| My home away from home |
| Hotel Cubanacan Club Amigo Marea del Portillo |
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lois >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Aug, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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Just returned to Marea del Portillo after an absence of 20 years. There were still friends there who recognized me. THe arrival at the airport is well organized. The ride to hotel gives you an amazing insight into the way of life of Cuban people. THere is help at the hotel for your luggage. The rooms are adequate and have hairdryers and towels provided. Beach towels are provided as well. THe hotel is located in a rural setting which makes it a very relaxing quiet place for all ages to enjoy a safe and fun filled vacation. The hotel is clean, the food is plain but tasty. Lunch can be served at the beach bar. The staff are very friendly and helpful. There is a money exchange and internet access in the lobby. The beach is just delightful and uncrowed. Enjoy the excellent snorkeling in the lagoon. Take every opportunity to explore the surrounding country side, the locals are delighted to meet you. Take the planned excursions available, the horse riding is great. The evening entertainment is a colourful and musical introduction to the Cuban culture. Feel safe to explore the beach and surrounding area. Enjoy this very special place.
Chow |
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| One very hot week (sometimes too hot actually!) |
| Hotel Sirenis Playa Turquesa (formerly Occidental Grand Playa Turquesa) |
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Pierre >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Aug, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We went to swim with the dolphins; well, actually, our 2 daughters went. My wife and I didn't have any interest in doing the swimming part so our daughters took our "20 minutes swim" coupons and went again for a total of 40 minutes. They had a blast. One of our daughter was selected to be thrown out of the water by 2 dolphins which made unbelievable memories. Glossy picture from the so-called "expert photograph" (a regular guy with a above average camera) is 10 pesos but not really worth it. We were right next to him while he was taking pictures and we barely see any difference when we compare our pictures with his. But even if we didn't swim with the dolphins, my wife and I were still allowed to go on the platform to have our picture taken with a dolphin between us.
There is a different show every evening at the theater. On our second evening, we sat behind two guys who had too much to drink and they really ruined it for everyone around them. Remember that seeing a live show is no different than seeing a movie: Shut up! It's even worse as the performers are there to see the lack of respect compared to a movie. One guy stood up and asked them to shut up to which the other reply "We have the right to speak". When the pissed spectator loudly yelled "You're a f-----g idiot", we thought "Ding! Round one", but no, he just left now that his show was completely ruined. The two drunk idiots kept taking. Please, people, if you're not there to see the show, just leave.
They cancel katamaran and pedalos reservations as soon as it's too windy, so better go make your reservations very early in the morning. Katamaran was quite boring anyway as they just go straight toward the ocean for 10 minutes then just come straight back. Pedalos were most pleasant for that.
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| Arrival |
| We were greeted at 20h30 with a cold towel and a drink they simply call the "Welcome Drink". My wife got hooked on these and didn't drink much else during out 7 days stay! |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| The pool with bar is the most popular but also has the most kids who play more with the plastic glasses than anything else (like others have said, where are the parents?!). The barman at pool is called Ivan and he's impossible to hate. Like I told him the last day I saw him, he's part of our best memories.
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| Other Comments |
General rules: You can tip everything, you can bargain any homemade stuff (my 16 years old single-handedly bargained a 30 pesos item for 22 pesos!) and there's rum in everything. Everybody expects a tip although they will not frown if you don't give any. The only "I really don't wanna work" face I've seen was from the cook on the beach.
Some people told us it was the raining period, some others said it wasn't so. Verdict: We had rain for a total of about 3 hours during our 7 days stay.
When it came time to leave, I found out the cashier had no canadian coins meaning no less that $5 bills. When I went to exchange my pesos for canadian money, I was offered $35 for my 37 pesos, which didn't make any sense. The cashier told me that if I could manage to find 1 more peso, he could give me $40 instead. This means the initial amount was somewhere in $39 but he had to round it down to $35. That's so bad!
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Buffet is the same everyday although slightly different between lunch and supper. It's not fine cuisine, but hey, you're in Cuba; you have to expect the food to be different.
Restaurants à-la-carte are not on the map provided by the reception and it wasn't obvious to find them on our own, so we had to call reception who did their best to explain it in this huge resort. By the way, the stuffed chicken at the Italian restaurant is just awesome!
