seven nights we have been here our room was cleaned twice I had to ask the cleaner on the floor for fresh towels/toilet roll on my way out of the room. Positive The beds are very comfortable. There is also laundry on site on the -1 floor. Ques- be prepared to que. All drinks are from the bar which I find strange as other all inclusive I have stayed in you can help yourself during the day to soft drinks etc. You also que at the bar at night. Which can be very long ques. I have spent a lot of time queuing. There are no bottles of water but you can get water from the snack bar. We went to the supermarket for bottles of water which was 5 mins away.. We had a fridge in the room. Pools - be prepared to not get a sunbed if you go after 9am . However there is another pool and also an adult only pool on floor 6. Plastic cups on arrival you are given vouchers to exchange at the bar for plastic cups you carry around with you they exchange the cups on each day however if you go to the theme parks and purchase cups there with a drink they will also fill these they will also fill your own Stanley’s etc. you are given a glass at evening time. Close to the shops /bars and beach Bus to and from the theme park stops running 12.20 picks up from 7.20 pm we walked to it from the hotel approx 2o mins walk . Overall a pleasant holiday for what we paid it was good. If you’re looking for 5 star services this isn’t the hotel for you.

We stayed here for four nights as two adults, after reading the negative reviews we didn’t know what to expect but I found the hotel to be absolutely fine, but the added bonus for us was the adults only rooftop pool terrace. Our room was spacious, clean and had been modernised in areas, the hotel does show some wear and tear in some areas but it does affect anything. The staff are a credit to the hotel everyone we spoke to was polite and hardworking. We stayed half board the food was fine, I’d say typical holiday buffet food with different theme nights. We got tickets to the theme park included in the price of our room, and for the price we paid for 4 days half board we was pleasantly surprised with the hotel. The rooftop pool and jacuzzis were great with ample Sun beds. We saw the rush for sun beds around the main pool and people leaving rubbish and food laying around so I can understand the negative reviews but I think the majority of the negatives reviews are down to the disrespectful guests and not the hotel itself, I would recommend and definitely stay again. Convenient location 13 mins taxi ride to airport 5/10 min walk to beach and promenade and walkable distance to theme park.

me and my partner came here from 1-8 july. i could not fault the hotel one bit! any thing that was a slight hindrance to us during our stay was out of the staffs control. speaking off staff, they were incredibly lovely! we had many conversations with the entertainment staff and enjoyed playing darts and pool with them. there is activities for all ages and it is very family friendly! if you are looking for a quieter holiday however, this might not be the one as there is lots of families that come here. me and my partner didn't mind this at all though. the food is lovely and there is a great range of different themes throughout the week. the rooms are clean and good quality and the hotel itself was also clean. i really liked how the cocktails were all slushy-type cocktails. would definitely recommend! the surrounding areas are also lovely and i will attach some pictures of these as i didn't get many in the hotel itself

Staff were lovely, food wasn’t too good to be honest plus if you like a cup of coffee or tea with your evening meal they don’t do them ,desserts were the same every night , toilets weren’t very clean and always running out of toilet paper , pool wasn’t very clean either especially around the edges , the rooms were cleaned every day and clean towels but we had a twin room which was very small the air con wasn’t brilliant either . The hotel was close to beach which was handy also I would like to complain about the music by pool it was awful some thing over and over again , there weren’t enough umbrellas by sun beds it is more a 2 star hotel . But would like to thank staff for ensuring we had breakfast on our last day . It could be a lovely hotel if they improved the look of it

