The Private Traveller

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Hotel Review: Constance Ephelia, Seychelles.

The Private Traveller

Overview

Having stayed at other Constance hotels in the past, I was aware of Ephelia on Mahé but to be honest had discounted before in favour of the Leading Hotels of the World sister, Constance Lemuria on Praslin. We had spent an incredible long weekend previously at Lemuria in one of their beach villas, with a total of 105 rooms, suites and villas, only 8 (plus the presidential) villas with their own swimming pools and large private beachfront space. Ephelia, with 313 rooms, suites and villas in total (we were told the biggest resort in the Indian Ocean) I had previously thought it was too large and would be overlooking an industrial mainland - how wrong could I be!

Having stayed on Praslin for our first week (and also to cover the mandatory in-resort quarantine period) we were then travelling onto Denis Private Island for another few days before returning to the mainland Mahé. I looked at various resorts; with an early return flight the idea was to either be on the island so that we could drive to the airport quite quickly, or stay on one of the immediate surrounding islands; but on looking again I liked the idea of trying out another Constance property and thought this could be reviewed in comparison with Lemuria.

Our stay at Ephelia ended up being a fantastic stay, read on and you will find out how much I really enjoyed this stay - the hillside villas were outstanding.


Hotel website: https://www.constancehotels.com/en/hotels-resorts/seychelles/ephelia/

Would I stay here again?   Yes, in a heartbeat. Having been lucky enough to have the ultimate hillside villa experience, nothing else would hit the mark there - the accommodation and views were just spectacular, not to mention being the only room types that come with their own private buggy. Just wow!

Location

Constance Ephelia is located on the west coast of Mahé (we flew within minutes from the airport by helicopter with Zil Air) in a natural 296-acre national park (Morne Seychellois), overlooking the Port Launay National Marine Park. It’s built between two spectacular beaches in 120 hectares of tropical surroundings. The resort is split in two almost by a mangrove forest, but it’s easy to get from one side to the other. Most of the main administration buildings, central reception, three restaurants and one bar, tropical garden rooms and junior suites are located on the south side; the more discerning (north) side has the senior suites and all the villas (family, beach, hillside and presidential); as well as another two restaurants/bars, the watersports centre and a beach bar. The incredible spa is located between, as is the helipad (if you’re a nervous helicopter passenger, Ephelia might not be the first landing best suited for you - the helipad is quite close to a hillside).

On our departure, although it was only about 23km (just over 14 miles) from the hotel to the international airport it did take about 40 minutes to drive because for a lot of the drive you are climbing over the mountain. I don’t think I’d appreciated on previous trips to the Seychelles how mountainous, and scenic, Mahé actually was; but to be fair we’d always just flown to other islands and never stayed there itself. That I’m going to rectify again on future trips, as there are a number of resorts on Mahé itself that I would also love to visit - Anantara Maia & The Four Seasons Resort, to name only a couple.

Accommodation

As I’ve said above, Ephelia is a big resort with a wide spread of accommodation categories and types. While Lemuria only has 8 villas in all (each very spaced out with their own private beachfront areas) with Ephelia having over 47 they cover quite an area and the beach villas themselves are adjacent to the beach, but definitely not as “on the beach” as Lemuria, but all have a private garden area and private pools. Having booked one of the beach villas, we were lucky enough to be upgraded to one of the (unbelievably spectacular) hillside villas - these are located high up on the hillside overlooking the north beach, the sheltered bay and to the national park at the back. To access this area, you’re given a private golf buggy to use during your stay and this navigates what would have been a considerable hike up and down with all the services at the bottom, albeit room service could be arranged. It was also so easy to get to all the various restaurants and bars throughout both sides of the resort, as well as to the utterly amazing spa.

Our hillside villa was just incredible, you could park the buggy at the top (charging points available if you needed a top up and there was always a security guard on site too) and walk down the private pathway to the villa. The first thing you would notice (during daylight hours) was a private massage sala built onto the hillside overlooking the aquamarine water and national park (two beds, so “in-room” massage treatments could be arranged from the spa) then some steps up to the villa entrance which also led round to the deck with the same outlook. There was a decent-sized (actually good for a swim) infinity edge pool wrapping round the corner of the villa bedroom area (doors slide open on two sides for direct access into your private pool) as well as a large deck area with comfortable loungers, seats and a table, as well as a large parasol to shade from the sun). Inside the villa, which was in three main sections, was first a large lounge/dining area (with its own large LCD TV, sofa, chairs and mini-bar); you then went through sliding doors into the bedroom area with its huge bed located in the middle of the room (another large scale LDV TV - both with Apple TV and a free selection of top-rated movies) and behind that the capacious bathroom area. This has a large soaking tub in the middle, a separate WC with floor to ceiling windows (though private as at the back of the villa), separate inside and outside showers, a huge vanity area with twin sinks and lots of cupboard and drawer space on both sides.

