Hi Peter,
The following is my review of the hotel and kite club. This may definitely be posted online.
The hotel checked all the boxes: delicious and extensive buffet, hygienic, nicely finished rooms... You have a beautiful view of the sunset in the evening. But beware: the pool is not heated and is not out of the wind.
On the beach (at the kite club) there was a beach bar with ping pong table, kicker table, lounge chairs, sitting lounge and a bar. This is unfortunately not utilized. No music is played during the day and the bar remains (almost) always unmanned making it more difficult to order a drink.
The kite club, KBC, located next to the beach bar could be better in our opinion. The service from the kite club was beyond poor.
- Anything you asked for was too much for the instructors (except if you were a woman, then they were jumping around).
- The kite club is way too expensive! We paid €400 for 4h semi-private lessons.
- Depending on who is manning the rescue boat you will have to wait 5 or 30-40 minutes for them to come and help you.
- There are plenty of people at the kite club, but still no one comes to offer help preparing your kite so you can get into the water faster.
- If you want to launch, it's best not to be too shy. Because that means shouting until someone decides to help you. This also applies to putting down your kite.
- The (future) instructors are extremely dangerous. Wearing a t-shirt of the club itself, as a visitor you expect them to know what they are doing. There was one who went way too overpowered into the water and the Attitude rescue boat eventually brought him back. Or one of the (future) instructors turning without looking, causing him to turn into another kite and then sending both kites towards the beach where people were cleaning up their gear. In turn, someone else while launching laid down my kite and disconnected my lines only to attach them to the kite incorrectly, causing you to untangle your lines yourself afterwards.
- We wanted to join a downwind tour to the white dune and speed spot. We were told that the tour was cancelled because there was too much wind. But that they would leave at 10am the next day. 10am we couldn't make it, so we were on the water by 10:40am. Turned out that the hour of the tour was changed to 11am without thoroughly communicating this. We wanted to join the next tour anyway. But "we can't find anyone to man the boats." We asked when this one would be, the white dune would be the following day at 3pm. We both thought that was too late to leave if you want to do some kiting at the dunes themselves. Even that schedule was changed and they left at 1pm, without alerting the rest.
- There is a place provided where you can put your kites down for a while before the next session and fold them afterwards. This place is dirty, messy and not brushed so the kites full of sand are taken home.
We normally stay at Lagoon Energy, the hotel at the very beginning of the lagoune. We will move there again next time. We did have a nice vacation, but the service of the kite club is more important to us than the animation in the hotel, the food and the rooms.
Greetings,
Lotte