Suite Hotel Jardins Da Ajuda

This was a really great hotel with a nice spacious room which included a small but very useful kitchenette with a hob, sink and fridge. We had balcony overlooking the pool with views out over the sea. There was a fantastic outdoor (and indoor) pool, great dining room with a really wide selection of items for breakfast to suits all tastes and nationalities and a really nice indoor bar area serving drinks all day long. The hotel is very well situated a couple of miles from Funchal centre on the road which leads along the sea front. There is a free shuttle service into town every couple of hours, but there are also regular public buses that run about every 15 minutes into the centre and back. There is a large modern shopping centre (the Forum) right next door which has great shops, a large supermarket and a range of cafes and restaurants. We thought it was pretty much perfect for a family holiday hotel.

Our main complaint was that the room air conditioning did not work. We reported it immediately and a maintenance man attended, fiddled around in the roof space for a while and declared it fixed. However, when I tested it with my sports watch which has a thermometer, the air coming out was room temperature (26C) and therefore it was just acting as a fan. I reported it several more times, but nothing changed. I suspect that as it was early in the season (late May) they hadn't actually got the main air conditioning plant for the hotel turned on and therefore it was never going to be any more than a fan, but I'm only guessing about that. It made it hard to sleep at night as 26C is too warm for me and I am always careful to book hotels which have air conditioning, so this was a pretty big issue for me. Other minor issues were that we were charged 12 Euro's for a key to the room safe, which in my opinion should be included free with the room, for guest security. Also the decor was a little dated, but nothing too bad to be honest.