I'm not going to make this holiday sound like a blogger's dream, 5 star, 1st class luxury resort, because it wasn't. My family and best friend just wanted a short break away for my 21st, as low cost as possible as we would prefer to save for a bigger, longer holiday later in the year. Having said that, this resort was really beautiful, great quality, lots of fun and I had an amazing time! The purpose of this review is to simply introduce you to somewhere you may not of thought to have gone, with some surprising features like infinity pools, nearby zoos, malls, fabulous all inclusive/half board food and located right on the beach. This is a bit of a long one but I hope you find it interesting and enjoy the photos!

The Hotel

We stayed in Fuengirola, Malaga, Spain in a hotel called Hotel Angela for a week the end of April. The hotel was recently renovated and you can really tell this in the communal areas. Beautiful flooring throughout and gorgeous furniture, plenty of seating it is worth it's four star rating.

My best friend and I stayed in a lovely twin room, it wasn't overly posh, but it was functional and clean (I thought it was quite nice looking!). The room had aircon that worked perfectly, we only needed it on for half hour before we went to sleep, the temperature in the room was easy to regulate. There was also an optional fridge you can rent and a free of charge safe - something I thought was a bonus as hotels usually charge to use a safe. On top of that there was plenty of storage, a TV with English channels and a lovely, sea facing balcony and table. All the rooms face the sea, the hotel is positioned this way which is a great idea. The bathroom contained the usual facilities including a hair dryer and was fitted with a shower not a bath which was fine as who has time to have a hot bath on holiday? The only downside to the rooms was the lack of plug sockets, we only had two in our room and one was used for the TV. Being two bloggers with at least three gadgets each, this was a slight problem but not the end of the world. However, this was forgiven as we had access to free WiFi in our room!

A little note on the WiFi, we had to ask at reception for the free passcode, the staff there gave it to us no questions asked. It worked everywhere apart from the ground floor bar area. It even worked outside around the pool which was perfect for me! The signal was a little bit temperamental, but did the job.

So, food. It was amazing. We went half board so we got breakfast and an evening meal in the form of a very generous buffet. You had the main counter with all your hot food, that the chef kept topping up and two middle counters, one with pastries and fruits and one with cereals and juice for breakfast and in the evening this changed to salad and desserts. There was an incredible amount of choice! For breakfast I mostly had a fry-up from the hot counter, and some toast or pain au chocolat and a yoghurt (I'm surprised I didn't come home the size of a wale). There was alos other options like cereals, fruits and breakfast cake (omg). For lunch, we never got that hungry, it wasn't included in the half board stay so we usually had a bag of crisps or treated ourself to something from the snack bar by the pool. For dinner, there was something different every night, unlike breakfast, and every night there was so much choice, it's a wonder how they thought of something new to serve the following night! It catered to every taste, from simple chicken and chips to steaks and pasta sauces with all manner of accompaniments. I tended to have a bit of the salad as a starter, followed by the hot food and then a dessert. The desserts. They were quite literally the cherry on the top! There was incredible home made cakes, jellies, fruit dishes, fresh fruit and multiple flavours of ice cream - heaven! However, it sometimes was hard to know what things were, there wasn't always a sign post next to each dish so it was a bit of 'try it and see if you like it'. This sometimes went to my favour! But I did accidentally eat liver one night and I was pretty horrified when I realised!!

You pay for your drinks at dinner, but they are free at breakfast. The hotel also offers happy hours, literally every hour of the day, rotating round each bar area.

Anyway, enough about food! The hotel has an infinity effect pool on the first floor. It doesn't actually trickle over the edge but you can swim right up the edge of the pool, look over and see the road and beach below. Or you can float in the water whilst staring out to sea - bliss. It was also heated at this time of year but seemed to have be turned off the last few days we were there, I presume the summer season starts in May.

