Blend Elphistone Resort Marsa Alam

This resort really exceeded our expectations and provided us with everything we needed after 15 days of touring the country - note: so many of the things said in the "bad reviews" that I read before booking are simply not true. We wanted comfort, relaxation, a clean beach, snorkelling, suntanning, and more than one restaurant during our 5-nights stay - and that is what you get. For the price of two dorm beds in Europe (70 euros) we had a gorgeous sea view (upgrade, babayyy), big beds, and a spacious bathroom in a private room. We had plenty of water given to us, lots of access to alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages (aka ;) mixers) all day long and found the variety of restaurants (plus snacks) combined with the international buffet to be good enough - and even very good sometimes. The service staff working in the restaurant speaks several different languages and they were all very friendly and accommodating to us - we even met the head chef several times who was also happy to explain the menu and share a laugh with my Italian friend. Laying out by the pools and going to the spa for massages (twice in fact, cause it is very affordable!) felt very luxurious for us - there is also water and juices served by all the pools. The sea was clean, and the snorkelling we did was fine, but I would recommend going on a a tour to a coral reef during a day trip - we also recommend the quad desert tour - it was awesome! The guy who coordinates the social events and dances with FIRE is super cool - very nice person and super talented too! Don't miss his show! Finally when we checked out on our last day they let us stay in our room til 3 pm which was very kind of them and allowed us to use the pool for a few last hours before returning to cold, grey Germany. I would totally stay at this place again for a week or so, as it was very chill and a great deal. (Pro-tip: bring your own bottle of gin/vodka ;)

The hotel is in a lovely location with it's own private beach. We were upgraded to a sea view room which was absolutely lovely. The third bed in the triple room was privately located the other side of the bathroom which was really nice. The food in the buffet was well cooked and there was enough variety during our stay for us all to choose something we would like to eat. We received fruit and drinks as a welcome gift which we really enjoyed and Ibrahim took good care of our room throughout our stay. We chose the hotel primarily as we planned to go scuba diving, and we really liked the opportunity to snorkel at the Elphinstone Reef from the end of the jetty which was available on the resort under the watchful eye of the lifeguard. It felt very safe.

My reviews are based on price vs services. Simply delightful as nice facilities, we were offered an upgrade with a lovely beach view as room service came daily and always bottled water available in the room. The buffet is very good only minus is breakfast being a little repetitive but both lunch and dinner always had different things every day. Something no one explains is that there's the drinks that are included in the all inclusive that includes some of the most common cocktails but there's also premium ones that have a cost, not a lot but if you want something branded or premium there's an extra for that. The beach is the Star of the resort we'll kept only a little coral and rocks, in general I don't think you need water shoes but if you like to explore yeah use them. Night activities are good and the animation team tries their best, fire show I recomend. For the price we payed for a week it's one bang for the buck for sure.

This large resort is 30 minutes from Marsa Alam airport. It served the best food I’ve ever had in Egypt during many years of travel there. One evening there was a superb filet mignon. The restaurant service team is really attentive and polite. The gardens are also really beautiful and continuously tended to. The resort has four pools, one is a quiet adult-only pool and another is heated which was nice now in the colder off season. The resort is not sheltered by wind as much, so very windy conditions result in a red flag requiring guests to stay inside the reef which still lets you swim in the ocean in the shallow. There was some animation by the pool and beach area, however finishing at a 11pmish at the latest.

The main thing I liked about the hotel was the 3 meals where the variety was amazing the quality pretty good and the service staff were always friendly and smiling and the hotel manager was always there to keep and eye on things. The pools were great and so was the beach and pier. Our waiter Abdelfattah was really nice and kept our same table every day, also offered puzzles for us to solve after we ate.