I'll be the first to admit I took a bit of a gamble booking this holiday to Costa Torrox, a place I'd never heard of before. We needed as short a flight from London as possible as our three-year-old boy is a bit of a livewire and we weren't sure how he'd get on with flying (or whether we'd keep our sanity and patience on the plane with him!!) - but we wanted to ensure warm weather and a beach. We contacted our travel agent, Dial-A-Flight as they were excellent last year when I used them for my holiday to Cyprus, they managed to find flights that nobody else could find and put together a superb package.

They looked at various options and most were unsuitable, but eventually suggested I try the Riu Ferrara at Costa Torrox on the Costa Del Sol. A flight time of just over two hours was a major draw, but I'd never heard of Costa Torrox so I decided to do my usual Internet trawl for reviews. And could I find anything? Very little in fact.

I worked out that the Riu Ferrara was opened last June (2003) and that Costa Torrox was near the more well known town of Nerja. I also discovered the Riu Ferrara was a favourite hotel for the Germans. But apart from the standard brochure photos and the one positive review I found, there was very little else to go on. But I threw normal caution to the wind and booked anyway.

And what a good choice. I can honestly say this hotel lived up to its four-star rating, easily equaling the quality of other four-star hotels I've stayed at in places as far apart as Cyprus, Mauritius and the Caribbean.

The excellent deal that Dial-A-Flight found us did NOT include transfers from Malaga so I decided to hire a car in advance. After again trawling around I used www malaga-carhire com as they offer on-airport car pickup from Malaga (no bus rides to get to the car) - but beware, they trade through Crown car hire, as do Dollar and Thrifty (I think) so when I arrived at Malaga airport, I found the Crown car-hire desk had the longest queue of all the companies. But they did upgrade my car without me even asking and were very efficient so I cannot complain.

Getting to Costa Torrox was easy once you found the E15/A7 motorway to Almeria - a straight run right through to Torrox taking just over an hour on a Motorway I'd love to have in Southern England - relatively quiet with fantastic views of the hills!

On arrival at the hotel, the reception staff were VERY helpful and offered a glass of champagne to welcome us. Nice touch. Off to the room. We booked a two-bed apartment on a room-only basis as we like to eat out. The Riu Ferrara is part hotel and part apartment blocks, but all guests can use all the facilities. Beach towels are free (just need a e10 refundable deposit per towel). The apartment was well appointed and nicely decorated. One bedroom with double bed, another with two single beds. A sofa in the lounge area also turned into a double bed. The lounge area had satellite TV, the only English speaking channel was CNN, but tune to D:SN a German sports channel to pick up some decent footy (they showed the England:Japan game live during our stay - but commentary in German unfortunately).

In one bedroom was a safety deposit box, which used the apartment entry card (someone thought about this!). The safe cost e10.50 for the week. No mini-bar in the apartments (not sure whether the hotel rooms have them). Bathroom was standard fare, with bidet (useful for those sand-encrusted feet!) - the water took a while to get hot each time, but when it did the shower was excellent. The kitchen was small but functional the only two things we could have done with were a corkscrew and a Microwave - but everything else we needed was there including a much used fridge. Air conditioning was built in and vented to all bedrooms and lounge area, so was relatively quiet, not like these ugly wall mounted external units some hotels fit as an afterthought. Overall, I was very happy with the quality of the apartment and the daily maid service was excellent.

And the hotel itself? Well, the pool was HUGE and thoughtfully designed with shallow entry at one end for young-uns, uniform depth at the other end (useful for water polo) and a deeper bit in the middle, wide enough to do lengths if you really felt the urge. Very clean and tended to each evening. There was also a small circular baby pool (knee deep) which was perfect for our three-year old. My only suggestion here is that the hotel put some shading over this pool as the sun was very hot for the toddlers and the sun umbrellas were around the main pool.

During our stay, the hotel was VERY full due to them staging the 2004 European Irish Dance Championships - this meant the pool area was very busy during the day. There was a huge number of sun loungers and sun umbrellas (fixed into the deck so they couldn't be moved) but even so, by about 11am I noticed people struggling to find free loungers. And even though the hotel notify guests that loungers must not be reserved early in the morning, I saw little effort to remove the plentiful number of towels on empty loungers as suggested in the hotel welcome pack. Maybe it was the Germans living up to their much deserved reputation!

The gardens are well tended but as the hotel only opened last year, the trees and bushes need a little longer to fill out. In a couple of years they will no doubt add much needed extra shade in the grassy areas. The whole hotel is surrounded by a fence (but a nice fence) and an ornate gate (activated by your room key) leads out the back entrance onto the long promenade and beach. This made the pool area and gardens feel very secure although I did notice a group of four cheeky local teenagers sneaking in each day for a dip in the pool - but they were no bother and certainly did nothing suspicious.

Also outside is a neat little cabin used for the Miniclub which was open a couple of times a day for the over fours. By the Miniclub and baby pool was a small park area with a couple of swings a slide and a small springy ride-thing. This proved popular with the kids but again lack of shade meant the rubberised safety flooring got intensely hot - sandles required during the day. Also nearby was a small sunken tennis court area which the kids used for kicking footballs around.

