Couple abandon £3,000 holiday five days early due to sewage smell and techno music

A couple cut short their three-week, five-star beach resort holiday that cost them £2,700 because they could not stand the stench of sewage in their room and having to walk nearly an hour in blistering heat to escape the pool bar’s loud techno music.

Clive Murray, 65, and his wife Rosie, 52, from Macclesfield, Cheshire, booked the all-inclusive Hotel Riu Touareg on the island of Boa Vista in Cape Verde in April through Tui.

It was supposed to be a “relaxing holiday” while the couple were in the process of moving house but instead they said it felt more like being in Benidorm or Kavos and were shocked by the condition of their double room – which they said smelled of sewage.

Clive, who served in the British Army as an airborne engineer for 26 years, said he had to fix the bathroom’s shower head with a rubber band and kept having to refit the toilet’s flush – as it fell off the wall when he pressed it. After two weeks trekking nearly an hour to escape “the noise” of techno music from the hotel’s pool bar, the couple threw in the towel and booked an Airbnb in Sal Rei, despite having paid for five more nights.

All in, Clive and Rosie said they spent more than £3,000 on the holiday and, despite complaining to Tui representatives at the hotel, have not been contacted by the company for a refund or compensation.

Clive, who is now busy renovating their new home in Cumbria, said he will never book with the company again.

“We wanted a relaxing three weeks away because, with the house move and everything, the whole year has been really stressful,” he told PA. “We just wanted to relax… if only. Almost every day, we would walk 50 minutes up the beach so we could get away.

“So we’d make our sandwiches in the morning at breakfast – remember this is an all inclusive – and go sit on the beach as far away from the hotel as possible, so we didn’t have to listen to this constant noise. And you could still hear it.

“I know some people will call me an old grouch, but there was a lot of older people there and yet the hotel had adopted a Benidorm or Kavos model with really loud techno music.”

It was not all bad, according to the couple, who said the food was excellent and the hotel staff were always very polite and friendly.

The retired…