MRS Chryssana Beach Hotel

I booked Mrs Chryssana Beach Hotel as I needed to recharge my batteries and get away from it all. Mission accomplished! From the warm welcome the moment I arrived, the team at Mrs Chryssana looked after me the whole time - nothing was too much trouble. Thanks Michalis, Manilos, Manos , Maria and all the rest of the staff. You are what makes this hotel so special. The pool is amazing, The food is authentic Greek food and tastes wonderful. Plenty of choice and excellent quality. I went early season and the hotel was quiet and relaxing. (No fighting for sun beds.) It’s a small hotel and it was nice that the guests chatted to each other unlike larger hotels. Just a short walk up the road you can get local buses into Chania, Agia Marina, and Maleme at 3.20 euros. Great value. Livelier resorts with a variety of restaurants, shops and sandy beaches. There I something for everyone in Crete and Mrs Chryssana makes a great base to explore this beautiful island. Thank you team Chryssana for a great holiday.

This our 2nd visit to Chryssana hotel. The hotel is perfect for a relaxing holiday. Also a good base if you want to explore and hire a car. We used the good bus service to get to Chania and surrounding areas. The bus stop is 3 minute walk from the hotel. Kolymbari is a short walk away and has a port and good restaurants. We went on a boat trip from the port. We stayed bed and breakfast. The breakfast each morning is an excellent variety. Greek yoghurt with honey is amazing. The staff work really hard here to keep everyone happy. The rooms are nice and cleaned to a high standard. Bathrooms are a good size and the shower is good. The pool is lovely and a good size. You can sit by the pool or in the garden area. There are always plenty of sun-beds available. The pool bar serve drinks and lunch. We have eaten here and is very good. Your holiday is what you make it, I don’t understand the bad reviews if you want 5 star luxury then book that. I know we will definitely return again. We have a lovely relaxing time here. Thank you once again Denise & Lee Warren

Never before have we felt it necessary to check out as soon as we’d checked in. I rate it as "Poor", if we’d have stayed longer it probably would have been a "Terrible". We arrived after a 10 hour journey to find our keys in an envelope taped to the front door with an arrow pointing to our room, there were no staff to help and the whole place looked closed, it was about 11.30pm. Never in 15 years of visiting Crete have I ever seen anything like it. We could manage, but God help you if you're not up to dragging your heavy cases up stairs in poor light or rain. Our room was meant to be an upgrade on standard but was little better than a hostel. Noisy fridge and aircon, uncomfortable bed and no hand basin in the toilet. We had asked for a quite room, we got a room directly above reception. As soon as we arrived we became aware of dogs at an adjacent property barking and howling, this continued all night and as the window was fixed open, and with a big gap under the front door, there was no escape. I got no sleep at all, if I had, the staff arriving at 6.00am to open up reception and prepare the hotel for the day would have woken me with repeated slamming of doors and very loud conversations – totally thoughtless. Most offensive of all was the food left for us – obviously cold left-overs from dinner, a plate of meat mixed with something, not sure what. We didn’t touch it, fortunately so, it began to stink abominably by about 4.00am so I put it outside, but even the howling dogs didn’t fancy it. We did go for breakfast – poor quality and little choice, the orange “juice” looked and tasted like squash, the dining room felt like temporary marquee. After breakfast we decided there was no way we could stay – we asked to be moved away from the noise but this could not be done that day and would have meant another day or two in the hostel room. Our Jet2 rep turned up and as was as useful as a chocolate fireguard, once she realised we weren’t in the market for excursions she didn’t want to know. The Jet2 24 hour hotline was no better, up to 48 hours before they could consider doing anything even though we offered to pay to go somewhere else. We left straight after breakfast, rented a car from VST -Vezirakis Stavros in Kolymvari (avoid Modus Rentacar if you value your life) booked another hotel on *********** within 5 minutes and left to enjoy our holiday elsewhere. We returned a week later to meet our transfer back to the airport. This gave us the chance to ask others about their stays and nothing made us regret our decision to go elsewhere. Most criticisms where about the poor food (see Tripadvisor pictures) and the "couldn’t give a fig" service. Even then, no-one at the hotel thought about an explanation or apology, they obviously must be making a fortune somehow, so repeat business doesn’t matter. The hotel is quite isolated, it is a 20 minute walk to Kolymvari in darkness and the walk takes you past derelict sites and several rubbish tips, there are

We had a great holiday here. It's very quiet and relaxing. The staff is the hotel's greatest asset. They do everything they can to make sure that you have a great time. There is a good choice of food for breakfast, make sure you have the bougatsa when it's available, there was also a wonderful chocolate cake some mornings. We missed breakfast on my birthday, but because he knew we loved bougatsa, Giorgos brought us some to our balcony. Michalis, the manager, also gave me a bottle of wine. Thank you so much. The pool area is very quiet. There are sofas in a shaded area, as well as sunbeds with cushions. We arrived late at night and emailed beforehand tobask for some water and beer to be put in our room, which they were happy to do. The bar and reception close at 11pm. If you're arriving after that, they leave the key taped to the door. Make sure you don't lock yourself out on your balcony, as we did one evening, as you will need to phone the manager to come back and let you in. As it was my birthday when we were there, we asked for suggestions for a night away. Manolis/Emmanuel, on reception, recommended Akrogiali Fish Taverna at Korfalonas, which was really lovely. We ate several evenings at Sto Skouteli and another evening in Afrata at Tis Litsas Tou Kamotata, all lovely meals. We ate at the hotel one evening but the food wasn't that great, I believe it depends which chef is on that night. Also, the ambience in the evening was lacking. When we getting ready to leave, I realised I had lost my house door key from home. My husband asked at reception, but although Emmanuel/Manolis had found it a few days earlier, because no-one had asked about it, the other receptionist, Benna(?) hadn't kept it. I can replace the key, but the keyring had sentimental value, and would have liked to get it back. I'm not sure how they deal with other lost property?