Not long arrived back from this hotel with my 2 year old and my mum. We booked last year as Salou is the perfect location for a toddler due to the short flight and short transfer time. The free theme park tickets included made this hotel a winner for us. Nearer the time we had read lots of bad reviews and was slightly worried about staying here. The hotel is very warm inside and aircon units seem to be far and few between inside. The mini disco and show is indoors and it gets very warm in there! They have a stage outside so not sure why this isn’t utilized. The mini disco doesn’t start until 9pm every night. The show is at 10pm. Our aircon in our room worked fine as long as the balcony door was closed. The sunlounger situation is something I’ve never witnessed before. Grown men running and throwing towels on any sunbed they can see. Women losing shoes running to get a sunbed. People with bags for life full of towels. We did manage to get sunbeds each day, we walked down at 8.55 and almost straight out the doors to get a bed. Wouldn’t recommend taking your child down with you as they’re likely to get knocked over. Food was average. We were all inclusive and if you like chips, pasta, sausage and pork this place is for you. Very repetitive and the ‘themed nights’ weren’t all that great. The outside bar snacks was almost always empty, and anybody could help themselves so people not all inclusive were going up and taking food. The all inclusive icecream wasn’t available on several occasions, I did buy ice creams to be told by another holiday goer that they should be half price for all inclusive and they were charging me full price (€4.50) for one! Location is great, 10 minute walk from the beach, but there is quite a steep hill to walk up and down and it’s tiring in 35 degree heat! Cleanliness was a bit of an issue, especially having a young child with me. The pool never seemed to be tested or cleaned. It was always very dirty and cloudy, my little one ended up with someone’s hair extension out in his hand! The toilets almost never had toilet roll in them and they need a bit of an upgrade. Room was cleaned everyday but inconsistent in how many towels and toilet rolls were left. Very very noisy corridors between 11-1am people returning to their rooms but this obviously can’t be helped and may have just been an issue with our floor at that time. Could also hear the noise from outside from floor 4 until early hours. Overall I probably wouldn’t return, it seems the hotel has far too many rooms for the amenities it offers. For the price we paid and this being rated 4*, I’d have expected better than what we got.

This hotel is very disapointing the food is disgusting no selection same thing every morning and evening, The toilets arent clean and when i was there the electricity went and the air conditioning wasnt working also we had to upgrade our room and it still wasnt big enough this hotel is a scam.I went as half board and i wanted to get a glass of coke and was given out to and they should have cleaned thr toilets than give out about taking a glass of coke . The roof was also leaking and was quite bad ,so if you were looking for somewhere to go stay as far away as you can from here.

I wouldn’t recommend staying here if you don’t want to feel like ur living in a dump this place is disgusting the food is rotten and the rooms wouldn’t even fit a dog we had to pay more for a room which is ridiculous the bathrooms are rotten the smell is rotten the pool is dirty not even clean the electricity went and when we were staying there was a leak in the roof the only good thing was the tickets to porta vantoura if you were to go to any hotel stay at home and don’t come here unless u want to be living in a kip

Food bland ,someone was sick in pool took them over an hour to get people out after numerous complaints .Bird crap eating areas outside..won't be back...

Hotel with a lot of issues, we were given a reusable cup on arrival to be used through our stay. This is ok but when we went to bar the staff would refill without washing or replacing the cup. We had to constantly ask for this to be done. There are pigeons and seagulls everywhere fouling on guests. 3 times I was fouled on. Food is cheap and lacks quality. Often cold and repetitive. During our stay a guest was sick in the pool. This was reported to staff repeatedly before someone came to clean it. Even after reopening the pool there was visible signs of vomit still floating in the water. I could go on and on but all I can say is avoid this hotel if you want an enjoyable experience

Good hotel. Theme park was amazing! The food at hotel was hit and miss it did seem to get better as the week went by. Beach was really nice. Weather not the best whuch would have made all the difference. Hotel entertainment at night time was ok. Couldnt fault the cleanliness of hotel. All in all a good holiday.

