FILION SUITES RESORT & SPA

Beautiful hotel room with a wonderful view of the Cretian mountains. Gorgeous food, friendly staff, plenty of sun loungers with space in between. We thoroughly enjoyed our very relaxing break in the sun ☀️. We would definitely love to return!

Firstly, you can say a lot about this hotel, but not that this is a 5 star hotel, perhaps a 3-4. The problem with having a 5 star rating is the tourist tax is quite high, €10 per room per night. Probably the biggest downside is location. Hotel is very isolated. You can’t go for a walk outside the complex. Nothing around, Bali beach is around 3km away downhill. Our room was ok, but the bathroom was rather tired, the shower and the screen needed a good scrub or ideally a renovation. We had a room with a mountain view, it was spacious with a good sized balcony overlooking the pool area, so we were able to watch all the evening shows from the balcony. Wifi was quite weak, it only worked fine when in the bar / pool area or by the reception. It wasn’t working too well in the room or in the restaurant. All staff were wonderful. Friendly, helpful and hardworking. Great views from the restaurant. Good choice for meals (buffet only), we didn’t struggle finding something good to eat. The fresh orange juice machine was excellent for breakfast! More signage would be beneficial to indicate what all the dishes being offered actually were… BBQ nights with freshly prepared “souvlaki” were great and a pizza (which was only twice in our nearly 2 weeks stay) was very tasty. Also, great tzatziki which were our favourite side for lunch & dinner! The pool bar food during the day wasn’t too good.No music at the pool, sometimes they turn something on but for a moment only. If you like the quiet atmosphere – then you will be happy in this hotel as no animation during the day or anything, you can just read a book in silence. We’ve never had a problem with finding a sun-bed by the pool. Evening entertainment was mixed. Musicians were generally ok, with Greek songs, a magician and dancers who invited guests to join. Once a week there was an animator for kids. The hotel has 2 x shuttle minibuses (8 seats) service to the beach, unfortunately cannot cope with the volume of people – sometimes you need to wait an hour to get onto one. Buses don’t run every half hour in each direction - there's a gap of 1.5 hours after lunch and then they run hourly. If you ask the hotel to get a taxi, they will charge €20 each way. The local companies only charge €10 each way and we used them a few times as the last minibus to the hotel was going back around 5pm which was too early for us. We were told there are no taxis in Bali, however we called a local company which operates in the Bali / Rethymno area and we arranged a transport for us. At the small beach at the minibus drop-of point, Filion hotel guests had free beds & parasols to use all day. The beach was very nice, the sea was very warm & clean! We recommend going to the main Livadi beach area which is a half hour walk from the usual minibus drop off (however if you ask a driver, he can stop earlier and drop you off – we did this and had no issues) On the Livadi beach there are the main bars & restaurants on the promenade. We rented a car for 2 days and visited a few nice places. The car was rented through the hotel, so you had a car “delivered” to the front of the hotel. It’s really worth renting a car, we went to Elafonisi, Rethymno, Heraklion and Chania – all of these places are highly recommended for visit! Overall we had a positive stay and would recommend visiting Crete!

We travelled 5 adults and a 2 year old. On the day we arrived we were told that hotel was overbooked and we had to stay in nearby villa first night, realizing there is not much choice we agreed. Staff could not provide us with villa wifi password, so no wifi. Next day we came back to reception, Regina greeted us with a smile and she was really trying to work things out and compensate for the mess on day before. She gave us late checkout, upgraded one of our rooms and promised a couple of massages which was a good effort and uplifted our mood. So here's good and bad: Hotel territory and location. Nice views, clean, well looked after, very quiet, not big, did not feel over crowded. Not much to visit in walking distance around. Best to rent a car which we did. Bali, beautiful seaside town 7-10mins away by car. Hotel's beach in Bali, 7mins away, pretty small with loads of sunbeds, during peak season I can see it becoming crowded. We were visiting middle of October, plenty of space. Food and drinks. Most dishes tasted great, meat and vegetables was mostly amazing, but not that much choice. Fresh orange juice machine at breakfast, but only one so you had to wait in line for it. Coffee not that good. Restaurant has spectacular mountain views. Pool bar serves a good variety of drinks and cocktails, bar staff are very friendly, always ready to serve with a smile. Snacks are repetitive and best left alone. Swimming pools are clean, did not seem to be heated, small playground area next to one of them. Be careful, the stone flooring around pools are very slippery when wet. Entertainment. No mini disco for kids, but in our 9 night stay there was a cloun show, which our daughter enjoyed and participated. Traditional greek dancing was fun, singer and magician were decent. A good variety but lacking a bit of quality, still was good enough for us. Spa. Don't even bother, total hit and miss. You get 1 free sauna hour per room, per stay (hotels claims free use of sauna on their website). The guy that works there is friendly, but a couple guests from our party tried the promised complimentary massages which lasted 20mins and was dissapointed. We used sauna twice, first time was good, 70 celsius, hot enough, second time 40 celsius, warm at best, not great. Room service. Very good, always cleaned to perfection. Overall a good stay and very good value, was not sure if I should give 4 or 5 star review, but the hospitality of Regina made me lean towards 5*. As a 5* category hotel it has room to improve, but for the good value amount we spent for the stay, it's worth it!

Very welcoming, Angel and Joseph on reception were very helpful and spoke excellent English. The hotel is 3-4 miles up the mountain from the beach, so a bit isolated. There is a bus down to the beach, but the beach was in a bay which had been claimed by various hotels so was very crowded, the sunbed were very close to each other, we only went once. Room was good. Food was good, plentiful and varied, restaurant staff were very helpful. There were a lot of stray cats hanging around the restauant and bar areas which we didn't like but a lot of other guest loved them. Pools were very good. The entertainment was hit and miss (mostly miss). We stayed at the end of the season when there were not many children around however there was still a children's entertainer who instisted on doing the same act with adults, which was a bit cringy.

This is not a 5 star resort. Has a cheap feel to it. Would give it 2.5 to 3 stars. Having said that, staff is very friendly and location beautiful. However, lots of problems with our “upgraded” room. Yes, lots of space but phone didn’t work— when I told reception they said we know—steep stairs that I almost fell down when checking in in the dark. Booked a spa appt and was told to make sure to show up in robe from the room which they had forgotten to bring. When I requested it, they finally brought one, no belt. On one door there was no handle. Another one had tissues stuffed in the key hole. This place needs a serious makeover