Advice Required: Site Trustworthiness

racersedge

Hi all,

Basically I've been searching around for a singles holiday.. actually a rather suddenly thrown together one as I realise my holiday time draws ever nearer. I was looking for information and used the search function and found one reference to it in a thread here. Since this thread is now three months without anyone posted on it I didn't want to drag it back up as I know some forums aren't overally keen on that sort of thing. So I hope that is okay.

I was thinking about going out Lanzarote and I came across the website for www.charliesholidays.com . So I searched the forum and this was the only thread that it came up on.

I bring it up only to ask if anyone has had any experience with dealing through the site? I don't want to get caught with my pants down, so to speak. The whole how you make a booking things seems.. well, a little odd. Although after using the likes of Expedia, Orbitz and whatnot over the years, I suppose I am a little used to that sort of format. I just want to get caught up in something and show up in the country and suddenly have no place to say! (Paranoia!)

Really I'd love to know if anyone had any experiences of it or whether they had used it. Reviews seem to be impossible to find about the holiday package itself, only for the namesake bar.

I just don't fancy getting screwed the first time I venture out of the country in a few years! They seem to offer some decent stuff at a competitive rate for a single.

Any help, tips or whatever would be much obliged. Thanks!

mikedragon32

It's an odd set up, but I guess it's all good.

The process seems to be check availability with them, book your flights and then pay over €30 deposit on Paypal for your room and €180 on arrival. They then organise activities all of which cumulate in you drinking in their bar afterwards.

To be honest, it's not orthodox, but it doesn't set off any alarm bells either as you're booking your own flights anyway and would have only paid a minimal amount for your accommodation.

Looking on booking.com the Bitacora costs €212 for the week if you book through them, so you're not getting ripped off. Charlie's is far from being the worst pub in PdC too (although maybe I'm just old and cynical now, there aren't many good ones!).

The only thing I would say is that if you weren't comfortable with the set up, you could maybe see about booking your own flights and accommodation and then rock up at Charlie's pub and sound out the possibility of joining in with the activities. A look at booking.com will show you that it's easy to get a room for a week for under €200.

If your nervous about travelling alone, something organised like this could well be the way to go. It might be no harm to contact them and ask if they have many singles going on the week you plan to travel so you don't end up as the only single on a singles holiday!

Taxi from airport to Bitacora should be no more than €20.

racersedge

Thanks for your input!