Sun lounger towel battles in all inclusive holidays

I've never experienced this sunbed wars you hear about. We go to IKOS for all inclusive in Europe.

Yup, I’d much rather have one sun lounger or none at all than having to get out of whatever pool I’m in , or leave my lunch and rush to the whistle. Ffs.

No you can’t do that.

Exactly. How are any of these experiences considered to be holidays?
How wonderfully relaxing when at any point a whistle might be blown which requires you to scramble to your last known landside checkpoint whereupon you are investigated for being absent for an indeterminate period of time. Moreover if it turns out you were gone too long then the whole gulag applauds the fact you will be punished for time based towel location misdemeanours.

And this is considered a better situation than towel sized land grabs around sunrise when one usually wouldn’t even be up for work.

Never had this issue

Millions of free beds or a ticket & towel allocation

Are you going with children? Many of the AI now have rules. For example, at Tui Blue Suite Princess on Gran Canaria you can’t reserve beds before 10.00am and if beds are unoccupied they confiscate the towels and sell them back to you.

That does not make it sound any better 😅

I can assure you that people clapped when towels were taken away.

Nobody is supportive of the whistle blowing shite. They do it because otherwise you’re getting kicked out of the pool area. Tiresome

Well, if it’s not available to those looking on the big package holiday sites it stands to reason it might be a bit quieter.

Not all inclusive, but we've stayed on a couple of sites in France where the lifeguards blow their whistles twice a day to get everyone out of the water and sitting on their sunbeds. They then go around removing all the towels from sunbeds that aren't being used. People are very supportive of this.

We stayed at a very quiet, peaceful resort this year in Tenerife and people were still at it - up at 8am to mark their territory, not showing up till mid afternoon. It didn't matter so much because empty sunbeds could be found, it was just a pain that the ones in the shade were generally taken.

@JimmyGiraffe I'm saying that if a hotel isn't available on the package websites then it's probably less likely to be crammed full of people which is when this issue arises. You can find nice hotels this way.

I’m not sure why you think that makes a difference, surely the hotel has a specific amount of sunbeds and this isn’t affected by how the guests book their travel arrangements?

I'm currently in a hotel in Sardinia and there are lots of free sun beds. I think it's because we booked it ourselves (i.e. booked the hotel directly and separate flights) rather than as a package.

Don't be daft.

OP is booking an all inclusive holiday and wants to find a resort that has a sensible arrangement for the use of sunbeds (or sufficient capacity). The two things aren't connected 🙄

I can’t see why the staff can’t round up the towels and put them to one side after an hour or something, but I suppose they have enough to do as it is and don’t want bad reviews for ruined / missing things or towels.

Book one of those resorts where they throw all the towels that have been put out to reserve sun loungers at 4am in the pool 😁

Yeah, booking the loungers up the night before for the day on a hotel app wouldn’t necessarily stop all the arguing I suppose.
The hotel I stayed in once with a booking system only allowed a daily booking system , so it wasn’t for the entire time you were there though. I still heard the odd argument as you couldn’t book on the day you were leaving! Unless they have them chained up and given out one by one ( which isn’t feasible for big hotels) I fear that it’ll always be a bit of a problem for the guests.

Not really. As long as there are enough sunbeds for everyone (and normally there are), you’d still get the same complaints about them being booked , and wars , and the prime spots being taken and what not. Probably even more rage actually when those three super duper extra special sunloungers you wanted have been booked for the whole week/10 days.

I know I said it before , but why the hotels don’t do booking online for the loungers ( that are numbered) I’m not sure. Most places have apps or QR scanners.
It won’t suit everyone , but has to be a bit fairer , although I’m sure people may still sit on the wrong ones or ‘ not know about it’ !

I think Turkey had also become more popular these last few years. Pre covid I've stayed at Titanic Belek - son loved the boat ride to their beach area with restaurant and when he was older I loved the Olympic size adult only pool - and they have a large lagoon type pool , have also stayed at Regnum (now hideously expensive) - we also went in May half term and we never had a problem getting a lounge anywhere - we never got up particularly early - by the time we got to the pool it would be 10ish - equally we don' "reserve" beds - at Titanic if we were going to go to the beach area for lunch we would free up our pool loungers by taking our personal stuff with us.

I would honestly book somewhere else and not All Inclusive. They are notoriously bad for sunbed wars. We have always booked really small apartment complexes or hotels and have never had a problem with sunbeds. Kids don't need the over-stimulating entertainment that comes with AI. They are happy splashing around in a pool all day and people-watching in the evening with an ice-cream. These AI resorts are so big that there are never ever going to be enough sunbeds for everyone. You cant go wrong with a small establishment near a beach and resort facilities.

Which hotel is this if you don’t mind? The problem is I find there’s a massive variation between 5 standards, for example I wouldn’t personally describe the Mitsis chain as 5, whereas ikos I would. We’ve never had a problem at the 5* all inclusive we’ve been to.

We are currently on holiday in a high end 5* resort (long haul) mostly filled with Italians, some French - and it’s almost impossible to get a sunbed. Not just towels but T-shirts, books, baseball caps used to ‘claim’ them all by 8am. Pool staff are oblivious. It’s on an island so there’s literally nothing else to do but sit by the pool. Why they don’t have enough sunbeds for everyone to have one beats me. Am currently sat on a very uncomfortable wire chair on the balcony of our room - I agree with posters who say it does spoil the holiday a bit - and going upscale hasn’t removed the issue!

When my son was little I'd get up at stupid o'clock and go down with my book and a coffee to bagsy a couple of loungers with an umbrella, because he's the palest kid you ever did see and we need the shade.

It's a HORRIBLE system and I'm really glad he's older now and there's no need to secure a spot by the pool in order to ensure that I get a semblance of a holiday. We can all relax wherever, and go down at whatever time.

I have in the past moved towels from serial reservers though and give zero fucks. My husband is like yours and mortified by it, but they don't have a leg to stand on. If you want a premium spot, get your arse out of bed like I had to for years to secure it. You either get a lie in, or your preferred sunlounger. Not both.

If I had younger kids again, I'd definitely choose a resort with an actively managed lounger policy and I'd avoid AI with free for alls, because it just creates so much stress and there's no way NOT to play the stupid game. If you want to spend time by the pool, you need to be able to see it, you need an umbrella, it's ridiculous.