Stella Studios Reviews

A 5 min. stroll to the resort centre and town beach. Basic, but spotless and well looked after by Sonia who lives above the studios. Hand-held shower with a hole in the floor, but you're provided with a mop and it's dry in 2 mins, so no problem. Enough cooking utensils, mugs, plates and glasses to cater for a small army, plus a fridge, kettle and toaster. A 2 ring electric hob with oven, so you could actually cater for yourself if you really wanted to. Adequate storage space in the bedroom and more coat hangers than I've ever seen. We had apartment No. 2 and had 2 patio areas with tables and chairs so we could have sun or shade all day long. lovely quiet area with friendly locals who will be happy to pass the time of day with you. Well stocked supermarket a few mins away with everything you could want, including fresh bread to die for. P.S. the goats are still there, but the dog doesn't seem to bark quite so much. All in all, a great place to stay and Sonia makes sure that you have a great time.

We booked ages ago, the apartments are brilliant. They are extremely clean, the bins are emptied daily with fresh crispy sheets and thick towels twice a week. Yes - the bathroom is small and the shower is the sort which sprays all over but it's more than adequate and really, how long do you want to spend in there? The kitchen was well equipped and I have never, ever stayed anywhere with as many coathangers! It is a short walk from the village but this is very pleasant and we made friends with the local goats and a small black dog who barked at us from his balcony every time we passed.

The Kosmar rep, Wendy, is excellent - extremely informative and very proud of the area in which she now resides permanently. She is rather partial to extra strong mints so take her a few packs if you want to get on her good side.

Finikounda is a perfect place to relax, although there are no swimming pools or sunbeds (unless you buy one for 44 euros) so you simply have to sunbathe on the beach. There are a few nice shops and enough tavernas to eat in a different one each night.

Psycho's was super and we ate there four times. On the last occasion, however, we had a bit of a fall out with them when we had to wait an hour and a half for our starters and then a further 30 minutes for the main course, one of which was not properly cooked. We like to take our time and relax over a meal but this was pushing a bit so we complained - at which point the chef shouted at us that he had been busy. Not too busy, however, to serve a couple their starters and main courses before us although they didn't arrive at the restaurant until 45 minutes after us.

To Steki is fabulous, traditional food which you get to choose after a tour round the kitchen. The fish restaurant To Karavi serves the best fried courgette starter in Greece - don't know what they do to make them any different(apart from sprinkling them with cheese)but they are superb. The service here is excellent. To Kyma is also very good as is Dionysos but, be warned, at Dionysos, the local wine tastes like sherry and is quite disgusting.

If you walk to the neighbouring beach where Camping Fines is, the bar and restaurant there is good. The 'the more you drink, the more you save' rule is in operation here as the local wine is 50 cents for a large glass. It's amazing how much we saved by visiting this one and it certainly helped with the walk back.

Places to visit - Methoni is brilliant with the castle going into the sea but Koroni is our out and out favourite.

This was our second visit to Finikounda and it certainly won't be our last.

Finikounda

We booked with Kosmar for a twin centre holiday. The first week we booked for Finikounda, Stella Apartments. These were, quite simply, awful. The bathroom (if you can call it a bathroom, it consisted of a toilet with a 'hose like tap' coming out over the toilet that was supposed to be your shower) was filthy and totally inadequate. The bathroom glass had 2 inches of mold growing in it. As we arrived there at 10.30p.m we had no choice but to stay put. We contacted the rep at 9a.m the next morning to request a move of apartment. We were told that there was no accommodation available in Finikounda and that we could move to Stoupa (which we were due to go during the second week of our holiday anyway) so we agreed to do that.

Quick note about Finikounda - although we were in the resort less than 12 hours it was long enough to suss out the fact that the beach isn't all it's made out to be in the brochure. Far from it - it was pretty dirty looking and didn't even have sunbeds for hire. I wasn't impressed at all with the resort and we were relieved that we were going over to Stoupa.

Stoupa

Ah...Stoupa. What can I say that hasn't already been said? Gorgeous place. We loved it and would go back like a shot. We stayed in the Stella Hotel for the first week and then moved over the Theoxenia Apartments (which was our original booking for Stoupa) during the second week. Both accommodations were lovely but we preferred the apts for the simple fact that we had a pool and a fridge.

All in all, Finikounda was extremely disappointing and Stoupa was absolutely gorgeous.