I attended Antalya Sensual Escape dance festival 27th January 23 to 30th January 23. Below is my full independent review of the festival

So here is my full review of Antalya Sensual Escape Dance Festival Antalya Nights Edition 2023! I am in a bit of a quandra and have very mixed feelings about this festival as I have seen so many good things but equally things that could have been done better.

Great things

1 Festival was really well organised in terms of hotel venue, good food choice and drink availability
2 Great price £270 for a all inclusive weekend for full pass 3 nights accommodation and all food and drink,
3 threesome bachata role reversal with Stephanie, Tiago Miranda Adegas and Filipe was probably the best workshop i had seen in 10 years of my dancing as this is something we don't get to try everyday and had great meaning.
4 a chance to dance with all the artists being a small festival

Things that could have been better:-
1 Wristbands were not sufficient quality - (both my wristbands came off / fell off during the weekend dancing).
2 There was alot of familiarity at the festival with many uk dancers attending, with this being such a small festival I felt it did create a uneven playing field so familiarity was a big risk with rejection quite high especially the Friday night party. I certainly felt at times there was a dance hierarchy at the social given the inheritant risk of familiarity as loads of people wanted to dance with the artists. (This can be a positive and negative point)
3 No alcohol was available after 3am.
4 Hidden costs of government taxes - we were only told on arrival it was 5 euros hotel tax per person per night (15 euros per person for 3 nights) upon arrival payable to the organiser -lack of transparency on pricing.
5 There was nobody on the door checking wristbands so hotel manager, hotel waiters, hotel cleaner and hotel porter were all coming to the party in the evening after staff closed the bar - (in the Uk hotel staff wouldn't normally take part in the event as a participant).
6 dancefloor started falling apart after the Friday night party and needed rebuilding on Saturday

Before I booked to go to Antalya I was prewarned about festivals in Turkey and having seen this for myself first-hand having danced across the world in my 10 years its unfortunate but not surprising how things have played out although many external factors were present which haven't played out the way I had hoped. I do not think it is the organisers fault, I feel this way since alot of these external factors are outside the organisers control and is simply an inherent risk given the scenario of the festival.

Larger established festivals like Bachturo in Poland, Barcelona bachata festivals being much larger, the risk is spread more evenly therefore providing better chance of things working out.

But lastly I am still pleased I chose to go to sensual escape dance festival 2023 as its been an experience and another country I have danced in ticked of my bucket list of countries to visit :)