Costa Dorada Prison not Palace If I could give this hotel 0 then I would. I can’t wait for the copy and paste reply - please don’t bother, we will never return to this awful place. The hotel is NOT a 4* hotel, we have stayed in some beautiful, well ran hotels with lovely food and this is not one of them. We have also stayed in better 3* hotels. This is the only hotel I have been glad to leave. I don’t really know where to start, I may as well start with the pro’s as there isn’t a great deal to say: -Location, this was great easy to walk to PortAventura and equally as easy to walk down to the beach. -Bedroom, was fairly modern and clean, beds were comfy enough however they weren’t big enough for two people. That’s about where it ends for the room. There are no tea/coffee making facilities in the room which is really poor for a 4* hotel. Yes you can hear your neighbours - luckily ours weren’t too noisy. The Con’s, get comfy and get a cup of tea it’s a long one: I want to start by saying we aren’t ones to moan, we travel multiple times a year worldwide. I have never written a poor review about an establishment and we have stayed in various rated hotels - ones less than this supposed 4*. We stayed half board for a week as a family of 3. Firstly don’t be fooled by the nice photos online they are deceptive and make it look nicer than it is. When you first walk into reception to check in it looks nice and just goes downhill. Food: The quality is poor, the trays often run out and quickly I had to ask numerous times for them to be replinshed. There are meant to be themes each night which usually consists of them changing the decorations on top of the food carousel and that’s it. The restaurant is big, to only have one main food carousel to serve a restaurant that size is poor. It results in queues along the whole stretch of people waiting for hot food, meaning you can’t get in to other sections with cold food at times. You have to wait to be seated and this can result in queues to get in when it is busy. You then can’t choose where to sit and get put where they choose even if it is not your preference. There are some odd combinations of food at times that you would not put together as a meal. It becomes very repetitive as well. Even plates run out at times, it’s basics and they can’t meet it as they are clearly overwhelmed. There is no drinks service at your table, you have to go and surprise surprise queue up in a long queue. We just didn’t bother and didn’t have a drink with our meal. It’s a poor business model as people aren’t buying drinks that would. Not what you expect in a 4*. Pool/Outdoor area: Dirty, grubby, tired and just stepped out the 90s. There are cracked tiles, sunbeds and umbrellas past there best. You only need to look at photos from 10+ yrs ago and they are the same ones. They are dirty, cracked, ripped etc. Never once saw the poolside being washed down. Normally see staff pressure washing pool areas and beds down in an evening but nothing. Never once did we see them test the chemicals in the pools. There is a small baby pool, a main pool in the same area. There is then another pool round the side and apparently a roof top one but we never went up there as it’s adults only. If you want to go and sit out in the morning and read a book or sit and relax with a coffee don’t think you will be doing this before 9am. NEVER in my life have I experienced this at a hotel anywhere in the world. You are basically locked in the hotel and prevented from going out in the pool/outside/garden area, you can only leave the hotel by the main entrance. See my comments on sunbeds. The grass and flowers were poorly maintained in places with weeds growing between plants. Looking back on old photos the grass near the baby pool and grassed area beyond the main pool with palm trees used to be green and lush. It has not been looked after and is now a mix of dead grass and dusty muddy area. This could either be a lovely grassed area again or paved for more sunbeds. If it isn’t watered and looked after not sure what they expect. It looks like there used to be a rear entrance gate off another road but they have stopped its use and let the area become unkempt. Pool rules: Depends who is on that day, never heard a whistle blown so much. I would be a millionaire if I got a euro for every time it was blown. Wearing your sunglasses - whistle blown, got an inflatable including small floatation rings for small children - whistle blown, kids jumping in - whistle blown one girl said she was banned for 5hrs for jumping in. No consistency, some days things were allowed and another day you were told off. Staff changed the rules from one day to the next. Poolbar: Again queues, you have to time it right going up otherwise you are stood waiting ages. It is very bizzare that you have to pay €1 each time for your cup and then take it back to get your €1 euro back. Again never had this at a hotel and don’t expect to have to do this at a 4*. Sunbeds: Don’t get me started on this shambolic debarkle. As I mentioned previously you are locked in from accessing the pool/garden area before 9am, this is apparently to do with them cleaning the pool area but not sure where/when as it’s grubby as anything and because the pool is closed until 9am as there aren’t any lifeguards. This is complete nonsense as the pool shuts at 8pm and there are no lifeguards then but you can still go out. It is an utter joke. Be prepared to start queuing at 8am at the doors like you are a caged animal waiting to be set free. What then ensues is some dangerous frenzy of people running, tripping and falling over witnessed by us from the balcony - not that the hotel care about this. The hotel are single handidly fuelling this quite frankly farcisle state of affairs. Don’t expect anymore sunbeds as they apparently won’t be