After a delay due to the air traffic control problem, we finally arrived at 3am to the Mrs Chryssana hotel and were left in darkness at the bottom of the walkway to the hotel reception, to find it closed and our keys in an envelope taped to the reception door, so not the welcome we were expecting. On finding our room (105 on the first floor) we unpacked and read through the welcome note from the hotel telling us there were some snacks in the fridge as we had missed the evening meal (we had chosen half board). So as we were famished by that time we looked in the fridge and could not believe what we had been given..a large plate consisting of what had clearly been on the dinner menu that night, cold inedible chips, lamb chop, chicken wings, some sort of cubed meat in a sauce that had gone rock hard and fish that was unidentifiable, all stone cold and inedible. what a disappointment, note to the chef, some bread, ham, cheese and olives would have been better appreciated. Room 105 is directly above the downstairs refrigeration generator, the noise was horrendous so we did not get much sleep on our first night(we booked 14 nights) and requested a room change the next morning, which was sorted within the hour, along to room 103, what a difference! Thank you so much to the lovely lady on reception for arranging so quickly, So, Pros: Lovely location for a relaxing holiday, beach just across the road at the end of the hotel walkway, pebbly but we knew that before we chose the hotel. Rooms kept really clean, thank you to the super cleaning staff and a comfortable bed with good pillows Pool area very nice, clean and tidy, plenty of sun beds and parasols and towels provided Staff are friendly and helpful Breakfast is buffet style, varied and freshly cooked hot food as well as the usual continental breakfast items and local Cretan options Lots of different flavour tea to choose from, hot water and coffee is from a machine, fruit juices (not fresh but from powder concentrate so a bit watery but ok) Cons: Dinner in the evening was in the same dining room as breakfast but no effort to make the atmosphere even a tiny bit more sophisticated, (this is an adult only hotel) same disposable paper place mats as at breakfast, either very low or mostly no background music at all, most of the glasses were chipped and no nice lighting , even an LED candle on the table would have been nice Only 2 choices of red and white wine and 1 rose Food was unimaginative, even for a self service buffet it wasn’t presented well, not even any garnish Please take the fish fingers off the menu, we are grown-ups Desserts are clearly frozen and thawed which is fine, but please pimp them up a bit with some decoration, a bit of imagination needed After the first 2 nights there didn’t seem to be any lobby bar service in the evening while we were there Subsequently due to all of this we ended up eating out at the local restaurants in Kolymbari and one lovely sunset evening in Chania (Michali

Review based on 10 night stay for couple in Sept 23. Positives: - The hotel is very quiet (thanks to being adults only). Guests were a mixture of couples and solo travellers. Very relaxing environment with nicely maintained gardens and a pool area that doesn’t play music, so was nice and relaxing. Despite not having many pool loungers (roughly around 25 in total), we never struggled to get a lounger during our stay. - The staff were very friendly, including those on reception, pool/bar staff and cleaners. All were very friendly and more than happy to help whenever needed. - The included buffet breakfast was varied and of good quality, with plenty of different options to choose from. Only downside is breakfast is limited to just 2 hours between 8am to 10am, would be nice if this was extended to 11. The hotel offers an evening meal at an extra price but can’t comment on this, as we ate out every night. - Very nice family run taverna (Sto Skouteli) with great food just a 5 minute walk from the hotel. There’s also a bus stop very close to the hotel (outside the mini market), allowing for easy access to Chania, Kissamos, etc. Negatives: - The Mattress! For us this was the main problem with our stay. It was very, very hard. We regularly visit Greece so are used to the usual hard mattresses, but this was something else. Every night both my partner and I would wake up due to how uncomfortable it was, with my partner suffering pain in their hips a few days in due to how hard the mattress was. We resorted to sleeping on extra blankets which made little difference. It’s no exaggeration when I say the pool lounger pads were more comfortable than the mattress. - The rooms were clean but basic and missing a few simple amenities. No kettle or any tea/coffee making options and no iron/ironing board. However there was a fridge which was a nice touch. The air con unit in the room was clearly very dated and worked intermittently. One of the nights it just simply refused to turn on, and when it did it was noisy. I would say they need replacing. I would also advise staying on the upper floor. We had a ground floor room and the outdoor balcony/seating area is overlooked by most of the upper rooms and does not offer any privacy. - There is a safe in the rooms but this isn’t included in your stay and cost around €3 extra a day to use. Seems like an unnecessary tax just to keep your valuables safe. - When swimming in the pool, if you touch the bottom or sides this left a strange blue film on the skin. I can only assume this is down to the type of paint used. Looking at other reviews this seems to be a common issue.