Our room attendant came twice a day at a time of our choosing and the service was just perfect - on each visit it would be restored to pristine condition, towels changed, mineral water replenished and often on returning during the day we would find that treats might be left (one day sparkling wine, another couple of days there were cakes, then red wine etc.). After having lower expectations of the villas at Ephelia compared to Lemuria, only because there were so many of them, as fabulous as the beach villas at Lemuria were (and I would also return there in a flash) these hillside villas surpassed those, and in the main it was the outlook - waking up in the morning to have a dip in your pool with the views over the bay, beach and national park was just outstanding. There was also something quite special (I’m going to write a blog post just about resorts which give the guests private buggies) about being slightly remote from the resort of the resort, and driving down (albeit it just took a couple of minutes) to breakfast, to visit the spa, or to get to the restaurants and bars). All other villas in the resorts were given bikes to get around, and at various points throughout both sides of the resorts there were communal buggy collection/drop-off points).

Food & Drink

With five restaurants to choose and five bars, there was plenty of choice - we ate breakfast in the main buffet restaurant on the first morning (and last for convenience) but apart from that we used Seselwa on the north beach, which was nearer to us, for breakfast on the other mornings. It was smaller and much less frenetic, but still with a good choice of food and a much nicer location literally just off the beach. We also ate dinner there one night, but our outright favourite was Helios (Mediteranean) followed by Adam & Eve (South East Asian). We didn’t get a chance to try our Cyann (the fine dining French/Asian restaurant) but were impressed with all food and service and in fact went back to Adam & Eve twice because we enjoyed it so much, and would have gone again to Helios except that the menu on the last night wasn’t very conducive to a vegetarian. In terms of bars, Helios, Adam & Eve, Cyann and Seselwa were restaurants which also had a separate bar area connected, the only individual bar was Zee bar on the south side of the resort where we had a snack lunch a couple of times and was good too.

Being in the hillside villas, there was the option of in-villa dining but we never actually took this up; it was actually good to have the (very) short buggy drive to get to any of the restaurants, even the further away ones on the south side were only a few minutes drive. There was a mini-bar and wine fridge in the villa, this was regularly topped up throughout our stay.

Facilities & Service

The absolute highlight here was the Constance Spa, located between the north and south sides of the resort. With hindsight, I should have booked some treatments as soon as we arrived so that there would be the opportunity to return, but we left these until our last day and wished we’d gone earlier. I will write up a separate spa review for This Man’s Journal part of my website, but it’s fair to say the Spa was incredibly designed, great treatment (Balinese massage and ‘Mrs’ ThePrivateTraveller had a male manicure) and just in a wonderful set up. There was a yoga deck above a shallow circular pool in the middle of the Spa village, this was surrounded by a number of individual spa pavilions (all with separate changing and shower facilities), whirlpools and jacuzzi, sauna and steam room (though both out of action when were there due to Covid), a unique Kneipp Path (I’d seen Kneipp baths before indoor, but never an outdoor path). There was also a separate gym (located nearby) which was very well appointed with equipment and a swimming pool to the rear of the gym; the gym was bookable during our stay (again Covid restrictions) but I never actually went to train there, I was having a break over Christmas!

As well as there being other things to do outside in the national park, and on Mahé itself, we enjoyed a really relaxed time in the resort - we walked on both beaches (both with stunning views), sunbathed and swam, but equally there was also tennis and squash courts on site, yoga in the spa, wall climbing, a whole arrange of watersports (kayaking, canoeing, pedal boats, windsurfing, snorkeling etc) too. The one thing I felt we missed out on was the zip-lining - up on the hillside where the private villas were located was the start of a multi-stage zip-line back down to the beach level. I did try one day to phone the zip-line activity centre, but was never able to get through, despite also being given a mobile number. There was a very useful app provided by the resort which you could access on all mobile devices, as well as having all the hotel info like restaurant, bar, activity information and menus etc., there was also a chat facility. I did also reach out to them about not being able to get through to the activity booking line and they promised someone would get in touch but no one did. It wasn’t a drama, it’s something I would really like to do and having had such a great stay would plan to return at some point in the future and can hopefully try the zip-line then. 

Service throughout was good; it was a bit patchy before arrival (complete lack of communication from the resort, despite flagging this numerous times), a bit patchy on arrival and on departure (mix up with timing of airport transfer) but the location was wonderful as were the incredible hillside villas that made up for any minor shortcomings on service. In all restaurants and bars, again service was mainly good, and the servicing of our villa was just exceptional - twice a day this was restored to 100% pristine condition.

ThePrivateTraveller’s top tips (any areas for improvement?):

  • The only thing I would say is that communication breakdowns sometimes led to glitches in service, but all minor and we ended up having a wonderful stay.

ThePrivateTraveller’s absolute highlights:

  • Location, location, location - the views from the hillside villas were incredible, having the private infinity pool too and loved the use of a dedicated golf buggy to get around the resort.

  • Our dinner in Helios was the absolute dining highlight, but Adam & Eve good too as was Seselwa at breakfast times.

Useful website links:

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