getting anymore. Considering the hotel holds around 1000-1200 people at peak and they have about 250-300 sunbeds. So if you like sharing thats 3-4 people per bed. It’s also not the hotels problem, we raised it at reception and the staff member couldn’t care less. You should not be prevented from using the outdoor area at anytime, you pay for this facility. At all the hotels we have travelled over the years not one has locked the doors to the outdoor area and guess what there has never been this problem with sunbeds. Yes some people might get up at 7am and go out and some at 8/9am but thats your choice as a guest what time you want to get up and go out not when the hotel dictate. On our first day we had to sit on plastic chairs - just what we paid for. Other poor people just sat on the floor. Staff: Some staff were friendly and trying their best. Others had bad attitude like the one we spoke to at reception about the sun-bed issue. Any issues raised there was never once an apology. Management also left a lot to be desired, we spoke to a number of people that also had bad experiences with management. Kids club: We visited on two occasions and it was poor. On our package holiday providers website it showed, lots of toys and play equipment which looked good for our little one. The kids club is a chalet/bungalow building by the side pool, what it actually consisted of is a very sparse room with some tables and chairs and two tatty old dirty play kitchens. There wasn’t much on display and very bare display boards. The activities were quite basic when we popped in such as colouring, colouring in a mask etc. There were no toys or choice of activities and definitely nothing like advertised in the images. Due to how poor it was we only went briefly on those two occasions. Kids play area outside: The green soft ground surface was old, cracking and coming up in clumps. The equipment wasn’t too bad but area wasn’t nicely maintained. There were multiple ants nests by the outdoor play area, this meant we barely used it as we did not want our young child getting bitten. Entertainment: Mini disco starts usually at 9pm occasionally at 8.30pm depending on what’s on after. It’s always this sort of time at hotels we have visited but it is a bit late for little ones that would normally be in bed. Not sure why it can’t be earlier as families are sat there around 8pm onwards anyway waiting for it to start. The disco is what it is but was very repetitive, every night the same songs on repeat. We didn’t really stay for the evening entertainment but what we saw one night was a male singer and it was awful to say the least, we thought it was karaoke 🤣 Inside bar: Again queues, sometimes there would be about 15 people in the queue just to get a drink in the evening. Queues: As you can see there is a theme occurring, can’t say the theme is better than the restaurant meals each night either. Want a drink/icecream round the pool - queue up, want your meal - queue up for the restaurant, want a drink with your meal in the restaurant - queue up, want a sunbed - queue up before the race begins, want a drink in evening - queue at the bar, have a query or question for reception - that’s right join the queue please. Want to queue up? Join the queue for the queue please. Public toilets: We used the toilets between the evening entertainment/restaurant area as these were the only ones we were aware of. Between our family we used male and female ones and every single time they were a state. More often than not there was no toilet roll you would go in to find 3-5 cardboard rolls on the floor and no paper. Sometimes there would be paper but never on the proper holder just dumped on top of the toilet or on the floor. The soap holders were rubbish they barely worked or were left with the cover flipped down so you had to put your hand in to scoop the soap out. One out of the three taps didn’t work, whilst they replaced a working tap with a new one - that then wasn’t working to start with so there was only one working sink. The hand dryer also stinks when you use it. The male toilets were just as bad. Reception/checkin: Very slow, it meant if you ever had a query you needed to wait until there was no queue as you could be stood waiting ages. The check in process seems to run slowly, the probably need more people on checkin at peak times. Lift: The lifts to the side of reception are in the most bizarre place. There is a narrow corridor going alongside reception through to the evening entertainment/bar area. The lifts for this building are located in this narrow corridor meaning when you have a pushchair/suitcases you are blocking the corridor whilst waiting or vice versa if you are wanting to walk through whilst there are people waiting its problematic. It’s poorly thought out and by taking out the wall between the corridor and stairwell would negate a lot of this problem. Which when you look on package holiday providers websites it shows it as all open plan so not sure why it was bricked up. The reviews don’t lie, if you are happy to go and make your own mind up then good luck but for what we paid that isn’t something I would be willing to risk when there are much better. Look back to peak times in 2025, it’s the same issues I have mentioned above and what has been done about it…nothing. This place is poorly ran, it clearly has no desire to improve, we chose this hotel over cheaper options as the pictures looked a bit nicer and reviews at the time didn’t look too bad (if only we had scrolled back a bit further to see what it is actually like). I only hope these reviews either stop someone else from making the same mistake in booking or the package holiday companies look at pulling this from the hotels they provide. I can’t believe that Portaventura would want to be anyway associated with this place.

