We just have stayed at the Mövenpick Aqaba for 5 nights. We were looking for 4 relaxing days on a beautiful beach, and to go snorkelling and enjoy the underwater beauty of the Red Sea at Mövenpick Tala Bay. Unfortunately none of both things happened: the beach infront of the Mövenpick Aqaba is only 130 meters long, the port is in full view, there are plenty of noisy boats etc. - so nope, not relaxing at all ! And the snorkelling at Tala Bay was very dissapointing as well. But all of that isnt really the hotels fault, and after having been to the Red Sea several times in Egypt (where we enjoyed both beach and snorkelling a lot), our expectations were not met at all in Aqaba.
Pros of the hotel:
- even though they are dated, we had nice and comfortable rooms, with seaview
- as everywhere in Jordan, most people were very friendly and helpful. This is especiallly the case with the security people, and the bell boys, and the house keeping personal
- the location of the hotel is good, and the beach is - for Aqaba standards - pretty okay
- the summer pool is nice
The cons:
Breakfat is a mess !!! The buffet is okay in matters of food (but nothing special, and its the same every day), but the organisation and service is feally bad ! Cutlery is missing and you can ask 3 people for it - without sucess / or try to get it yourself - and get rudely told that you will get that spoon soon (which doesnt happen). Coffee is horrible. You have to go down on your knees to get plates from under the buffet. The stations where the plates are cleared are disgusting. I could go on for ages.... Pretty much everything that can be done wrong, is beeing done wrong here.
Long ways: if you are staying in the main building, it will take you quite some time to get to a pool or to the beach. You have to cross the bridge, go down two sets of stairs etc.
Flying rats (doves): i love birds and animals in general, but its really disgusting to see hunderds of doves flying over the hotel. On one afternoon, it got so bad that is was like snow falling - but instead it was feathers falling into the pool.
As already mentionned, some staff was very very nice. Like the lovely gentleman who checked us in at 12 (and normal checkin time is 16), or the very nice gentleman checkin us out today. And other staff where very unfriendly and/or rude, or arrogant and unhelpful.