Hotel Ta' Cenc & Spa

Located on Gozo, the accommodation provides serene surroundings, friendly staff, and top-notch facilities like a spa and heated pools. Easy access to amenities and scenic hikes enhances the overall experience.

Firstly, this is not a five-star hotel. If you come expecting that then you will be disappointed. It is of generally three-star quality with four-star facilities. Not being critical, just managing expectations. Some of the (many) positives: 1. The hotel has a great range of facilities and many of the rooms open out directly onto one of the pool areas. 2. The staff are very helpful and pleasant. They obviously work hard and standards of cleanliness, maintenance & service are excellent. 3. The bedroom is air conditioned and also has a ceiling fan. There is a small but pleasant outside seating area. The bed is comfortable and king-sized. 4. The wifi is excellent. We were probably lucky being close to the spa but we had around 150-200mb/s bandwidth so streaming on laptops, phones and iPads was smooth. 5. The set menu dinner is generally very good. There is always a choice of four starters and mains plus an amuse bouche and desserts. They follow the same pattern every day but do change in detail. The actual quality varied but overall was really good making dinner a highlight of the day. Maybe not really worth €38 but there is not much choice locally for eating out. Water at €4.30 a bottle is a bit steep and the price is not mentioned anywhere. The wine list is pretty good though and the local wines good value. 6. Breakfast is excellent. Good selection of decent hot & cold food presented in a buffet style. We didn’t eat at the hotel during the day but the bar menu looked good. 7. The pool areas are lovely. There are two outdoor pools with plenty of seating around and the spa pool is very picturesque. 8. Transport is easy with a good, reliable bus service (nearest stop just outside the hotel) and Bolt & Uber taxis available and good value. At peak times we found it could be difficult to get a taxi at the hotel but we asked at reception and they got a local guy out at short notice. Tatty car and quite expensive but if you have a ferry to catch, a life-saver. 9. Cats. If you like cats (we do) then this is great. There are maybe 12-15 about the place. They are very well behaved, stay outdoors and do not jump up onto the tables if you are eating outside. Now the moans: 1. The room was a bit dated and in need of some refurbishment. The TV is ancient & has a very limited choice of channels with no smart features. We couldn’t even use our amazon fire stick. 2. The service is mixed. The room safe and coffee machine in the bedroom didn’t work. I reported them on the first day and here I am on day six and they still don’t work! One day our room was not serviced even though we were out in Valetta until three pm and had a ‘Please clean our room’ sign on the door. 3. The restaurant service is again mixed. They clearly have several teams and the quality of food & service varies significantly depending upon who is on that day. 4. Don’t come if you dislike or have a phobia of cats. Period. 5. Gozo doesn’t really have too much to draw you a