Won't be back here again, definitely not the same hotel as advertised, beds uncomfortable, no soundproofing in rooms whatsoever, entertainment at night was shockingly bad, some nights we couldn't even get a seat, and why indoors? Worst of all was the food, bland with very little choice, cold and more or less the same every night, certainly never seen much of the so called theme nights, worse though was the seating arrangement in the dining hall, not allowed to choose your own seat! We got moved even though we had drinks, food already on the table and I was using a walking stick! Plenty of empty tables around but every one all squashed together, went all inclusive bit ended up eating out most nights, appreciate that staff work hard but they need to remember that we pay and pay a lot of money for our holidays and we certainly didn't feel well rested!

This hotel is by all means a budget hotel so don’t go expecting luxury. We were in a big group and it done us ok but I wouldn’t go back. The pros- the rooms were clean, the cleaners came round multiple times a day so if you wanted a lie in and put the do not disturb sign on, your room would be cleaned later in the day if you wanted. There was AC in the room that was great, kept our room so nice and cool. There was also lots of little lights in various parts of the room- this is a weird thing to add but I appreciated this, hotels can often be one or 2 lights for the whole room so it’s either light or dark but we were able to put a light on either side, a light in the bathroom and a light up beside the full length mirror, this was handy as we have a three year old so we could keep the place dark-ish while he was asleep. There were also black out curtains in the rooms. I found all of the staff really lovely and helpful, from the housekeepers to bar staff to reception staff everyone was really friendly and helpful. We loved the location, it was a 5 min walk to the main strip but just tucked away enough that we didn’t hear any noise from the strip and a 10min walk to the beach. The pool bar food was ok, there was decent enough variety and it was good for snacks for us and the kids during the day and the breakfast was ok too. The cocktails were also really nice, so rare to see proper slushy cocktails made to order included with AI. The cons- lunch and dinner was awful, I’m not a fussy person but even I struggled with the restaurant food for lunch and dinner, we went for dinner once and ate out every other night, the food was really really bad, worst I’ve ever had in any hotel. The set up was strange too, it was never once busy when we went but we still had to wait to be seated then the staff would show us to a table, we’d often be put to the very back of the hall which I found annoying because we have a 3 year old, if we were seated closer to the buffet then we would be able to see him and leave him at the table for a min or two while I got him food but we were always placed too far away for me to be comfortable leaving him so I had to drag him round the buffet or one of us had to wait with him while the other picked the food. We were also always placed right next to other people, I would have preferred to be a bit further away so we had a bit of space for bags, pram etc I would understand this if it was busy but it never was. There is also no drinks to help yourself to except water, you have to stand in a queue to get a drink of anything, even juice. This was annoying too because one of us would be finished and the other would still be in the queue. This leads into my biggest gripe of this hotel- queues. The queues were insane, everywhere was queued, we waited 45 mins to check-in when we arrived, the pool bar is just a constant 20 minute queue all day and it is the only place open, there is no where to help yourself to a drink so unless you want water from a teeny paper cup you have no choice but to wait in it and you aren’t allowed to fill bottles from the water machine. You are also only allowed 3 drinks at a time, this was really annoying because we were a group of 11 so 4 of us always had to go to the bar to get everyone a drink. I’ve never seen a hotel that didn’t have a juice bar where you could just help yourself or a beer and wine tap where you could just help yourself. This would have been such an easy fix because we mostly drank juice during the day and a few beers or wine at night. A few times we bought a bottle of wine and took it down because the queues just weren’t worth the effort. If you go to this hotel do not go all inclusive, it is not worth it. The back pool was also really dirty, one of the days we noticed lots of little polystyrene balls floating in it- assuming some sort of float exploded and they were there for at least 3 days just floating about the top- we left and they were still there, the main pool seemed ok but the kids pool was full of dirt as the area surrounding the kids pool is muck. We never went to the rooftop bar as it’s adults only but it is not included in the all inclusive, you have to pay for drinks and snacks and a lot of people were complaining about this.