The Animation team put on activities for Adults, Teenagers and Kids and although I preferred to vegetate in the sun, plenty of people took part in activities such as Aqua gym, water polo, hockey, air rifle shooting and shuffle board. The nice thing was that these activities never became a nuisance for those not taking part. Inside the hotel was a small gym and an indoor pool, but the good weather rendered this unused during our stay.

And the food? Fantastic. Breakfast was simply immense with fruit, cereals, full cooked hot breakfast, pastries, yoghurts etc etc. There were even about 6 or 7 types of bread which you could slice yourself - delicious. Evening meals were buffet style themed affairs but in reality they laid on enough different food that you would not go hungry - there were even four type of pasta each evening for those who didn't want the main meals. All food was superb quality. Although we went room-only, we had breakfast every day and evening meals on three occasions.

If your board doesn't include meals, you have to go to reception just before eating, they will check with head-waiter that there is space and then you sign a slip at reception to put the food on your room account. You will then get a ticket to give to the head waiter when you enter the restaurant so they know you've paid! Simplicity itself, but it does mean you risk being turned away if they are particularly full. Evening meals were done in two settings and we found the earlier sitting did in fact get full (families wanting to feed the kids) so bear this in mind if you go room-only. There is also a dining area outside for lunchtime snacks, drinks and ice creams .

On one occasion there was some confusion between head waiter, myself and reception. After getting reception to sort it out (which they did very efficiently) we were blessed with a free bottle of wine the next time we ate in the restaurant, the head waiter said it was because of the previous confusion. This is a good example of their attempts to keep everyone happy.

The hotel have a doctor who turns up for an hour each day. We had cause to use him as our little fella got conjunctivitis. Very good doctor, speaks very good English. Beware, he charges ?60 when you visit him and whilst you can claim this back on your holiday insurance, check that you don't have an excess (mine was £50 so I couldn't claim the doctors fee back)

What about Costa Torrox itself? The resort is mainly one long beach with a promenade running alongside. Roads run at right angles to the beach which means the main busy through road is at least 200 metres from the beach. This made the promenade safe and peaceful to walk along, especially in the evening. The promenade is dotted with restaurants, mainly the pasta and pizzeria variety, although we ate at the Pizzeria Ferrara one evening and had a very enjoyable meal (4 people, food, drink, desert - ?37 - about £25)

I wouldn't call Costa Torrox particularly pretty. Most of the buildings seem to be 6 storey apartment blocks, many of which were empty giving the feeling that we had visited off-peak. The long stretch of beach was relatively quiet (not shoulder-to-shoulder like some Costa Del Sol beaches) - this may be due to the fact that the beach is not particularly pretty either - it is a mix of black sand and shingle so not easy to make sandcastles with. However, there are a couple of guys who seem to make a living creating fantastic sand sculptures on the beach by the promenade - well worth a look. There doesn't appear to be much to do in Costa Torrox, which is probably why the pool area of the hotel was busy most days.

If you need a supermarket, you have the Mercadona just 50 yards from the hotel - excellent range of goods. For Chemist, there are two Pharmacia, one left and one right down the main street, each a mile from the hotel - my advice, take the one left out of the hotel - it's near a Repsol garage and had a better stock.

Directly across from the hotel is the 'Lady Club'. It is a lap-dancing club, but don't fret, I never saw anyone go in there and it didn't seem to affect the feel of the area.

If you have a car then one must-do visit is the Il Ingenio shopping mall. It is two junctions down the E15/A7 motorway towards Malaga just north of Torre Del Mar (about 15 mins from Torrox). Great for womens clothes shows (inc Mango and a HUGE Zara) - my wife and daughter assure me that the prices are very cheap (I wouldn't know). Plus they have a massive supermarket (Eroski) which sells just about anything you can think of.

As we had a hire car, we travelled around a bit. North of Costa Torrox is the town of Torrox itself - very pretty, with a small town square with locals going about their business and the old fellas whiling the day away chatting in the square. Beware, the roads are narrow and very steep so good calf muscles required. But very pretty with all the white painted buildings with flowers outside a lot of them.

Just North of Nerja, one motorway stop down from Torrox is a lovely little village in the hills called Frigiliana, apparently voted prettiest village in Andalusia. Again, very hilly but very picturesque. If driving, be aware that if you travel into the hills, the roads get very windy and often without barriers. The Spanish don't think twice about overtaking on blind corners either. My wife is usually a good passenger, but even she was sick after an hour winding our way around the hills north of Torrox town.

So, would I recommend the Riu Ferrara? If you like your hotels quiet then this isn't for you as it often feels busy, especially at mealtimes. But for a good family hotel or apartments it gets my thumbs up. Just a shame that Costa Torrox itself doesn't have much to offer.

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Riu Torrox - Torrox

Operator and Date: Independant - Nov 2005