Villa Pakatoa is a huge well appointed villa in an urbanization with a sweeping view of the neighbourhood, down to the sea. The villa itself has been entirely renovated, and is of a high spec. There are three superking bedrooms which are extraordinarily comfortable and the two downstairs bedrooms (which are accessed by an internal staircase, but both have external doors out of the bedrooms should you want to use them) also had sofas for extra seating areas. An exceptionally well placed utility room, which doubles up as a little kitchen for the downstairs bedrooms, there's also a washing machine and tumble dryer in the area. The master bedroom, upstairs, also has a balcony and is big! All these bedrooms are ensuites, with the upstairs bedroom also having a bath tub. The smaller double room (still a kingsize bed) and the twin room are just as comfortable and they share a separate shower room. The outside area is great - dining table with enough seating for all guests, and two very comfortable bucket chairs, and the BBQ area is well placed to get to and from the kitchen. The lounge has plenty of seating, along with a dining table that seats 10. And finally the swimming pool - we are a family of sun worshipers - we were not disappointed! The terrace got the sun on it from around 8am until 8pm, a very sunny area, but with seating areas well placed around the gardens in case you'd prefer some shade. While some of our group were early morning runners and did run both up to look out points, and down to the beach and port areas, realistically there is no denying that you will need a car to get around. This villa won't disappoint.

Absolutely not a criticism of Villa Pakatoa, but the driveway is tight, and steep. We found it easier to park on the street, and use the walkway gate to get in and out of the villa (we lost a watermelon on our first supermarket visit as it fell out of the boot and tumbled down into the parking area in pieces!).