Good location. Excellent happy crew, great with kids. Life guard with the gold tooth was outstanding. Really diligent watched pool at all times. Food ok, found something everyday. Entertainment was ok we have seen worse! Hotel clean. Staff pleasant and friendly on the whole. Duty manager was useless when our 5 year old went missing for over 30 minutes, told my son in law to walk to police station and get out of reception as he was wet! He said you call the police and my child is missing so I will not be leaving until you offer some help. He would not call the police and sent the only non English speaking staff member present to look for a 5 year old English child! Not helpful. Reported to senior manager who was most apologetic and said he would be following this up as his whole attitude to a missing child was diabolical. Luckily she was found safe and well no thanks to duty manager. 9 year was accidentally given a cocktail not a mocktail but we intercepted it in time and no harm done. Queues for bar could be very long. Usual sun lounger issue. People putting towels out and not using the beds all day! Sign says if sunbeds unused for 15 minutes towels would be removed. Be good if this was done as people had kids by the pools with nowhere to sit because of selfish people. We had a great holiday and the grandkids want to go back. Our daughter and son in law like us prefer to visit different places but would go back if it wasn’t for that.

Just returned from a weeks AI stay. The hotel offers everything you can expect from a budget friendly Spanish hotel aimed at families. Rooms - we stayed in a double room 160 overlooking the pool area. Exceptionally clean on arrival, towels and bedding changed daily. Spacious and comfortable balcony area. Air conditioning worked well. Shower pressure was excellent. The room only had two sockets + 1 in the bathroom, we could’ve done with a few more but we are a family travelling with 2 kids who want devices charging so that’s more of an us problem rather than the hotel. Pools - We have 2 young children so it was important to us that we had sunbeds with a good view of the water, guests are not allowed out to the pool area until 9am queues do start forming from 8.30 which we joined but if your not worried about location there are plenty of beds available after this time. They do fill up by late morning but you don’t have to do the early morning rush if you don’t want to. One day when it was particularly busy they brought out extra beds and were offering them to guests that didn’t have one. Pool area is cleaned early every morning. Beds aren’t brand new but do the job. No inflatables in the main pool which was a bit annoying to begin with but kids soon got used to it. Inflatables are allowed at the smaller rear pool but we didn’t use this as it is covered by a lot of shade. Restaurant - We found the food offered at both breakfast and evening meal times were great. Everyone in our party were satisfied and there were always plenty of options if you are willing to step away from the standard of hotdogs chips pizza and pasta. Each dish had flavour and we didn’t find anything to be bland. Your satisfaction will depend on your choice. We found staff at the restaurant really helpful and polite. You are greeted at each sitting and shown to a table based on your group size. Roberto in particular was excellent and took time to explain the process and layout to us on our first day. This was really helpful. Pool Bar - Large range of choices in food and drinks. Snacks available throughout the day, kids were never hungry. Burgers, Chips, Pizza, Salads, Fruit, Icecream. Queues fluctuate throughout the day for drinks but staff work really hard to keep wait times to a minimum. If the queue was long we would wait 5 minutes and it would soon go down. Large covered seating area for pool bar which always had seating available. Evening Entertainment - This is heavily aimed at small children. Nightly mini disco at 9pm then an hour of entertainment from 10pm which varies every night. The mini disco my youngest loved but the following entertainment was hit and miss. All entertainment is indoors which is a shame as it would be nice to sit outdoors of an evening while abroad but we were unable to do this if kids were inside for the disco. There is a stage outside by the pool bar but this wasn’t used at all during our stay. Queues at the bar can become very long of an evening but they do try their best to clear it. Communal Areas - Mostly modern and clean however the main toilets require regular cleaning due to the number of guests using them. Once a day is not enough for the amount of use they get, by evening they could be quite unpleasant to use. Overall we really enjoyed our stay. We would return. If you are looking for a high end aesthetically pleasing resort you will be disappointed. But if you can appreciate this hotel for what it is you will enjoy your stay.

After reading all the negative reviews we were dubious upon arrival at this hotel but were pleasantly surprised. The hotel. Pools and rooms are clean, staff are friendly and polite and always always busy! I wasn’t entirely happy with my room as it was small and so was the balcony but they changed it straight away and were really helpful. There is not a great deal of sunbeds around the family pool is probably a downfall but throughout the three pools there is enough to accommodate all the guests. I have found the food good, it is not à la carte but it doesn’t state to be it is buffet style and a good variety. All food was fresh and hot. We were all inclusive and found all the drinks to be great, nice wine and cocktails. If you take the hotel for what it is it delivers everything for a family holiday. Entertainment was good and the team were great for kids disco each evening. Rooms are cleaned daily and as mentioned before all. The staff look constantly busy and smiling. I think the hotel has been given a bad image and I know people have their own experiences but ours was comfortable, pleasant and enjoyable.