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| Rooms |
Rooms are grouped in individual blocks of rooms making it harder to have connecting rooms. We were 3 groups of 2 people and our daughters had to stay in a separate block (at least close) which didn't make us a bit worried. We had room 504 which was better than the other 2 rooms (506 and 512) because it had an additional sofa, table, bar stand and 3 stools. The rooms wasn't physically bigger, but more places to sit which was useful for the 6 of us when we wanted to relax in an air conditioned room. The resort is huge, but it doesn't take long to learn its layout.
Beds are a bit too hard for me but still acceptable. The pillow is thin but wide (like 1'x3'), so you can easily fold it to make it the thickness you want. The fridge is filled daily with at least two 1500ml water bottles and 2 pops (flavor randomly vary). It seems we had a small problem with our shower as the water was only warm, but my brother-in-law said he had plenty. We didn't complain because it was enough to make it refreshing anyway.
I had to kill only 2 bugs in my room during my stay. You might want to bring tape to block the gap under the room door because it's quite big allowing most bugs to easily get it. My daughter (who's terrified of bugs) used a little flashlight we initially bought as a gift for room service. She couldn't leave without it in the evening because this is when crabs come out.
The curtains are not thick enough and light brightens the room at 7am.
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| Beautiful Beach, Nice Staff, Better than neighbor Resorts |
| Hotel Playa Caleta |
| User Rating:
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Michael >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Aug, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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To give context, this is my first trip to cuba and first stay at an all inclusive. I purchased a package through SunWing.
To start, here are a list of things you should bring that will enhance your stay ( I will give detail later) :
- Cookies
- Power Converter and Adapter (they have 220v euro plugs)
- Cup (like a travel mug or similar)
- A large towel
- Extra toiletries
- Snorkel and Mask
- Photocopy of your passport (Critial)
- Canadian $$, not USD
- Travel Clock
- Cookies
There are several hours between meals, and if you just miss the breakfast there will be no food until lunch at noon. After dinner, there are only toasted ham sandwiches. You can fill in the gaps with cookies and chips from home.
- Power Converter
Some resorts come equipped with american style plugs, but this one does not. You will need a plug adapter and a power converter. A must for charging your camera battery.
- Cup
Drinks are free and unlimited, but the cups are very small and the service is slow (all bars were understaffed). If you bring your own cup they will fill it with anything you would like! This greatly increases the enjoyment of this resort as the bars are not first come first serve, they are "Loudest are served first". Trust me, bring a big cup.
- A Large Towel
One per person. With SunWing you get 1 beach towel per person, but sometimes they forget to bring fresh ones, and if you lose their towel that costs 25 CUC. Bring your own towel and use it when your provided one is wet and waiting to be replaced. If you buy new towels for this trip, wash them first to get rid of the little fuzzies that will stick to your wet skin.
- Extra Toiletries
Like all Cuban resorts, they accept these as tips, as their local supplies are limited in range and qantity.
- Snorkle and Mask
The resort supplies a free snorkle and mask, but it is a bit stained and dirty, better to bring your own.
- Photocopy of your passport
When you check-in they take your passport for the night for processing. If you are unconfortable with this, they will take a photocopy. (if you have one)
- Canadian $$, not USD
USD gets an extra charge of 10% when converted. Canadian can be converted right at the resort into CUC. Keep in mind that the gift shop at the hotel charges an extra 20% (at least) compared to the duty free at the Varadero airport on the way out. (After you pass through security, not the stores in the area where you pick up your tickets). To give an example Havana Club Rum is $11 for the large bottle at the hotel, where it is $6 at the airport.
- Travel Clock
Any little plastic clock from a dollar store will do, there are no clocks in the rooms. < |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| There are shows and activites every night. The Friday before we left there was a very good beach part with all sorts of games, the prizes always being rum. Dance lessons and related things were offered, but I did not participate (not my cup of tea). |
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| Arrival |
| Arrival was Simple. The airport had a SunWing advisor that directed us to our bus, and the bus offered a tour guide that provided information and trivia about the surrounding area. Checking in was slow as there was only 1 clerk, and we were put off when asked to leave our passports at the front desk. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The beach is better than you could dream. Clean, with some small shells, clear blue water. There are many boats free for use, compared to the neighbor hotels that have none.
