Polaris World Forum

Opening of the La Torre Intercontinental

2009-02-11T12:26:00.000-08:00

As a valued business partner of Polaris World, we recently had the opportunity to have a tour of the La Torre Intercontinental hotel before it has been officially opened.

We usually stay at the Intercontinental hotel on Mar Menor when we are visiting Murcia and have been watching the construction progress of the hotel on La Torre with interest and were definitely impressed with what we saw.

The hotel is thoroughly impressive and as Polaris World have a new agreement with Intercontinental that sees them being able to set the prices for the rooms, there are some great rates to be had and we would definitely recommend giving the hotel a call to get the best rate of the day.

Below are a selection of the photos we took whilst there:

The hotel bar

Hotel restaurant and breakfast room

Entrance lobby

Go Ruth! Polaris World Spain Wish You the Best!

2008-10-20T13:11:00.000-07:00

It was not all that long ago that we used to enjoy a night out in the Clover or the social club on the Polaris World resorts to see the band DOSS play when Ruth was singing with them, but now we just get to cheer her on from the comfort of our sofas!

But alas, I doubt we will be seeing Ruth back in the Clover any time soon but at the same time we are extremely glad and hope that she stays in the X Factor for some time to come and wish her all the very best of luck.

It is certainly good PR for Polaris World and you never know, maybe Ruth will place the Polaris World resorts on her tour schedule one day!

Buena suerte Ruth!

Proposed Opening of La Torre Intercontinental on Polaris World

2008-09-23T02:19:00.001-07:00

We all knew that the 2nd Intercontinental hotel on Polaris World resorts was due to open towards the end of the year and a fair few of us would have already seen the construction progress going on first hand, so it comes as no surprise to hear the latest news that the official inauguration ceremony of the Intercontinental 5* hotel La Torre Golf Resort will be on New Years Eve.

La Torre is the 2nd of Polaris's resorts and has been up and running for some time. The town centre continues to see new openings and the hotel was one of the last areas of construction to be finished up. The first Intercontinental for the region is on the Mar Menor Golf Resort and has since proved to be very popular with conference rooms for business events, lovely open terrace area for evening events as well as weddings and parties and a great jazz band that play in the Lobby bar on the weekends.

To celebrate the hotel opening as well as to see in the new year, an evening meal has been planned for the 31st and the entertainment has also already been chosen...

This year, Woody Allen, American film director, actor, writer, comedian, playwright and also musician, has been invited over to Murcia for the event. Woody, a jazz clarinetist, plays with a jazz band in Manhattan and they have been asked to play during the evening meal.

It's always good to hear news of positive progress on the Polaris Resorts and we hope that the Intercontinental opening will be something to look forward to.

When we hear more about the event we will let you know...

Renting on Polaris World - Try Before You Buy!

2008-08-29T06:27:00.000-07:00

Buying a property in the sun these days is no longer the care-free 10 minute transaction of days gone by, so with a lot more caution surrounding the purchase of a holiday home or second home in Spain why is it that you should still be considering purchasing a property on Polaris World ?

With word of a credit crunch looming all around and news that the low cost airlines are now becoming less and less low cost, you need to look at more and more ways to make really sure you are committing to a property having done all the research you are happy with.

One of the best ways is to take a holiday over to the Polaris World resorts and rent a property for a week or so to get more of an idea about living on the resort or returning on a regular basis. Instead of a hotel, look at the available rentals across all of the resorts and sample a slice of Polaris World life as if you were an owner. Many owners use a management company offering a meet and greet service to show you around the property, advise you on local things to do and see and are on call throughout your stay to ensure you have everything you need making for an ejoyable stay with minimal effort to yourself.

With all of this in mind we do have an ever increasing number of Polaris World properties to rent, including a Property of the Month currently on the resort of El Valle giving you all the information you need to enjoy a Try Before You Buy stay on a Polaris World resort.