Ok... There were a lot of old people here at this time, not just in the hotel but in the whole beach front resort. We were speaking to an English local who said it is actually cheaper for some elderly to come here during the winter months for 3 months or more than staying in England and paying for heating and weekly food shops. It's perfectly flat, loads of shops and things to do so you can understand why this would be an ideal location for the elderly. Apparently in summer, the resort becomes more of a family place because it becomes too hot for the older people but the hotel Angela is strictly adults only. I don't necessarily say this is a negative, the couples in our hotel were so lovely, me and my best friend even became "virtually famous" among the oldies, everyone recognised us and spoke to us which was quite funny. There were several younger people staying in the hotel. The outright negative of the hotel was the entertainment as it was vastly aimed at the older guests so you had lots of opera singers, cringey comedians and line dancing... I love the cheesy bingo, karaoke and fun entertainment of family hotels so this was a shame, but we chose to venture out after dinner and found several more lively, young bars along the sea front and behind the hotel, so this was perfectly fine. I expect more would be open in the heart of summer

Location

The hotel is situated right on the beach of the Costa Del Sol so it literally took less than 5 mins to get to the beach. We didn't actually bathe on the beach at all, only walked on it because it wasn't warm enough for that. It was slightly windy and the hotel provided shelter from that and a heated pool, so there was no need to get sandy for no reason.

Left and right of the hotel there were nice bars, restaurants and convenience stores with little souvenirs and essentials. If you walked far enough you'd get to a small children's fair ground and pretty harbour with some more nice bars. Again, I imagine these would be much more lively in the hight of summer. A short distance behind the hotel was a long main road with tons of different shops and services from estate agents to Zara. Each alley way off this main road provided yet more shops and quaint little streets of atmospheric bars and restaurants. I went to one of these on my birthday as a treat from my dad, which was lovely. We also drank at these bars most nights to get away from the not so brilliant hotel entertainment.

On my birthday we also took a trip to the Bio Park - a zoo that was accessible via that main road on foot. We got the tickets cheaper from our rep. This zoo was pretty amazing!! There was literally every animal you can think of from gorillas, to tigers and lizards. There was even a lemur island where you could go into the enclosure and take selfies with the gorgeous lemurs!

The bus services are super easy to work, again on that main road and we hopped on one to go to the Miramar Mall. This was just like being in any regular England mall! Primark, Zara, Bershka and some lovely Spanish shops that offered affordable items. The make up shop Primer was especially good for across the pond or cheaper cosmetics.

Another bus took us to Torremolinos. I loved it here! It seemed to be a much more upbeat, lively, family resort, so much going on! Again, loads of shops and a lovely flat sea front with palm trees and peddle boats and all that good holiday stuff. It would be really nice to stay here.

Finally, we went to Marbella, the posh, celebrity lifestyle resort. It's not completely unaffordable, there are cheapy shops, regular shops and high end shops like anywhere else, the location is just much more beautiful and classy! I loved the marbled walk ways! We took a long stroll along the beach front and passed many glorious, enormous villas just hidden behind steal gates, barbed wire, CCTV cameras and lashings of greenery - oh what it would be like to have a look in some of those! We were constantly on the look out for celebs but unfortunately didn't see any! It would be lovely to stay here, we are thinking about looking into it as I'm sure there is an affordable way to do so.

The weather was changeable. It never dropped below about 18 degrees, which is pretty warm if it was England, so it wasn't cold during the day. When the sun came out and I was sheltered from the wind, the temperature soared up! Felt about 25 degrees plus - beautiful! It was nice enough to walk about in shorts when we were exploring even when it was cloudy but not so hot that we would get sweaty and uncomfortable.

So, to sum up this rather long review, I had a really fantastic time! We only stayed a week and I think that was plenty for me. Due to the weather being changeable at that time, I wouldn't have been satisfied lounging around the pool for another week as we visited everywhere we wanted to the first week. I think if I went again I would book during the summer months so the resort would have been a bit more happening. The Hotel Angela, itself was fab, though, I would definitely go back there to say, mainly for the amazing pool and food!

B x