Pro-Tip: The beach area left of the boats have no areas of seaweed, where to the right there are some spots here and there. This area is less populated and a great place to swim.
The pool is nice, but does not offer much shade. You must jam yourself near the pool bar if you want to avoid a sunburn, (or avoid making one much worse). There is a volleyball net and basketball net, but you must give your passport if you want to borrow the balls. Better to bring an inflatable ball from home for the kids.
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| Other Comments |
PROS:
Beach
Pool Bar
Friendly Staff (Very Friendly)
CONS:
Bars Understaffed
Small Cups
If the wind stops, there is a smell in the hallways
Flavorless boiled chicken in the buffet every lunch and dinner.
Related to the town, you are not allowed to bring a purse or bag into the stores.
Overall:
I would go here again, Playa Caleta had good food (compared to what I have heard about Cuban food), It has free boats for use, and an amazing staff. Compared with the resorts next to us that had no boats whatsoever. If you bring the items I reccomend, you will have an amazing time. Also, book the catamaran trip, swimming with dolphins was amazing.
After this trip, I love Cuba.
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Breakfast Buffet = AMAZING
Lunch Buffet = Average, with good ice cream, very slow drink service at times.
Dinner Buffet = Same as lunch, (service and food selection)
À la carte:
Italian : Good food,good service, amazing cheese.
International : Bad food, Slow Service, no cheese.... Only got 1 drink, they never came to ask about dessert.
Snack Bar : hamburgers and hot dogs by the pool, Good food, bad-slow service. The lady operating it seemed to be always upset, and would often be missing.
Bars: understaffed. Takes 15min+ to get a drink. The loudest get served first. Mini cups. On the tour bus in they told us we should try the national "Mojito" drink, no bar at Playa Caleta makes this drink. If you get a good side with a bartender, he will make you a very rum filled rum and coke. Bring a large cup from home to avoid long waits at the bar.
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| Rooms |
| The room was great. Very clean with good A/C. We were upgraded to an ocean view room at no charge. The view was amazing. Plugs are euro 220v. Bathroom includes a hair dryer. There is no clock so bring a travel one. Room service came everyday at 11am, they are the nicest people you will ever meet. |
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| Paradisus Varadero Royal Service Raves! |
| Hotel Paradisus Varadero |
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Fiona >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jul, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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This is our 3rd trip in 2 years and we were lucky enough to experience the Paradisus Varadero’s brand new Royal Service. I reviewed the main resort previously; this review is largely specific to the new Royal Service.
Butler service
The PV has chosen their most experienced, charming and multi-lingual staff for the Royal Service. They bent over backward to make our stay great. Extensive room service is available 24 hours a day. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Spa and gym: A gorgeous, full-service 5* spa and fully-equipped gym are now available. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| The lovely private pool is surrounded by lots of those big, square palapas with mattresses, bolsters and room for 2 or more. Curtains tie up for sun or hang down for shade. Also very comfortable lounge chairs. It was marvelous to have the option of this (usually) quiet pool in the Royal Service, or the bigger pools with more going on in the main resort. |
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| Other Comments |
| The rest of the resort: Well, we wouldn’t be back again if we didn’t love the place! Check out the newer reviews for more info on the fabulous beach, lovely grounds, great restaurants, big pools and friendly staff! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Pool bar
Has its own mint patch for freshly-made mojitos! Really great service unless there is a large group of guests on hand, in which case they need more backup.
Private restaurant
Excellent food, excellent service for breakfast, lunch and dinner. This is the closest to really fine dining that we have encountered in Cuba - we have always enjoyed the food in the main resort but this is a step up! There are lots of choices of meat, fish and vegetarian dishes, as well as soups, desserts, etc.
