Valamar Rubin Hotel - Porec, Croatia     

We stayed for a week at the Rubin, on a bed & breakfast basis, and thoroughly enjoyed our stay! The hotel is in a perfect location, with the beach a one minute walk down some steps, and about a 10-15 minute walk to the marina and the streets of Porec. Hotel doesn't look like much on the outside, but reception area, restaurant and rooms were lovely - recently refurbished. Everything was really clean and room balconies were larger than most in other hotels. Breakfast was great, so much to choose from, with loads of different types of bread, a cooked section, (with eggs, pancakes, bacon, sausage, etc), yoghurt, fruit, pastries, and slices of cold meat and cheese. Staff were excellent, very friendly and spoke English well. Try and learn a bit of Croatian as the locals appreciate it and encourage you! Places to go: Ulixes and Istra restaurants, Nono pizzeria, Bar Comitum and Bar Casablanca, (both good for cocktails), and Cafe Torre Rotundo. A top tip is to look down all the little alleyways in Porec, as this is where many of our favourite spots were. Another tip would be to take the water taxi back to the hotel at night as the pathway is not fully lit, although the taxi boats did seem to stop around midnight. We hired bikes one day from a the nearby Jedro sports stall, and also went on a day boat trip to Lim Fjord and Rovinj with Victoria Tours, which was good value. Overall we had a great holiday in Porec and would definitely return to the Rubin!