Deirdre McQuillanvisits Renaissance Golden View Beach Resort in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
IT WAS LATE when our Dublin flight arrived at Sharm El Sheikh, but as we made our descent a vast display of coloured lights twinkled like jewels in the desert below us. Queues quickly started to form for visas (€15), necessary if one wanted to travel outside Sharm to any other Egyptian destination. The bus to the hotel took about 40 minutes, passing flashy hotels, casinos and the honky-tonk resort of Naama Bay, crowded with tourists drifting around in that familiar aimless way.
The Renaissance is 10km away in a quieter spot on a headland at the end of a road leading to the Al Fanar lighthouse. A steel sculpture of doves in flight commemorates the terrible air crash of January 4th, 2004, when a plane en route to Paris crashed, killing all on board.
The hotel’s entrance, a spotlit, palm-lined avenue, led to a spacious marbled reception area, past a security check. Check-in for our party was reasonably speedy despite there being only two receptionists, and we were led to our room down a flight of steps past an outdoor swimming pool and bar area, attractively lit and landscaped.
The comfortable marble- floored and air-conditioned room featured a king-size bed with Egyptian cotton sheets and downy Featherfree duvets and pillows. Glass sliding doors opened on to a small open terrace with limited sea views facing a carob tree. There was a TV, internet access (€10 an hour) and mini bar stocked with beer, water and soft drinks. Wooden hangars hung in the wardrobe, and the large bathroom was equipped with bath, bidet, shower, wall hairdryer and acceptable toiletries. A proper sea view would have cost an extra €35 per day.
Guest rooms are spread around well-kept grounds planted with bougainvillea, hibiscus, privet and tamarisk. The hotel overlooks small shingle beaches and justly famous coral reefs, which are accessed via pontoons. Sharm has become a divers’ and snorkellers’ paradise, and snorkelling equipment can be bought in the small hotel shop.
The staff-to-guest ratio is high, and it shows. Breakfast in the Coast restaurant was ultra-efficient, with a variety of choice; the waffle and egg stations were usually the busiest – foul mesdames, an Egyptian bean speciality, were less popular than fried eggs or omelettes. Clientele were mostly Russians, Germans and British.
Flights of steps or longer pathways led down to the sea, where there was never any problem getting a lounger on the sun terraces – a system of plastic cards ensured the return of towels daily. Good-humoured Egyptian staff seemed happy in their work, particularly Mohammed at the beach-towel station, who had a lively sense of humour. The first question invariably asked was: “Where you from?”
There are four restaurants, two near the main lobby and two down at the sea. Aqua, beside one of the four swimming pools, was a shady place for lunch, as was Acapulco Joes, a Mexican. Aqua’s Reef or Beef nights, when guests select their own fish or meat, provided one of the week’s culinary highlights.
We found the Il Palio Italian restaurant expensive and rather mediocre; a better choice was Coast’s buffet for about €25. Wine was expensive, the cheapest being Egyptian at €20 a bottle (or €7 in the local supermarket). A beer cost about €3.50. A trip to Naama Bay (the hotel has a shuttle service) was worth it for the town’s many fish restaurants. Prices do not include a 21.5 per cent service charge, a 10 per cent sales tax and, at the hotel, a further 2 per cent if you charge a bill to your room. Costs including tips can mount up.
A diving centre at the hotel provides lessons for novices, and tours can be organised to various places. We took a boat trip to Ras Mohammed, Egypt’s famous national marine park (€40 each including lunch), with more than 1,000 species of fish and incredible lagoons and reefs. It was informative and fun, with stops at three snorkelling spots and an excellent lunch afterwards.
The weather was perfect in late October, hot but not humid and with a pleasing breeze. The only disturbing moment in an otherwise relaxing week was watching an Irish visitor expire from exhaustion; it was a juvenile sandwich tern, a migratory bird to the Middle East that, like us, was thousands of kilometres from its homeland.
WhereRenaissance Golden View Hotel, Om El Seid Hill, Sharm El Sheikh, South Sinai, Egypt. 00-20-693-664694, www.renaissancehotels.com/SSHBR.
WhatFive-star hotel overlooking the Red Sea.
Rooms385.
Best ratesStandard room from €102 per night, including breakfast. Seven nights' BB, including return flights and transfers with Panorama, from €714.
AccessWheelchair access at entrance and exit to pool area.
AmenitiesTennis court, sauna and fitness areas, bars, conference rooms, shop, money-exchange machine, beach volleyball, dive centre, creche.