Lydia Maris Resort and Spa

A fantastic 10 Night Stay at Lydia Maris Resort & Spa. The food was excellent, lots of choice for breakfast, lunch and dinner, the oriental and mexican themed nights stood out for us.

For snacks, the Gyros was excellent and available throughout the daytime alongside the delicious stone baked pizza and scoops for a refreshing Ice Cream, waffle or slushie etc, all in all we could not fault the food or the service from the staff.

The large pool is lively and the centre of the action throughout the day, more than enough sunbeds to go around and plenty of shade available if needed.

Our room was a little on the small side but clean and well maintained with a modern bathroom.

What makes Lydia Maris so special though is the animation team, Gustavo, Nono, Chloe and Kiki are fantastic with the guests, they make the effort to say hello to every body around the pool each day, they work extremely hard to entertain the guests with Aqua Gym, Water Polo, Kids Activities like making and baking cookies and then they entertain the whole family through the evening with shows, mini discos, quizzes and bingo, they really make the day that much more enjoyable.

My Honest Review of Lydia Maris ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆

We stayed at Lydia Maris and overall had a fantastic holiday. The hotel itself is absolutely stunning and is perfectly located, just a 2-minute walk from Kolymbia’s shops, bars and restaurants. Our favourite place nearby was Oasis.

We stayed in one of the swim-up suites, and the room was amazing. It was modern, spacious and very well equipped. The main bedroom had a huge king-size bed, plenty of storage and excellent air conditioning. There was also a separate room with two full-size single beds, which opened straight onto the terrace and swim-up pool.

The bathroom was lovely too, with a powerful shower featuring massage jets, a good hairdryer, and thoughtful extras including robes, slippers, toothbrushes and toothpaste.

The swim-up pool itself was beautiful. My only downside was that our terrace never got any sunshine, so it stayed shaded all day. If I wanted to sunbathe, I had to take my towel onto the grass at the front. The pool was also freezing cold, even though it was around 37°C every day, and with no sun on the terrace it was difficult to warm up afterwards.

The hotel has plenty to do, including free tennis courts, a small arcade and a children’s play area. There’s also a lovely main pool with great entertainment throughout the day. We didn’t use it much because we had our own pool, but be aware that the sunbeds were all gone by around 8am. The pool bar served delicious cocktails and the staff worked incredibly hard.

One of the highlights was definitely the food outlets outside the restaurant. From 11am until 5:30pm there were unlimited gyros, pizza, ice cream and drinks available. This was a huge hit with our children, especially as they weren’t keen on the main buffet.

Breakfast offered a good selection and was what I’d describe as a typical all-inclusive breakfast buffet. We didn’t use the lunch buffet, but unfortunately dinner was the biggest disappointment of the holiday.

The restaurant opened at 7pm, and every evening it felt chaotic. Guests would rush in as soon as the doors opened, with little thought for young children trying to get food. My children were regularly being pushed around, finding a table was stressful, and the whole experience wasn’t enjoyable. We actually chose to eat gyros or pizza before the restaurant opened on several evenings just to avoid the crowds.

There was a good variety of food for most people, but my son has ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder), so there wasn’t much he would eat from the buffet. Thankfully, the pizza, gyros and ice cream parlour saved the day. The ice cream parlour also served waffles, cakes and slushies, which the children absolutely loved.

One thing worth mentioning is that the swim-up suites have rooms directly above them. Unfortunately, we had neighbours who decided to move furniture around at 1am, so noise can travel.

The beach directly opposite the hotel isn’t the best as it’s very stony. However, if you walk to the small beach near Oasis and head to the right, it’s much nicer and definitely worth visiting.

We also did the submarine boat trip during our stay, which was brilliant fun and something I’d definitely recommend.

Overall, we had a wonderful holiday. Lydia Maris is a beautiful hotel with lovely facilities, a great location and friendly staff. While the evening restaurant experience and the cold swim-up pool stopped it being a perfect 5-star stay for us, we would still happily recommend it and would consider returning.

We stayed here for 7 days as a family of 3, 2 adults and an 8 year old.

The hotel is really nice, its not massive and has a cosy relaxed feel to it. We arrived at 11.30pm after a long day of travelling and were handed 3 packed lunches on our arrival which was much appreciated.

We spent the first couple of days around the pool. The pool is large and isnt to deep at any point and there's plenty of shade available if required. If you want a sunbed right next to the pool you'd have to have your towels down by 6.45, if you were happy being on the grass a bit further back then before 9.00.

The restaurant food is ok, very repetitive and not a great deal of choice...... the food is probably what let's it down from being a 5 star in my opinion.

The staff are friendly, room was always clean. Entertainment staff are excellent anr⁷d are always up to something....... you'll here the word sabotage a lot from Gustavo!

The surrounding area....... theres a strip about a 2 minute walk away which has a few Greek restaurants, some fast food joints, shops and bars...... we ate out a couple of times in the Greek restaurants and the food was superb. We also went to the beach which is a 5 minute walk, there were plenty of fish that you could see in the shallows.

We did 2 day trips. Firstly we booked a pirate boat trip through tui. This was aimed at the younger ones and our 8 year old loved it, there were 3 swim stops and plenty of coastline to see along the way. We also went to Faliraki water park which we booked ourselves..... tickets were £75 for the 3 of us and taxis were £30 each way...... there is a free bus service from outside the hotel to the water park but in 40 degree heat we wanted to travel with a bit of air con! The water park was well worth the money!

All in all we enjoyed our stay at lydia maris and Rhodes is great, we'd definitely come back to the island again