Aquis Agios Gordios Beach Hotel

The location is superb. Superb. Commanding cliffs behind, a beautiful and quiet beach right in front, all in a sweeping bay. You can lie by the pool, and when you feel like it, walk for two minutes down to the beach where you can swim and snorkel and explore a little reef. You're a couple of minutes away from a little strip development, but it's quite modest by Corfu standards (I had a mental image of Kavos which, thank heaven, it was nothing like). We hired a car, and made a few trips, but really, it was money badly spent. There were plenty of excursion possibilities.

The service was always brilliant. The staff work very hard, and particularly in the dining area. It's a miracle to see the how so few people can look so well after so many. The staff was a mix of Greek, Polish, Albanian (that I could figure out). English was great. As a Greek speaker, I never overheard any misdirected comments about the guests. Room cleaning was perfect.

There was plenty of variety - fresh vegetables and fruit through to chips and meatballs. It wasn't haute cuisine, but the food was good, with nice little touches like herbs, seasonings, accompaniments always available, and there was as much of it as you wanted. The free wine was a defininite weak point, but there's plenty of beer or spirits if you're a determined drinker. Drinks, alcoholic and soft, were freely available, which counts for something when the temperature is in the thirties.

Some things were excellent. There's a small but good gym. The pool was adequately big, and always cool and clean, and there were plenty of good sunbeds. Because it's a 'no kids' hotel, there was a very calm and cool atmosphere around the sun deck, even with a free bar, apart from one afternoon when one (English) group decided to take over half the pool with big inflatables, playing drinking games which seemed to involve singing and leaping into the pool screaming, to the evident unhappiness of pretty much everyone else. No-one from the hotel spoke with them, which was disappointing, and I was dreading a repeat performance which fortunately never came. The entertainment was not particularly imaginitive, with the obligatory 'Greek Night' and a rather heavy reliance on one man with an electronic keyboard. That said, there were a couple of musicians who were very, very good.

A nice apartment with a view of the sea, about 200 yards from the main hotel. Absolutely fine, with good, plentiful and free air-conditioning. Everything in brand-new condition.

I can see that this hotel treads a fine line between popularity and comfort. The customers while we were there were mainly British, with some Germans, Swedish, Dutch, Romanian, Albanian and even some Greeks. There were lots of young couples, and also middle-aged ones, and the overall atmosphere was relaxed and very grown-up, a good place to go if you don't want banging house music and compulsory bingo. The hotel in my opinion would do well to try to move up-market, playing on its position and facilities, but I would worry that it might well go the other way in the current economic climate.