Do you need to book a restaurant table in advance in Egypt resort hotels?
Based on 1 discussion with 3 participants · Last activity: today
Based on 1 discussion with 3 participants · Last activity: today
TL;DR
Reservations are not required if you arrive early: breakfast at 8am, lunch around 12:45, dinner before 19:20. After 19:30 the restaurant fills up fast.
Clarification on the booking system for a la carte restaurants: every day at 16:00 the hotel app's system updates and opens booking for the day after tomorrow. For example, on August 12 the app shows August 12–13 as available dates (usually fully booked when the hotel is at 100% occupancy), and after 16:00 August 14 becomes bookable. Guests are advised to book any restaurant for a convenient time as soon as the new date opens up.
At the main restaurant it's pleasant to dine right at the start, around 19:00. After 21:00 things turn chaotic: very crowded, few clean or free tables, it gets very noisy, and the dessert selection is noticeably smaller than earlier in the evening.
Late-night snack service (until midnight) in practice: arrived at 23:00, no staff present in the venue, waiter showed up only after about 15 minutes. Food options were limited to sweets and small cheese-and-lettuce mini burgers.
One guest reported that the ground-floor restaurant remained closed for their entire 14-day stay, despite hotel staff repeatedly promising it would open any day — tables and equipment were set up but the venue never actually opened.
Guests who stayed in early-mid July had no trouble finding seats — free tables were available at any time. They noted the restaurant manager personally keeps an eye on the hall, escorts guests to a free table, and even helps carry chosen dishes to the table.
Booking strategy: right upon arrival (even at night) they signed up for lunch the next available day and kept booking daily until departure. This was enough to try every interesting restaurant and even repeat visits at two of them; the Rancho restaurant was visited only once.
At restaurants that operate by reservation, staff may check your booking slip not only at the entrance but also inside the dining room. So the reservation can still matter even if nobody is standing at the door.
According to a recent report, Fun Sun had tables available every evening; it felt more spacious than the hotel’s other restaurants.
The hotel offers a late dinner service until midnight — food is guaranteed but the menu choice is very limited. Guests who arrived around 23:00 after check-in were invited to eat; the dish served was something like pasta with meat sauce.
The Japanese restaurant Segun is best visited around 18:30 to enjoy a relaxed atmosphere without being rushed. Arriving at 19:30 meant staff hurried service along, as the restaurant appeared to close around 20:30.
At the Fun Sun restaurant: seats are available right at dinner opening, but after 30–40 minutes the place fills up and entry is only as tables free up. An alternative is to arrive an hour to an hour and a half after opening, when it quiets down again.
Queues can be avoided by arriving either right at opening or about an hour later. Even at 100% hotel occupancy there were no queues. When a queue did form, it was almost always at the first restaurant near the entrance — the furthest one (Zamorodash, connected to Bella Italia) was consistently queue-free.
Walk-ins are fine if you time it right: breakfast at 8am, lunch around 12:45, and dinner no later than 19:15–19:20. After 19:30 the restaurant fills up very quickly.
Arriving for dinner at 19:00 without a reservation always worked — tables were available. After 19:30 the situation changes drastically and seats become scarce.
Over two weeks it was possible to visit each restaurant 2–3 times. The kebab restaurant was disappointing — the food felt no different from a regular buffet restaurant, and a second visit wasn't worth it.