Lobby bar
Air conditioned and therefore mosquito-free if that’s a concern for you. We didn’t encounter many mosquitos this trip but have on trips later in the summer. The 24-hour lobby bar is small and not many people used it – but we enjoyed getting an early morning tea or a drink after the show. If you’re looking for more action, head over to the main resort’s lobby or disco. You can always ask for a ride in one of the little guest transports. |
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| Rooms |
Most of the villas have 2 suites upstairs and 2 downstairs. Ours was downstairs and had a private patio with table, chairs and a lounge/sofa. The bedroom-sitting area is attractive and large, and has a couch, 2 armchairs and a coffee table, flat screen TV, built-in bar fridge (fully stocked) and picture windows/doors out onto the patio. Full water view. The king-size bed is more comfortable than the usual PV beds; still not luxurious but a definite improvement. There is a pillow menu, from which you can choose various shapes and fills. We tried several – lots of fun! Large walk-in closet with lots of hanging and drawer space and a safe.
Bathroom – yes, it rates its own review!
The bathroom is as wide as the bedroom, with a large spa-bath. There are various aromatherapy products for the bath and your butler will actually come and draw your personally-selected bath for you. I didn’t avail myself of this, but if you’re into that kind of service, have a blast! There are “his” and “hers” counters, each with a sink, large mirror, lots of counter space. Between the 2 counters is the door to your private Roman courtyard with a latticed roof for semi-shade and privacy, little palm tree, gardens and a path down the middle to the outdoor shower in the tiled wall. WOW! Gorgeous! I couldn’t get enough of standing in the warm Cuban air while showering. It was a very clean vacation! |
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| Your Arrival |
Once again, the best staff have been assigned to Royal Service. Check in, check out, questions, etc. were all handled very quickly and easily.
The entire reception, lobby, etc. is air conditioned and therefore mosquito-free if that’s a concern for you. We didn’t encounter many mosquitos this trip but have on trips in the summer. There's a nice little lounge area with a decent pool table for a lazy end to a long, hot day!
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| Great relaxing vacation! |
| Hotel Arenas Doradas |
| User Rating:
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katie >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jul, 2010 | Leisure | With friend
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| n/a |
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| Arrival |
| Our arrival was not too great. We checked in around 11pm and were given a room with no a/c, balcony and bathroom door did not lock, no shower curtains and the beds were not made. We went back to the reception and within minutes we had a new room. I don't remember her name, but the reception staff are very friendly, speak English and you don't have to wait forever to get what you need. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The pool was nice and refreshing. Very big with a small wadding pool. The pool bar there is great.
Grounds are nice, clean and neat. There are always men out working on it to keep it looking beautiful. |
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| Other Comments |
Great vacation. Friendly staff, great food and drinks. The workers tend to be a little more flirty then we liked and we were freaked out a bit, as well as the security. Two girls travelling alone so they assumed we wanted some fun maybe? just be careful.
Bring a beach towel. There was one day that we didn't have one and other days where we had to use the same one day after day because their laundry machine wasn't working. You have to pay $10 pesos at check in per towel which you get back when you check out. Don't use the public bathrooms, they smell like a bear cave. DISGUSTING, that and half of the time they don't have toilet seats. Better to go to your room and use it. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
The buffet restaurant is great. They have the best bread there!!!! They have a omelet and pasta station, which are great...very tasty. Some food is a bit repetitive but it never lacks flavour. We didn't try any a la carte because you have to book it only at 11am for dinner the following night, and you can only book one at a time. By 11 we were in the pool so we didn't bother, the buffet was more then enough.
Bars were great too. The drinks were good and not too strong. The bartenders are friendly...but a bit flirty so be careful. My friend was talking to one bartender and out of no where he just stuck his tonuge in her ear....not too sure what to say about that lol |
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| Rooms |
| The rooms are very basic but very clean. GREAT water pressure and the toilets actually flush well. Very little light in the rooms, but you just have to open up your curtains for the sunlight to come in. I found the beds and pillows to be really comfortable...I always had a good night sleep. |
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| Attempted Rape! Do not make the mistake of going here |
| Hotel Cubanacan Club Amigo Marea del Portillo |
| User Rating:
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Zaid >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jul, 2010 | Party | With Spouse/Partner
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We stayed in the Marea del Portillo resort for one week starting July 21st. We met so many awesome people there and had a great time.