The Need for Speed - Exciting Things To Do Not Far From Polaris World Resorts

2008-08-22T01:51:00.000-07:00

If lazing around the pool gets a bit too much for you and you have a burning desire to do something that requires a bit more energy than a forward crawl, then you need to try out a Track Day , super adrenaline charged days of taking a supercar and pushing it to the limits around the race track in Guadix.

Only 2 hours from the Polaris World resorts, the Guadix race circuit near Granada is home to Track Days Spain, a company specialising in safe, affordable track days for car enthusiasts, petrol heads and anyone simply looking for a fun day out.

Set up by a car mad petrol head who found there was nothing similar to the Track Days back in the UK over in Spain, Track Days Spain costs from 249 euros for an entire day of racing around a track that has been used by Lewis Hamilton for testing and also Aston Martin for testing their Le Mans race car. There are some fantastic super cars to rent out for the day but most participants bring their own cars to be able to let rip like they can't do on the open road.

With an emphasis on safety, Track Days Spain offers full briefings, track supervision and qualified instructors to help you enjoy your day to the max. We went along to one of the early ones as a spectator but had a chance to be taken around the track as a passenger and was totally amazed at the difference between watching boys with their toys drive fast around race tracks on the TV and the buzz you get being tightly strapped in and having to hold your helmet upright as the G force pulls you around the corners of the track. This is not just for the boys, the whole family can enjoy the atmosphere down at the track.

The next track day is on Friday 12th September and you can get all the information you need and book your place for the day on the website www.trackdaysspain.com.

To subscribe to the Track Days Spain newsletter to find out more about upcoming events, to see the photo scrap book and to book your place at the next event, visit www.trackdaysspain.com

New Show Apartments on Polaris World's Las Terrazas de la Torre Golf Resort

2008-08-18T05:08:00.000-07:00

As Polaris World begins to hand over the latest resort of Las Terrazas de la Torre, located just a stone's throw from the resort of La Torre, owners and prospective buyers can now see the reality first hand in the new show apartments.

Las Terrazas comprises an 18 hole desert style Nicklaus Design golf course with front line apartments around the edges. In the middle of the resort there is a town centre where there will be restaurants, a bar, supermarket and the regular Polaris World services and facilities all centered around a lake. Within the lake there are additional apartments with great views all around the resort and golf course.

The show apartments are located in Block 13 in the 1st phase of the resort. On entering the resort, this will be to the right hand side. The apartments will have views of the communal pool and of the golf course. Until the resort is up and running, residents can make use of everything that is already available over on La Torre, a couple of minutes in the car or an easy bike ride over.

The new show apartments will be open every day of the week from 10am to 7pm.

Polaris World open a new showroom on the resort of Condado de Alhama

2008-07-25T03:03:00.000-07:00

The new showroom on the resort of Condado de Alhama offically opens!

The new showroom covers over 1,700m2 and has been built in a Hispano-Arab style, similar style to the planned Oasis town centre that will serve all of the resorts on Condado de Alhama. As with the main Polaris World showroom in Balsicas, the showroom on Alhama will have a wide range of sales tools and information including models, posters, location maps, leaflets and catalogues, light panels, videos and much more to cover all of the resorts and properties on the development.

The new showroom will make it a lot easier for clients to visit the site as the showroom is located within easy reach of all of the resorts already built and also those currently under construction on Condado de Alhama.

Open between 10am - 7pm every day of the week, the showroom will hopefully pull more visitors to the site. Residents have been moving into the properties on the resort of Jardines de Alhama for over a month now and most handovers are planned to be finished by Sept/Oct time so the showroom will serve a purpose for them as well as to give new visitors the chance to see the more than impressive construction progress taking place.

Polaris World Opens.......

2008-06-22T10:26:00.000-07:00

1) The Hacienda Riquelme golf course!

The 4th golf course for Polaris World is now up and running. An 18 hole par 72 Florida Open style course let the first golfers up to the 1st tee in the last week and there were also a good few people seen on the driving range whilst their partners sat not so far away soaking up the 30 degree sunshine at the temporary Spike bar just next to it.

