Rixos Premium Seagate

This resort already has a tonne of reviews so I’ll just focus on areas where they exceeded or fell short of my expectations of a 5 star - not ultra high end but somewhat luxurious - all inclusive resort. This was a 5 night stay in late October with 2 kids. POOLS: main pool is the place to be - beautifully landscaped area and a massive pool with lots of (very) shallow as well as deeper sections hence great for families. You did have to get there by 8:30am or so to reserve sun loungers though which was not ideal. The other 2 pools were more ordinary but good enough and had a bit more lounger availability (still not enough). AQUA PARK: excellent and well above expectations but more geared to older kids (120cm height requirement strictly enforced on most slides). The same fun and games for sun loungers though. BEACH: not particularly attractive but it had soft sand and calm waters. Snorkelling seemed the highlight here (have to walk down a long pier) but they surprisingly don’t provide you with masks and we didn’t have our own. KIDS CLUB: tiny outdoor playground, 2 lifeguarded shallow outdoor pools (one heated), video games room (PS4 and PCs), art and crafts room. Staff were generally great, very engaging. Full daily schedule of activities. Not the best I’ve seen but not bad either. ENTERTAINMENT: a lot going on. Live musicians, big shows every evening (albeit repetitive). Truly impressive setup on Halloween! FOOD: a big topic. The main buffet was a real mixed bag. Always a few decent dishes which were outnumbered by the number of mediocre or even bad items. Definitely below expectations. In contrast the a la carte restaurants were quite enjoyable - we tried Salt (seafood), Churrascaria (meat), and Mykonos (Greek with $30pp surcharge or $15 for kids) - all 3 served decent quality food in an upmarket setting. Mykonos aside, it was surprising to have this quality of restaurant included for no extra charge. The downside was how hard it was to get bookings, with slots released at 4pm daily disappearing within minutes. DRINKS: another mixed one. Decent quality spirits included at all bars (e.g. Absolut) and pours tended to be generous. If you went to the lobby bar a premium spirits selection was available with no charge (Grey Goose, 3 types of Glenfiddich, etc). That was a surprise. Two big negatives though. Firstly the red wine. Most restaurants or bars just had the one option of a local Egyptian merlot and it was very average, borderline undrinkable. There was a diff bottle in the room which was even worse. There was a premium wine list but prices were absurd (cheapest bottle £70 and almost all other bottles £150+). The other one was coffee. Really bad machine produced coffee. I was dying for a caffeine hit by the end of the trip! SERVICE: mostly great. Very high staff ratio meant you never waited long in restaurants or bars. People were friendly. Some seemed a bit brusque or unbothered but this was more of a cultural thing and I believe they were well intentioned. OTHER NOTES: 1) No premium level. All guests were equal, meaning no wristbands and no asking for room numbers. 2) No late checkout was available on our departure day but access to spa was offered and full access to F&B continued (as per prior point they wouldn’t even know if you had checked out). 3) Guest mix was interesting - seemed to be 50% Brits and 50% Russians. 4) Late October weather was perfect with daytimes at 30-32C and not a cloud in sight. 5) Pricing was much better as a package holiday versus booking direct with the hotel. OVERALL: a few notable negatives but a lot more positives. I would return.