One night, one of the girls we met went to the washroom. She was pulled by her elbow into a dark corner by security and was told to stay with them. When she asked to leave and tried to pull her arm away, they pulled her back into the corner and started to touch her inappropriately, despite her numerous demands for them to stop and to let her go.
The security staff was backed up by management and the receptionist refused to call the police for over an hour before I tried to bride her with 5 pesos to call the police.
The police said they could not do anything because it was all just the girl's word versus the security guard's and therefore the rapist security guard was back on his shift walking the grounds outside the room that the girl stayed in. He was not fired and he was not in any real trouble.
We found out the hard way that in Cuba, a tourist should have bruises, scrapes, scratches and vaginal damage for anyone to be charged with rape or attempted rape.
Upon leaving, airport security asked about the situation. They acted as if they were going to help, and asked to see the picture we had of the rapist security guard. When we showed them the picture, they deleted it from our camera to get rid of evidence.
We now have to contact the Canadian Embassy and other officials to try to bring justice for a girl that has been changed forever.
Security is all over the resort, and that's definitely NOT a good thing. They didn't serve, protect or do anything to help anyone.
There were numerous complaints of security stealing from hotel rooms, asking for beers or food too many times, and even peeping into hotel rooms to watch as vacationers changed or were being intimate in their rooms.
I even tested their security by yelling out several times "Seccoro!" which is Spanish for "help me" at the top of my lungs at a far dark area in the resort and none of them showed up. However, they were definitely there to watch us dancing together in the disco at night.
The city, the beach, the pool and the activites were all too beautiful to describe in words... however the security and rest of the staff were completely rude and ignorant and just got ruder and more ignorant if you complained.
I do not recommend going to this city unless you DO NOT want to party or have a loud time on your vacation and I especially do not recommend going there if you are not fluent in Spanish. If you are a senior or a family with young children and don't mind bad food (even by Cuba's standards) then this resort can provide you a simple and inexpensive vacation - just make sure you lock all your belongings in your suitcase every time you leave the room. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Activities were fantastic! Horseback riding was inexpensive and beautiful. The cruise had an open bar and music and was also very inexpensive. There were also other activities we didn't partake in that looked fun such as snorkeling, lobster lunch on a nearby white sand beach, jeep mountain tour, etc. |
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| Arrival |
| Beatiful weather and cute, tiny airport... Horrible 2 hour bumpy bus ride to the resort. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The beach had brown sand (which we didn't mind) and the water was so warm we couldn't believe it! The water temperature was just too perfect to imagine.
Pool temperature was perfect as well. The pool was closed early at night and they did throw bleach and other harmful chemicals in there - which was a shame due to the perfect pool temperature for night-time swimming. |
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| Other Comments |
| Find an English speaking lawyer in Cuba before going to Manzanillo to party. It's just not a party city and the service is bad enough if you aren't drunk and belligerent, so if you do start to get loud the service will go from bad to worse. If you complain the service will drop off the scale to an unacceptable level. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Bars closed whenever the bartenders felt like it, so we suggest buying water and other drinks from the gift shop for the nights that the bars decide to close at 11:30 PM.
Restaurants were ok, but the food and the service was not. There were numerous occasions of having rude service and the food was constantly recycled from the day before. The food in this resort was horrible compared to the food in another resort in Varradero that I had on my last trip to Cuba. |
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| Rooms |
| An insect infestation of 4 different types of bugs resulted in us having to change rooms. The second room was much better, however the security guards do peep into the rooms, so we recommend only being intimate in the dark for short periods and changing in the washroom. |
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| Your holiday is what you make of it!! |
| Hotel Be Live Playa Coco |
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Danny >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jul, 2010 | Leisure | With Group
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| Cuba will always be a favourite. Whoever has visited more than once, will understand what I mean!! |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| We didn't do much. We just rented a car one day ($80 CUC) - I prefer doing my own excursions in Cuba since I know the place and trust the people - We drove to Moron (the Cayo Coco highway over the ocean is a wonderful experience by itself - they charge 2 pesos each way to use the Autopista, and bring your passport) then we came back and drove to Playa Pilar in Cayo Guillermo then went to an old resort we had stayed at back in January to visit some friends |
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| Arrival |
| Sunwing, as usual, always a great flight with all the extra inclusions that other airlines have decided not to offer anymore. Once at the Cayo Coco airport, it was a breeze...we were the only landing flight, immigration and luggage within 25-30 minutes and then on the bus... One mishap though is that a family had a person without a Canadian passport so we unfortunatly got delayed for an hour and a hald almost..which was unfortunate, but hey we were 10 minutes away from the hotel and we all survived!! |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Beach - I mean it's Cuba...do you really need me to say anything...It's Cuba people, the pearl of the caribbean..I've been to many beaches, Cuba does have the best sand and water on this planet
Grounds - Kinda lush, but beautifully kept. The hotel layout is very nice
Pool - Very nice freestyle pool. Nice for the afternoons because of the activities (if you wanna have some fun) but not too busy while we were there, it was low-season |
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| Other Comments |
If I have anything negative to say about this resort it is the buffet food, then again we were there off-season and I do not know how it is during high-season. But still you will find something to eat, and you will not die of hinger.
