Lake Taupo Holiday Resort

First time stay, will never stay again! I think as we paid top dollar for our campsite, we expected better. It does seem there were maximum people allowed to camp at the same time, but the facilities ie - kitchen/toilets were rammed and filthy and not big enough to cater for the masses. We camped in a tent, did not take a BBQ as we thought we could use the camping ground ones. Well that was a mistake, as there is only 1 BBQ in the block we were staying. One BBQ! What a joke! There are 2 BBQs in the other block nearer the entrance. Don't even think about using the kitchen, it is very very small for the hoards that used it all at once, and only one oven. Families rammed inside cooking and eating and yelling over the top of each other. Food left everywhere as people could not be bothered to tidy up after themselves, what are their own kitchens like? It was just awful. There were only 2 BBQ tables outside on the lovely grassed area, if there were more tables outside, I am guessing families might have used these instead of staying in the kitchen for over an hour at a time. Fridges/Freezers were also at a minimum, there wasn't any room for any of our food ever, so we resorted to buying copious amounts of ice each day to stay away from the chaos. That kitchen seriously scarred us, it was revolting. The hygiene standards of others saw food in sinks that blocked up, food and wrappers inside the dishracks for your clean dishes to drain. Food on the floor that people had dropped but not bothered to pick up. Now I totally understand that this is not the resort's fault, but it is definitely their problem, and one that needs to be addressed and fixed. Maybe Management should communicate with their cleaners to see how bad it gets. And for the amount of people there each day dirtying up the place, there needs to be a couple of cleaning services a day. Hey wait on, why not have another 2 x sets of Kitchen/toilets for the park? That would really take the pressure off the existing facilities, and maybe invest in another few BBQs while you are at it. I recommend the Management/Owners should have a walk around the park at peak times (ie - Xmas, holiday times) to see what guests are subjected to. The no noise policy..... well we were woken up to an individual at 7.30am on Xmas morning who took their massive speaker to the kitchen, plugged it in and put it outside the door, directed at the campground playing music. Wow, I thought this place was strict on not being too noisy and respecting all campers. Not sure on how you would be able to police this though. We had a speaker, but chose to be respectful and did not blast it with our choice of music, as not all like our music. But we did endure many others favourite hits, many many times. When we booked ages ago, there was a minimum of 7 nights stay, we arrived a day late (our choice) and we chose to leave a day early, we couldn't stomach the filth anymore. There were a couple of positives so I feel I must share, the hydr

Stunning place for families. Super clean pools and accomodation. Great staff too. A very well run holiday park with awesome water slides and pools - even a cave with treasure chest to dive to. We loved the wide range of accomodation options from tent sites to beautiful villas.