2) The El Valle supermarket!

And they sell shreddies and taramasalata! Ok, so it's not exactly a cause for celebration but the new supermarket does appear to be sufficiently different to Polaris World's other supermarket over on La Torre. Paco who runs all the supermarkets is a fantastic guy and him and his team have been working round the clock to get the new supermarket up to scratch and while it's still early days as the shelves are still being stocked but so far, so good!

New Show Apartments opening on Polaris World!

2008-06-16T09:34:00.000-07:00

We have just heard that tomorrow 4 new show apartments will be opening on the resort of Los Naranjos on the Condado de Alhama complex tomorrow, 17th June.

The apartments will be of the Jardines style, similar to those Polaris already has open in Los Jardines de Alhama. The new show apartments highlight the speed of construction going on across the whole site and the new show apartments will also give clients more of an insight into the area where the Los Naranjos resort is located.

Given the construction still going on, visitors will have to be accompanied to the site from the main Condado sales office, which is also due to open within the next couple of days as it relocates from the temporary office, and go across to the new apartments. Once the Jardines style apartments are open we hope for the Penthouse style apartment on the same resort!

The latest on Polaris World

2008-06-16T06:40:00.000-07:00

Now the El Valle social club has officially opened there have been many people scoping out the new services to see if everything lives up to the expectations we´ve all had of the this one being the social club on the most exclusive resort to date, and I don´t think they have left disappointed. From having been down there a couple times now we think the terrace and sofa area outside has been done very well and could not have come at a better time just as the weekend temperatures have been hitting 30 degrees!

Inside the building the grill restaurant is yet to open and there were no menus about for us to have a sneaky peak but the name definitely suggests there will be lots of meat about!

Elsewhere, the Intercontinental hotel on the Mar Menor resort celebrates its 2 year anniversary by offering discounts of up to 25% in the hotel restaurants and also on spa treatments until 30th June which I think we shall almost certainly be making use of! The opening of the Intercontinental hotel on La Torre is also still scheduled for December opening and hopes to bring more business to the area.

Next we´re hoping to hear about the official Polaris World opening of the golf course on Hacienda Riquelme!

New Sales Initiatives for Polaris World

2008-06-12T01:02:00.000-07:00

Always hoping there are bright new ways to bring in the pennies, Polaris World Spain will be matching the current deal Polaris World is offering to existing owners.

A new initiative, via the "Friends of Polaris World" scheme was launched last week to entice owners to "recommend a friend" and earn themselves 3,000 euros. The offer will last til the end of the year and you can recommend as many friends as you like so we would like to extend the generous offer to our clients who have already purchased, AS WELL AS new clients to help the deals come in.

As a Golden Partner for PW, much of our business comes through referrals of existing owners and we take great pride in the fact so many are willing to put their pals through the same experience! So we hope that anyone interested in having their best bud live next door, or alternatively, have their mother-in-law live in the Jardin over at the other end of the resort, calls us asap!

Preview of the El Valle Social Club

2008-05-27T08:24:00.000-07:00

It turns out the El Valle social club did indeed open on Saturday, but just for the golf tournament that was on. We managed to have a sneak peek around it today and took the photos below to give our readers the first glimpse of what they can expect. The person we spoke to expects the whole lot to be open in around 15 days which walking around, could be a very realistic max date. The structure is a gleaming white building near to the apartment blocks in the middle of the resort as above.

To the right side of the main entrance is where we expect the supermarket entrance to be:

Within the building the mail boxes will be located down on the right hand side, which will probably relieve the call centre of much paper as they currently receive the post for all residents! The entrance to the bank/cash machine will also be found near to the entrance. Walking through to the golf Spike bar at the back of the building there is a bright internal courtyard with units either side and plants and some benches in the middle. On the right side the golf pro shop will be next to the Clover bar.

