Bayview Hotel

I have mixed feelings about my week-long stay here in January, on 3rd floor.

LOCATION: If you would rather walk around than always utilise the albeit very good bus system this -- the Manoel Island Yacht Yard side, the side from whence the ferries and boating trips depart -- is not the most
appropriate neighbourhood. Residing closer to the Tower Road side, the
Med Ocean side on the way to St Juilian's -- closer to the Tigne Lido, the
Sliema Pitch area -- will give you lots more shops, eating places and seafront
and people-watching opportunities. It is my fourth visit to Sliema, and I will not
knowingly stay in this district again.

STAFF: Friendly, but do not rely on for directions or wake-up. If you are
stressed for time and truly want to visit certain places, get second
opinions about transport, and set your own alarm as back up. I was
sent in the wrong direction on bus and lost an hour, was woken up 20 minutes
late, or not at all. But they are very friendly, and I was slumming, not pressed
for time.

FOOD & DINING: Well-prepared, varied and plentiful. There was always soup, and always 4 types of ice cream. Lots of veges, meat, fish, pasta. Always buffet, but even breakfast had hot dishes. You can really pig-out.
Even on half board, I was satiated, and lunches were skipped -- with my apologies for not helping the local economy on this score.

ROOM FIXTURES: Bed is a bit of a toy, flat-pack variety. As soon as I
came up after checking in, the foot of the twin I sat on crashed --
as two slats had not been inserted into the metal frame properly. It is
adventure-land!
There should be a law against slats under beds, which have the effect of sleeping
on a hammock. To exacerbate things, the sheets are short, narrow and slippery -- so if you prefer your
sheeting to cover the mattress and not creep up and clump up underneath you and,
disturbing your sleep, a poor-remedy is to use your emergency safety-pins to tack
down the bottom sheet.
Yes, it is very poor, even if there was no traffic noise or neighbour noise!

Exceptional is that there were two TV film channels, both of which kept the English language sound track. This was appreciated.

BATHING: Hot water was immediate, plentiful and very hot.

Summary: If you get an outright bargain, as did I, go for it. It's a hol, and you can sleep
when you get home. It's gotto be warmer than the UK, and the bus fares are
so affordable.

We booked the Bay view Apartments through a Travel agent and wish we never had.
The view from our room was the sewer pipes from other apartments . There was no natural daylight in the kitchen / seating area so throughout the day it remained dim. Cleanliness was not too bad although we did have to clean a patch on the sofa as it looked like someone had vomited on it, we also had to fix the toilet cistern. Water would not stay in the sink despite putting a plug in so trying to was your face was very challenging.Although they send a repair man who came armed without a screwdriver.

All in all we did not enjoy our stay here and will definitely be using this site to check out what people think of a place before we book in future.

Our advice to anyone thinking of booking the Bay View stay at the hotel not the apartments.

I've just got back from a four night stay at Bay View with a friend, and we were generally really pleased with the hotel - we got a good rate, it was clean, a central location and the staff were all nice.

We stayed in a twin room with a side sea view balcony in the main hotel. The room was clean and spacious with an en suite bathroom and kitchen facilities (kettle - but no tea or coffee - toaster, fridge, sink and hob). You have to leave a deposit at reception to get a hairdryer or a TV remote and the TV is probably not worth bothering with - only a couple of Engligh speaking channels available, both of which are news channels.

The staff were friendly and helpful and the hotel also has computer access (1 euro for 20 mins of internet), a bar, indoor and outdoor pools, small gym, roof terrace, TV lounge and pool table. It was January so we made use of the indoor heated pool which was small but nice, and most of the time we had it to ourselves.

We had also opted to have breakfast at the hotel. Each morning this consisted of a choice of: cereal; cold meat and cheese; a fruit option (bizarrely, one option was half a banana); toast with jam; cooked breakfast options which changed each day and included baked beans, sausages, scrambled, poached or boiled eggs, mushrooms or tomatoes; and yoghurt. The staff in the restaurant at breakfast were all very friendly and it is a buffet style set-up. The tea was fine but my friend said the coffee wasn't great.

The hotel is located on the main seafront at Sliema and we had a nice view of the harbour from our room (definitely worth paying for a sea view). The bus to St Julians or to Valletta stops right outside which was useful as we found that there wasn't a great deal of choice in Sliema in terms of places to eat, although this may be different in the summer.

The only reason I probably wouldn't stay here again is that I'd prefer to stay in a location closer to a larger choice of bars and restaurants.

jan 12 Dont go its horrible dirty,cold,disgusting food,rude,arrogant staff and expensive.We booked for 4 weeks,we arrived to find our appartment was 400 metres down street,we paid an extra 400 euros for a kitchen even though we were half board.Our room were on the top floor,which appeared to have maltese persons living full time in.It was bitter cold we had to put the oven on to keep warm.It took 36hrs to get a working tv from hotel,brocure said lcd widescreen.The room had office equipment STORED in it was this a storage facility.My partner sat down on a dinning chair and it smashed to pieces he hit his head on the floor.On further inspection of chairs most werefound to be unsafe.We were moved into main hotel with a side view of a dirty alley when we had paid for a front sea view.After a week we had had enough and cut our losses and get a flight home,the rep from ESCAPE refused to help usand told us we were on our own,after we had made several calls to her.We were 2 oap very unhappy in a foreign country,we have been to malta many many times but will never return.We found a travel agent who managed to get us on a flight back for 275 euros,EASY JET refused to transfer any of our return flight money on to this early return.On handing back tv remote 10 euros for pleasure of using it we were charged 3.90 euros for phone cslls to rep even though hotel had 3weeks or our money for nothing.We have travelled the world this is the worst hotel we have ever been in.DONT GO MONEY GRABBING COUNTRY