Wyndham Garden Lara

⭐⭐⭐⭐☆

We stayed from 30 August to 8 September and this was our third visit to the resort. We travelled as a family, booking two double rooms for myself and my wife and a separate room for my wife's brother, who has a disability.

Before travelling, I contacted the reservations team to request that our rooms be located close together. They advised they would do their best, subject to availability.

Arrival & Check-in

We arrived at the hotel shortly after 1pm and were initially offered rooms on two different floors. We explained that this arrangement would not work due to the needs of our family member, and we were understandably disappointed that our request had not been accommodated.

The hotel offered us a family room as an alternative, which we viewed. Although it was a nice room, we preferred having two separate rooms. We spoke with Guest Relations, the Jet2 representative and, I believe, a manager who also came to reception to assist.

Eventually, we were offered two rooms on the same floor, one door apart. As these rooms had only recently been vacated, they still needed to be cleaned, and we were advised that they would be ready in a couple of hours. We agreed and headed to the snack bar for lunch while we waited.

I'm pleased the situation was resolved in the end, but I do feel that families who need to stay together due to disabilities, age or mobility issues should be given priority where possible. I appreciate the hotel was busy, but nobody wants to start their holiday feeling stressed.

Rooms

We stayed in standard double rooms located on the first floor of Main Building 5.

The rooms were clean and functional but on the small side. Our balcony overlooked a roof and fire escape, so the view wasn't particularly appealing. Another small point was the limited drying space. There was only one small hanging rail for wet towels and swimwear, which wasn't really enough.

The shower was generally good and the air conditioning worked well throughout the stay. The only issue was that water would occasionally seep out from the shower door onto the bathroom floor, so the shower enclosure may need some maintenance or better sealing.

As expected from our previous visit, there were no English-language TV channels available other than news channels. This wasn't a major issue as we were able to screen mirror Netflix from our phone, though sometimes it would drop out due to internet connectivity.

One area that could definitely be improved is the replenishment of drinks and refreshments in the room. Apart from the two small bottles of water provided daily, very little was replenished during our stay. On one occasion the coffee and sugar were topped up, but soft drinks and other items were generally not replaced. I experienced the same issue during a previous visit, so this appears to be an ongoing problem.

Sleep quality was also somewhat affected by the pillows, which felt lumpy and in need of replacement.

Food & Dining

We didn't use the main restaurant for breakfast, so can't comment on that.

For lunch, we mainly ate at the snack areas around the hotel, the Ramada section and the beach facilities. Overall, the food was good and convenient, but the selection became repetitive as the holiday progressed. A little more variety would make a significant difference for longer stays.

Dinner was generally enjoyable. There was plenty of food available and most people will find something they like. However, we again found the selection somewhat repetitive compared to previous visits.

The restaurant can be quite busy during the evening. We typically arrived around 8pm and sometimes had to spend time looking for available tables before being seated. We always managed to find one eventually, but table turnover could perhaps be managed more efficiently.

One thing we noticed was staff beginning to clear down certain food stations around 8:30pm to 8:45pm. While we understand preparations need to be made for closing, it can make guests feel rushed. It would be preferable if the full offering remained available until the advertised closing time.

Beach & Facilities

One of the highlights of the resort is the beach area.

The beach can be reached in around eight minutes on foot or by using the complimentary shuttle bus, which runs approximately every fifteen minutes.

We really enjoyed the beach facilities. There were plenty of sun loungers under shaded canopies, a pleasant bar area, a pizza station and lunch facilities. There is also a beach pool, although we didn't use it as it appeared quite busy whenever we visited.

We spent most of our pool time at the Ramada pool area, particularly during the late afternoons. Although still busy, it felt noticeably calmer than during the middle of the day.

Outside the Resort

There are plenty of shops located directly outside the hotel along the main strip. However, beyond shopping there isn't a huge amount to do in the immediate area.

It would be nice to see more restaurants, cafés and entertainment venues nearby, as there is only so much shopping you can do during a holiday.

We also visited Land of Legends, which was well worth seeing at least once. Transport from the hotel was around £10 per person. The complex is impressive, with lots of branded shops, entertainment and attractions, although it is quite expensive.

While there, we took a boat ride costing approximately £30 per person for around eight minutes. It was enjoyable enough, but personally I wouldn't do it again as I didn't feel it represented good value for money.

Overall

This was our third visit to the resort and, generally speaking, not a great deal has changed since our previous stays.

There are certainly areas that could be improved, particularly room replenishment, dining variety and ensuring room allocation requests for families with specific needs are given greater consideration.

That said, we still had a good holiday. The beach facilities remain excellent, the staff ultimately resolved our room allocation issue, and the location remains one of the resort's biggest strengths. Being in Lara means the transfer from the airport is only around 30 minutes, which makes arrival and departure much easier.

Overall, we enjoyed our stay and would rate it 4 out of 5 stars. While there are areas that could be improved, the positives still outweigh the negatives, and we would consider returning again in the future.

Stayed with he family last week of September and we enjoyed our holiday.

We were fortunately given a free upgrade to a suite which was awesome (usually £1000 extra). A huge living room area really made a difference with having kids. Room is modern and new and fit for purpose. The balcony is small though. 2 chairs and a very small table is it.

The hotel is immaculate throughout. You won't go 10 seconds at any time, anywhere in the hotel without seeing someone sweeping, cleaning windows or picking up cups. Very hard working all day and night.

The pools were warm enough, 10 seconds in and it was pleasant. The Pool by the hotel is kinda quiet and by 4pm has no sun at all due to the large hotel next door. The Ramada gets sun most of the day and its more lively, louder music, more things going on and generally a nicer place to be. Both hotels have much the same food and drinks so just pick and choose to mix it up a bit. The pool and bar area down at the beach is better again. Again a bit more of a holiday feel, music, large bright area right by the beach. We liked it. Lifeguards are engaging and friendly. One gave my kids a few sweets which was nice.

Entertainment was good down at the beach bar at night. A fair bit of dance type shows but I felt the quality was good. Very well drilled, not amateurish at all.

Booze - Effes on draft was fine, cocktails were decent and made fresh, a range of spirits generally made quite strong. Red wine wasn't great (low level house wine). Very short waits here and there but staff made every effort to keep the wait to a minimum.

Food was decent. Lots of options but does feel repetitive after a few days.

We had a night at the Asian restaurant which we all enjoyed. A selection of sushi, sweet chilli chicken and a few other things which we all enjoyed. Book your choice of a la carte as soon as you arrive as the only option we had was 5 days into the holiday.

The hotel has a table which offers a shuttle service (paid) for a range of trips and options. We used this service a number of times and it was very good and a far cheaper option than going with the tour operator. We did a 4 hour trip to Antalya old town and harbour. Was only about 10 or 15 euros each and is well worth it. We also got a service to the aquarium and land of legends for cheap and its a very good service.

Location is perfect. Pretty much central to everything at Lara Beach. Lots of shops and restaurants very nearby. A few bars but it appears no one goes in due to the hotel being all inclusive, sat with a beer on my own a couple times :) Shops are good if you are able to deal with the obvious slightly pushy nature.

Beach is nice. Busy and need to be sharp to get a sun bed. A nice pier to bath on and grab a beer. The water is tropical, literally far warmer than the hotel pools. Can just walk straight in!

All in all we really enjoyed our holiday and would return to this hotel in the future.

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!