Madeira - Vidamar Resort Hotel Review
Flight to Somewhere rating:
The sea view room definitely delivers on the sea aspect
You can either eat from the special menu or you get a monetary allowance for ordering off the normal menu (€15 per person) at the time of our visit and anything over that you have to cover yourself. We tried all three restaurants and were very happy, so definitely give it a go! You do need to book a table, so I recommend doing it sooner rather than later to avoid disappointment.
Vidamar has a fitness club and hotel guests can go to all the classes as well as use the gym free of charge - there are plenty or classes to choose from and they are proper workouts rather than a bit of fun with the animation team that is more typical of resort entertainment, so bear that in mind - there is spinning, body combat, Zumba etc. I went to Zumba three times and really enjoyed myself! It was tough but lots of fun and the two instructors had a very positive energy. I actually loved it so much that I purposefully planned the days so I could be around for Zumba. If you enjoy a good workout, do pack your gym kit as you will be able to put it to good use at Vidamar Resort.
Booked Vidamar Resort in Funchal after lots of research on TripAdvisor and was not disappointed. It is a 5-star hotel about 20-30 minute walk from the old town of Funchal.
We opted for a sea view room and weren't disappointed. The room is spacious and has amazing views and you can really see the sea from any point in the room. The bed is massive and there are pillows in three sizes to choose from, which is a nice touch. There's a kettle and a small fridge in the room as well - I find having these makes the stay so much more pleasant. What can be better than sitting down on the balcony with a cup of freshly brewed tea to watch the sunset...
The breakfast at Vidamar resort is great, but the buffet dinner is a bit hit and miss. However, the dine around programme is awesome and makes up for that. If you go for half board, this programme enables you to visit the other restaurants in the hotel complex (which are also open to the general public) and not have to always eat in the buffet restaurant. There are three places to choose from: Italian, sushi and Portuguese.
View from the sea view room - you can see the garden view rooms
There is a spa (extra charge and no special offers, so we didn't use it), but if you don't want to splurge on the spa, there's a small indoor pool and hot tub area available free of charge - great for the cloudy days. During the sunny days, you can lounge around by the outdoor pools and even try a swim in the sea if you are feeling adventurous (I wasn't). Also, apart from the pool are on the sea level platform, there are sun loungers in the olive garden, which is quite idyllic.
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There were only two cons - first, because of the way the Vidamar Resort is built, the sounds from the reception get carried upstairs to the rooms, so we were forced to listen to the evening entertainment program of the lobby bar in our room whether we wanted to or not. So sound insulation could be improved. To get a quieter room, I would recommend asking for your room to be in the second tower, not the one where reception is. That tower seemed a lot quieter to me. Second, something made an irregular humming noise in the room (possibly the a/c, but the noise came on and off even with the a/c off).
However, the positives outweighed the minor negatives, and I would definitely book here again.
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The view from the room - you can see the blue sun loungers in the olive garden and the outdoor pool
The view from the sea view room
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