Ala-Säynäjä

The staff here was very nice but the property could use an update. The superior room lacked amenities that our standard rooms had like an in room fridge and sauna. While the room was clean and fine, and the property might appeal to children, the facilities could use a real upgrade to match the other standard hotels we’ve stayed at in Finland.

Bring your own food if if travelling off season. Only one of the 2 restaurants will be open for dinner and it works with a massively reduced menu. No restaurant available for lunch, only room service. The "buffet breakfast" is actually only yoghurt, stale bread and green salad. Alongside that you can order one item from their breakfast menu of 5 options - most of which are eggs. No fruit/ porridge or other regular breakfast options that you would expect from a resort of this calibre (allegedly 5*). Nearest shop/ other restaurant is 40 minutes away so it really is quite unacceptable. At least prior warning of this situation would've enabled us to plan better for this but none was given. Otherwise the location is beautiful, there was a shuttle service into the city around 3 times each day which was appreciated. The spa is great but again not everything was functional due to the "off season" timing. We had emailed the hotel over a week prior to our stay to check what services would be available but received no reply so assumed everything would be as advertised on their website/ Expedia. This was not the case so whilst it was a relaxing and beautiful location which we did enjoy, ultimately it was a bit of a disappointing resort stay compared to what was expected.