The Clover looks smaller and cosier than the ones on La Torre and Mar Menor and will hopefully be as lively but also in keeping with the more exclusivity of the resort. For something a little more chilled though, residents can cut through the courtyard to the more comfy looking big sofas just inside:

These sofas are located inside just between the Cypres restaurant (just meat meat meat in there we are told! can´t wait...) and the relaxed lookin area just near to the Spike bar:

Pretty impressive all in all. There will be other commercial units in the inner courtyard but we don´t know yet what they might be. That is our next mission....!

El Valle Social Club Opening This Weekend!

2008-05-22T09:51:00.000-07:00

The BBQ idea appears to have caught on already and as far as we know, there hasn´t even been one yet! Since our blog yesterday we have seen that the plan is to open the Club House on El Valle this weekend and to celebrate the grand opening there will also be a golf tournament on Saturday. To end a hard day of soaking up the sunshine around the golf course there will be a well earned barbecue for those taking part.

The residents of the resort have received notification of the weekend plans and can register their entries with the golf club house at the price of 30€.

In the Club House there will also be a restaurant known as "El Asador" which translates as a Rotisserie or Steakhouse (bring it on!) as well as the softer sounding "Sándalo Chill Out Bar" as well as a Clover pub of La Torre and Mar Menor fame (the Irish certainly made that one happen). For the services there will be a cashpoint, supermarket and also the golf pro-shop all housed there.

In addition, we have also found out that the first residents BBQ being held on Hacienda Riquelme will be on Saturday 31st May.

At the end of a long day, the steakhouse is certainly making the moussaka I had plans to have for dinner tonight sound decidedly dull.....

Summer is finally coming!

2008-05-21T10:06:00.000-07:00

After a week of dull grey, very English like weather, the sun has finally returned to its rightful position in the Spanish skies. Not that we didn´t enjoy a bit of a break but Spain can be fairly dull when you don´t have at least 15 tourists in the pool to people watch...

Anyway, we have been informed, albeit not by Polaris this time but by the El Valle grapevine that the club house on El Valle is actually due to be opened this weekend. Polaris had told us they hoped it would be soon but an actual date gives us a little bit to work on and new drinks dates to arrange up there. We are not sure whether the supermarket will actually open at the same time though but it is planned to be within the golf club house building so the outlook is good.

We also know that there will be sorts of BBQ dinners arranged for the residents over the summer on El Valle as well as on Hacienda Riquelme and we get the impression the plan is to be able to do something for the residents who may not have the full round of restaurants and bars up and running on their resort yet, and if these summer evenings with the BBQ go down well then they may be done every few weeks throughout the summer. Now, a big BBQ up near the golf course with a nice cold drink watching the sun go down across the resorts does sound appealing and we´d hope it would be something that the residents would enjoy. We do know that Polaris World have been trying to do a fair bit so far this year to improve the after-sales help, customer relations and general contact with those who have already brought a property and now it would be good to see it all come together.

We´d be interested to know of other residents who may know a bit more about the dinners or who have plans to go to one and we´ll try and have the post-event low down on here as soon as we know when it is!!!

Polaris Progress

2008-05-07T08:58:00.000-07:00

Another week and the progress continues in Polaris World!

This week we hear that the scheduled opening of the golf course on Hacienda Riquelme should be the 1st June. This is long awaited news, we are not golfers here ourselves but it will apparently going to be longer and more of a pro course than on La Torre.

In addition to this Polaris tell us that they hope to have a show apartment on Las Terrazas de la Torre in a couple of weeks, they also hope to be opening the club house at El Valle in a couple of weeks too.

We hear that the new restaurant to open on the resorts will be known as "Cipres" - a bistro type restaurant. We haven´t heard where exactly it will be but we can but assume it will be on the resort of El Valle in the new club house. And we still need to test the Bamboo restaurant....!

Whats going on at Polaris World?

2008-05-02T00:30:00.000-07:00

My source has informed me that this week Polaris have been calling all those clients who purchased on the original Phase 2 of the Terrazas de la Torre resort to offer them alternative properties in different phases and on different resorts.

