We stayed for one week at Riu Palace, Tenerife in mid March 2008 on B & B basis. The hotel has a perfect position right on the seafront at Adeje so we asked for and were promised a room on a high floor with a sea view. Some people don't see this as important but we do. You can imagine our disapointment then when we were given room 101. It is on the ground floor right at the back of the hotel with a view of a large wall. We had arrived around midday and the weather was superb. However the room was dark and gloomy, so dark we had to put the lights on even with the patio doors open.
As has been said by others, the hotel is horseshoe shaped. If you get a room at the front it will be sunny, light and pleasant. However, if your room is at the rear, on the end of either of the two arms of the horseshoe you may well be disapointed as we were. Also, the hotel is built on a slope. Some rooms have a patio rather than a balcony even though they are on a higher floor. With a patio there is little privacy as anyone can walk past at any time. Not that anyone would walk past room 101 as it is tucked away in its cavernlike cul-de-sac.
We asked to be moved and were politely told that the hotel was full and that it is necessary to book a room with a sea view. We said we thought we had and the paperwork confirmed this. Apparently this request had not been received. We were told that 'maybe tomorrow or the next day' there may be a better room. We were moved the following day to room 461 which is on the opposite side of the hotel but again at the end of one of the arms. We had a balcony this time with the view of the dusty service road as mentioned by others. If you leaned right out you could actually see the sea!
The rooms themselves are medium size and adequate. We found the beds firm but comfortable but the small square pillows are simply silly and annoying. The furniture is hotel standard and the patio furniture is cheap and flimsy. The bathrooms are up to standard with tiling and some marble but the most annoying thing was the shower curtain. The shower is over the bath. The bath is narrower than usual and the shower curtain when pulled across has the habit of clinging to you as you are taking a shower. It is not good.
We had read other reviews on this site and took with us a travel kettle and a travel iron. I would advise you to do the same.
Although we had bed and breakfast we did eat at the Riu Palace 'restuarant' twice. I have put 'restuarant' in inverted commas because it is very large, self service and is really a canteen. The food was plentiful and varied. We took breakfast out on the terrace as it has a nice sea view and feels much better than the canteen. It seems many other guests agreed with us and there was always a long queue for a table. Again, I agree with others; they do not know how to make a decent cup of tea. We drank the poor coffee instead. The bacon was very thin and fatty and the sausages were chipolatas.
Were there any good bits? Well yes there were. The staff are amazing. All friendly and helpful. The rooms are clean, as is the whole hotel. The pool areas are fine with plently of loungers to go round. We didn't try the speciality restuarant which needs to be booked in advance, I assume, because no one likes eating in the canteen.
We went to the gym but it was full with three or four people in there. The spa area is again small for a large hotel and one of the two jacuzzis was broken. The sauna was good.
The hotel is rated as four star. Well perhaps it just about makes it in some areas but frankly I don't understand how it can be when there is no table service and guests have to hike around a very large canteen and join queues to fetch thier own food between courses. This isn't the most expensive hotel in the world but it wasn't cheap either and a hotel that charges this much for a week and sees itself as four star should really provide the small things that set it apart. It is a very great shame really as with just a little more thought and effort this could be a really excellent hotel.
Would we go back? Perhaps, it has a great location. So, yes if we had a good room and again on a bed and breakfast basis.

Long weekend break (5-night) was what we were about.

Arrived quite late, but nice to get a drink (complimentary) whilst the reception formalities were ironed out. We were on half-board, dinner had finished but they had left us out quite a buffet spread so no complaints there!

Room on the sixth floor was nice enough, clean, well appointed, no particular view except of a dried up drainage channel, but then again we didn't the pay extra to get a sea-view. Shower over bath a bit of a tight squeeze.

Quick shower and made friends with the Barman, had a few then got our heads down.

Fortunate that we did, because we were awoken at 6am by a large amount of noise from one or more of the surrounding rooms, shouting and generally scraping chairs, drawers etc. the noise appeared to be from German couples in adjoining rooms going by the odd bits of language we picked up, we hoped they were getting ready for early checkout, which appeared to be the case as there was no re-occurence over the rest of our stay.

No complaints as to the food and range available, it would be nice to get a table outside for breakfast, but this would have involved queueing for quite a long time everyday.

For dinner we preferred the poolside covered restaurant (much more personal and attentive service at your table) at no additional cost.

Poolside and sandy beach area within the hotel grounds very clean, well laid out and no problems getting loungers wherever we chose. Attentive and friendly drinks and bar service.

Locally, English and German bars about 5 mins walk, 10 mins walk to further bars, restaurants, ice-cream parlours etc.

Newspapers available in the Hotel shop (provided you reserve) together with other sundries you might need, supermarket about 5 mins walk for everything.

Sunset is great to watch, unfortunately the sundowner bar area which you would have thought was the purpose closed well before sundown (perhaps because it was still the "winter" season? )

All the staff are brilliant, and we got the impression several guests were regular visitors which always bodes well. Average guest age perhaps a little older than us (we are 50) but fine by us.

Nightly entertainment a bit naff, but then again when not many go and watch it and buy drinks to support the cost you can't really expect the hotel to spend fortunes booking top acts (the resident band was OK, we'ed seen them before in Gran Canaria).

Being on the sixth floor was handy for the reception, shop, restaurant, entertainment etc. but getting a lift to or from the lower floors during busy periods was a niggle.

Would stay again but as we've said before in other reviews theres a lot of the world to see!

Just returned from short break at RIU PALACE - usual warm welcome and good standard of facilities. Room was a slight disappointment - hotel is horsehoe shaped - rooms on one wing therefore have limited/no sea view -overlook dusty service road. Avoid rooms in the range of 50 and up - view gets worse as numbers go up.
Also slightly surprised by the clientele - two defining charcaterisitics - elderly and German. We are no spring chickens (both in our 50s) but we were definitely well down the age scale. Also the vast majortiy of guests were German - not a problem in itself - although the fact that more than half the TV channesl were German language with only 2 English language news stations should have been a clue.
Quality of food not as good as other RIUs we have stayed at but not bad - part of the problem seemed to be the layout as there wasn't a natural flow - led to a lot of congestion at certian places.
All in all though an enjoyable break.

We stayed in the Riu Palace for one week on a half board basis.
We were given a very spacious room with a sea view and was excellently maintained every day, added with a few personal touches. The food in the restaurant was very good catering for every taste. The also have a speciality restaurant of which you can dine in at no extra charge and the food was superb. The hotel is in an excellent location with shops, other restaurants and bars within easy walking distance. From the moment we arrived every member of staff were very helpful and extremely
courteous. They helped make our week with them a very enjoyable one and would go back there again