I want to start with some background. My family and I visited this hotel on numerous occasions before its takeover by Portaventura World in December 2023, and we always had fantastic experiences. We returned to the Dorada Palace this year (now renamed Ponient Dorada Palace) for the first time since the takeover.  To say it has gone downhill massively would be a severe understatement. While the hotel website advertises major renovations and modernization, the marketing images are misleading. In person, it looks like a cheap makeover designed to cover up worn areas rather than the complete renovation you are led to believe. We booked based on past experiences, but the current reality is a major letdown. 🟢 The Pros: • Park Tickets: 2-day tickets to Portaventura Park and Ferrari Land were included in our stay. • Shuttle Service: A free, convenient shuttle service to and from Portaventura World is provided. • Cleanliness: The rooms themselves were clean and have received some basic modernization. • The Staff: Every staff member we interacted with was polite and incredibly hard-working. They are clearly overworked, so my issues lie entirely with management, not the frontline team. 🔴 The Cons: • Terrible Food & Poor Restaurant Layout. The food was genuinely awful and very limited. The restaurant is a large room with tightly packed, back-to-back seating. Mysteriously, staff insist on seating everyone right next to each other, leaving half the room entirely empty. The buffet setup is highly inefficient. There is only one central island for the entire restaurant, a third of which is dedicated to a children's section with a live cooking area in the corner and the dessert Island in the other.  You are left with basic, low-quality pool-bar food (fries, burgers, hot dogs). Trays are rarely refilled on time, leaving guests with even fewer choices. Furthermore, the advertised "theme nights" are a gimmick; the only things that change are the decorations and an AI-inspired billboard outside the restaurant area, the food itself remains exactly the same in my experience. • Excessive Queuing... If you love to queue, this is the hotel for you. You will queue for ages at check-in, queue again at the pool bar because there are no self-service soft drink or beer machines for All-Inclusive guests, then queue around the tiny buffet island at dinner, and queue again in a separate queue at the restaurant bar just to get a drink with your meal. Once the pool bar closes, you move to the interior bar where you will queue yet again, only to be served beer in a tiny 330ml glass in the evenings. You spend more of your holiday standing in lines than relaxing. Tip for Future Guests: The hotel operates on a token system for plastic cups, which you must carry everywhere. If you forget your cup, they will not serve you, even with an All-Inclusive wristband. However, if you go to Portaventura Park and buy a drink there, they provide it in a 500ml reusable cup, which if you bring it back to the hotel with you the hotel staff will fill it, saving you multiple trips to the bar. • Deceptive "Kitchen" Apartments & Hidden Costs. We paid extra for a 1-bedroom apartment with kitchen facilities so we could prepare food for the kids outside of standard dining hours. In the past, these came fully stocked. To our surprise, while the hobs and microwave were there, management had stripped out every single plate, cup, pan, cutlery item, and even the kettle. You couldn't even make a cup of tea. When I asked about a kettle, I was told they no longer supply them and instead use an outside hire company with a lengthy price sheet. We ended up buying a travel kettle at a local supermarket for €11, which was significantly cheaper than renting one. Furthermore, irons have been removed from the rooms; you must now pay €3 for 20 minutes to use a terrible, burnt iron in the basement laundry room on a lopsided wall mounted ironing board. • Poor Maintenance. The toilets near the entertainment area smelled of raw sewage, and the soap dispensers were broken off the walls. In the cubicles, sharp metal toilet roll holders were left hanging open which resulted in a member of our party actually cutting their arm on one by the pool toilets. Further maintenance issues was an air conditioning vent near the dessert station in the restaurant is visibly bulging from the ceiling due to a water leak. It looks ready to collapse, yet management continues to seat families directly beneath it. Another vent by the restaurant bar drips condensation and is developing black mold. There are cracked tiles around the pool that could easily cut open a foot, and the children's play area is so run-down that it sat completely abandoned anytime I seen it. • Sun Lounger Shortages & Pool Cleanliness. The hotel accommodates roughly 1,000 to 1,300 guests at peak times but only provides around 300 sun loungers. Staff block access to the pool area until 9:00 AM, leading to a massive horde of guests waiting at the doors to sprint for a bed. The loungers themselves are dated and worn out. We gave up entirely and just sat at the pool bar chairs. Because guests leave food wrappers behind and there is minimal ground staff cleaning up during the day, the pool area frequently gets messy and attracts pigeons who are trying to eat the left over food. • Room Comfort & Noise, while spacious, the rooms are not soundproofed at all; we could hear neighboring conversations perfectly clear, especially through the bathroom walls. Additionally, the air conditioning struggled in the 30–31°C heat. (Counterintuitively, the AC worked noticeably better when the fan speed was manually set to "1" rather than "2" or "3" setting on the fan controller). Final Verdict: Knowing how brilliant this hotel used to be, this stay was an incredibly disappointing and an expensive letdown. Management is running this property into the ground and exploiting an overworked, understaffed team. Salou has plenty of fantastic hotels and unfortunately, this is no longer one of them. We will not be returning and would recommend anyone who is considering this hotel to look elsewhere as it's not worth the money.

