ANC Resort: Smell of cigarettes and remains of excrement in the WC

Hi there,

If you read my blog regularly, you know how difficult it is to find accommodation that is clean and has the minimum conditions.

The experience with the ANC Resort only changes because it was the first time that a WC that had the sanitized/disinfected tape, when opened, still had remains of excrement.

When we were planning the trip to the Azores, we wanted a room that had a kitchen. As we would leave the hotel around 7AM, it was best to prepare breakfast for ourselves, and since there were no vegan restaurants (only a couple in Ponta Delgada), we would also prepare dinner when we returned.

We found this hotel on booking.com and since it had such good reviews, we decided to book.

We arrived at the hotel on May 19 at 10 p.m. and were greeted by the receptionist André.

He was kind, but he made us waste too much time trying to get us to pay for breakfast since “there would be something vegan” and to try the sushi restaurant when we had already repeated that we were vegan.

Already at reception, you could tell that the hotel was not really a 4-star.

When we opened the door to the room, the first thing that hit us was a very strong smell of cigarettes.

We immediately went to the reception and André went up to verify that it was true that it smelled of cigarettes.

As the hotel was full and moving to a different room was not an option, he would have to talk to his manager to see what could be done. After a while he came back and told us that they would reimburse us for that first night and that, if we decided to stay, they would do an “extensive cleaning” the next day to remove any traces of odor that might be present.

In said exhaustive cleaning, logically, they would also change sheets and curtains.

We told the receptionist that we had no other place to go, let alone at 11pm. In addition, finding us another hotel would probably have meant losing a day of vacation.

The receptionist left and that’s how it stayed.

When we went to use the bathroom, we removed the tape from the WC that “certifies” that it is disinfected and we raised the lid, we found that the WC had remains of excrement from the former guests.

There it became clear that this hotel had no salvation.

As the room reeked of cigarettes, we had to sleep with the window open to breathe and not spend the night sneezing and coughing.

When we went to turn off the air conditioning, we realized it wouldn’t turn off.

Again, we had to call the reception, already at midnight and the receptionist, who was a different one, was not able to turn it off.

So, in addition to being cold from having everything open, the smell of cigarettes and the dirty room, we also had to sleep with the noise of the air conditioning.

Not only should they have refunded the amount for the night, but they should have paid me for spending the night in those conditions.

The next day we left the hotel at 7am and returned at 5pm hoping to find the room squeaky clean.

We went in and the sheets had not been changed let alone the curtains. It was evident because the pillows had the same hairs stuck to them as when we woke up in the morning and the curtains were still dirty and reeking of cigarettes.

Also, a sprig of grapes that we had eaten the night before that was in the trash, was now on the floor in the middle of the room.

It seems that, instead of cleaning, they had made more dirt and on purpose.

Again, we had to call the receptionist André to show him that they had not done the promised “extensive cleaning”.

The excuse was that since the window was open, the wind had brought the twig of grapes. To top it off, they were making fun of us.

André came back with two terrible-looking cleaning women, they looked like something out of a Tim Burton movie. Also, they looked angry. As supposedly at that time they were going to do the exhaustive cleaning and that takes hours, we went to the reception to wait. To my surprise, in 20 minutes André was already letting me know that the room was ready.

All they had done was change the sheets, nothing more. I asked why they hadn’t changed the curtains, and he told me that they “didn’t have replacement curtains”.

That supposed 4-star resort hotel had no replacement curtains.

They left us two chocolates as an apology that we threw away because they were not vegan. I didn’t want chocolates; I wanted the service that I had paid for.

As for the air conditioning, they had managed to turn it off, but since they didn’t have any technicians for the weekend either, it would have to wait until Monday. Here too, it’s a shock that a 4-star resort hotel has no technical staff on the weekend.

Since André was so concerned about whether there was anything else not working in the room in order to provide good service, I told him that one of the lights was not working. We agreed that the technician would also fix it the next day, which was Monday.

Monday passed, Tuesday passed and Wednesday arrived, which was the day we checked out. They never fixed the air conditioning, nor the light, much less cleaned the room properly.

In addition to everything I have told you and the lousy service provided, the qualities of the hotel do not correspond to the 4-star category.

Also, the hotel is already extremely worn when it hasn’t been in operation very long.

As soon as we got back to Porto, I left the reviews of the accommodation with the photos I had taken. The Google review was immediately deleted, that’s why it has such a good score, because they reported all the bad reviews.