Why?

The aparent reason being given to the clients is that they do not yet have a construction start date for this phase so rather than have clients wait and wait, they can move to a more key ready property.

Good or bad?

We have been told that Polaris hopes to have a show apartment in Phase 1 there next month so we are happy there are no plans to temporarily shelve it like they had to with Alhama!

Exciting News!

There are substantial discounts being offered on Hacienda Riquelme and having spoken to some of our clients, the alternatives are quite attractive and they appear to be being looked after well enough. As the resort of HR is already up and with people living there we think that if our clients are happy then so are we!

Friday afternoon fun

2008-04-25T06:25:00.000-07:00

It turns out, so we´ve been told, that one of the new sales directors at Polaris has an Asbo as the exhaust on his Porsche makes too much noise driving through Redhill. True? Who knows... Amusing for a Friday afternoon? yes!...

On a slightly more serious note at least clients on Hacienda Riquelme are not going to starve any longer as Polaris have put a temporary supermarket there. Its probably slightly annoying for the residents on El Valle, some of whom have been there longer without even a corner shop as far as retail therapy goes, but I suppose at least they have the Wood House bar which does a good burger. The supermarket should help to ease the issues of how long the residents there will have to wait for the town centre. With all of the issues surrounding the delays on the town centre though, it is the very least residents there can expect.

Property Management & Key Holding Services

2008-04-25T05:57:00.000-07:00

Here at Polaris World Spain we always like to bring you interesting information on new services that are available which we think may be of interest to Polaris World property owners.

Overseas Keys (www.overseaskeys.com) have launched a brand new service offering professional property management in Murcia as well as key holding services. Uniquely they can hold your keys at Murcia Airport so you can easily collect or drop them off when you or your guests fly in and out.

Overseas Keys is the first overseas venture by the co-operative travel who most of you will know are one of the largest travel firms in the UK.

We think this is a great service to be offering and we feel it could be of benefit to many of the Polaris World property owners.

Polaris World Spain would like to wish Overseas Keys the best of luck with this new venture.

You heard it here first...

2008-04-25T01:50:00.000-07:00

Dear Readers,

Blogs are so prolific on the Internet thesedays we thought we would join the masses and bring the benefit of our experience and contacts to our wealth of readers!

Over here though, we have that little extra to bring you though!

As a Polaris World Golden Partner, PolarisWorldSpain deals with Polaris on a daily, well, almost hourly basis so there is very little that escapes us. If there is something worth knowing about that affects the general market or Polaris world then we will hear it as it happens. If it is whether “the man off the tele” is actually currently sitting inside a 4 x 4 room with no more than his thoughts for company, or what the real reasons for the latest dramatic personnel changes in the UK office of Polaris World are, then you will hear it here first.

And believe us, there is a lot going on on Planet Polaris!

Our contacts tell us that the current coffee corner goss centres around the recent recruitment of 3 new sales Directors who will have full control of Polaris Sales. Jack, Nick and Paul Hamilton of ex-Parador fame have been brought in to the centre of the action with the aim of bringing their experience to a formerly very Spanish dominated management, to see if they can shift a few more properties no doubt. Will this mean Polaris will see the errors of their ways and place a native speaker on the box for the next round of adverts? Or will they view it as a quirky authentic piece of Spanishness and an exemplary piece of latin schmooze and keep on bringing him back time and time again until we see an all singing all dancing personality on the TV….or are we now confusing the much beloved José Luis with that guy on the Halifax adverts…?...

Either way, the next few months will show us what this means for us as agents still selling the properties but our sources tell us that Polaris has no plans on retiring José Luis from his TV fame just yet…..

The New Polaris World Discussion Board

2008-04-04T06:02:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the brand new discussion forum for Polaris World.

As one of the leading Polaris World Golden Partners we will bring you the latest news and information about Polaris World as soon as we hear it.

Of course we also look forward to your feedback.