Following earlier review on Day 3 of 10 it all went downhill. We tried Dinner it was abysmal, undercooked, strange combinations. Not sure who they were catering for but it certainly wasn’t anybody in my party. Out of the six of us none of us could eat the food as it was either undercooked chicken or fish. We don’t eat pork due to religious beliefs so that ruled out half of the options. We could have had pizza, chips or chicken nuggets but not ideal when your in your thirties and fifties. Days 4-10 again abysmal.

Booked last minute, 2 adults and a 2 year old. Cheap enough holiday so wasn't expecting perfection. £1500 half board from belfast. Overall hotel is in a good location but wont be returning. Happy enough as we made our holiday what we wanted but if we would of paid what we usually pay for our holiday I would of been raging. Reception Area was nice and was clean, I used the online check in so it do speed it up but all the people in front of me hadn't so it did take quite a while to check in as the que wasn't moving but cant really blame the hotel for that. If everyone used the online check in it would be much quicker for everyone. To leave you suitcase in a locker is €8 a locker so if you have a few bags thats pricey enough. Just as I was about to put the bags into the lockers my room was ready. 3 hours early so cant complain and this was great. Staff friendly enough no complaints there. Rooms Room was a pool view room, it was clean, had a safe, and beds were comfy. Strange thing was lack of towels in the bathroom. Only 1 large towel between the 3 of us. It was cleaned everyday but if you want your bedsheets changed you have to tell reception. The room Pool 9am opening so this encourages people to que up until the doors are opened. At the start of our week this was funny to watch as people ran to get sunbeds and I found most beds were gone in 15 minutes. If you wanted a bed with an umbrella you had to join the morning dash which I wasn't going to do so we improvised shade using our buggy for the little one and just accepted no umbrella for us for the first half of the week. This could be fixed by more umbrellas and maybe not locking the doors until 9am but im no expert. As the week progressed the hotel got quieter so there was a que in the morning but it was a walking race rather than running but loads of beds left right up until about 11am. I did find the area around the pools dirty and grubby especially the kids pool and the tables were mostly dirty even in the morning. Some mornings the pool started clean and got dirty as the day went on which is normal but strange that some mornings it was dirty from the start. The rule of not filling your water bottle from the water station is absolute nonsense and was ignored. Loads of cracked tiles and areas that need repainted and a spruce up. Food Simply not for me. The buffet is chaos really and I couldnt find anything I wanted to eat really so we ate out every night but 1 so cant make an honest comment on the evening food. My wife described it as edible but thats not what I want on holiday so preferred to go out and was happy with that because our holiday was cheap so had the budget to do that. Breakfast is the same everyday but again not for me. I just had fruit everyday and didnt think the rest was up to scratch for a 4 star hotel but thats just my own opinion. It was always so others would disagree with me. Pool bar food is edible but thats about it. I found the price to be the same as gping out for lunch so we only ate lunch there 2 days out of the 7. The pizza was as good as a frozen basic Iceland pizza and the burgers were the same really. Kids play park area Dont go near it, trip Hazards and holes all around it and not safe for kids but that didnt bother us as we were there for a park