Great vacation, great people....and remember, you and your crew make up your holiday. We've been to a 5 star Bahia Principe in the Dominican and had the worst time of our life (even though the food was great), because we had people that "suck" with us on holiday, so we're never taking them again...lol!!! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Bars are great, the beach one had lemon juice that tasted great. My favourite though was the 24 hour snack bar by the Teatro, Pedro and Angel (the chef) are the best staff boys I've ever met on holiday (and I go to Cuba twice a year)...Angel makes the best Tuna sandwich you can ever have and is the nicest man you can ever meet.
Buffet - mehhhhhhhh is all I have to say. the pasta bar and the grill had always something good. But the rest of the stuff that you choose from didn't have much choice, but, do not worry, you are still eating better than the rest of Cuba, so do not take this for granted.
Japanese - A MUSTTTT...simply amazing
Italian - Excellent
Seafood - DIdi not try it, our reservation was too early so we decided not to go. |
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| Rooms |
| All our group had Oceanview rooms in block 4 (the pink one on your left). They were spacious nice and very clean. Beach towels were there and none of us mentioned any kind of bad smell in the rooms. The women with us loved the rooms, and that tells that they were nice...us men just wanna shower and sleep!!! |
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| Pleasantly Surprised! |
| Hotel Blau Costa Verde |
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Amy >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jul, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We didn't do anything outside of the resort (we've already been there, done that) but on the resort we did participate in the beach volleyball every morning as well as bocciball shortly after. The entertainment staff had activities throughout the day but that's all we chose to participate in because it was located conveniently on the beach.
At night, there were different shows every night. We never really saw a show because it started late (9:30pm) and by then we were already asleep.
They also have a games place where there is a pingpong table and a pool table. For pingpong, it's best to bring your own ball and paddles as I've noticed the ball went missing at one point. The pool table has its own equipment always there. |
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| Arrival |
We travelled as a family which included my parents, myself(20) and my brother(14).
Arrival was very speedy. The front desk had everything ready for us. We asked for 2 rooms and they had put them next to each other.
We were also pleasantly surprised to find that our beach towels were also waiting for us in our rooms. We did arrive after midnight, so it wasn't really necessary to have them but it was nice not to have to find the club house the next morning while we still had no idea where everything was. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The grounds were meticulously kept. The beach was always clean. The palm umbrellas (that's not their correct name, but it doesn't come to mind right now...) were maintained and plentiful.
The staff that dealt with the beach chairs were sometimes hard to take. This one guy in particular was incredibly lazy and would often attempt to ignore my request for chairs. I would've preferred a lack of staff for that on the beach. I'm quite capable of getting my own chair, but we had to put up with them for 2 weeks. They also collect the chairs at 5ish and if you want to stay longer they give you looks. Their shift ends officially at 5:30-6:00 I believe and they always want to be done earlier. I just ignored them when I wanted to stay longer which was just once or twice during my stay anyways. |
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| Other Comments |
The hotel's gym/spa also offers manicures, pedicures, haircuts, etc.
For the most part these are generally less expensive than at home. However, don't expect the kind of manicure you get here. It's very basic there: cut the nails, file, do the cuticles, put on the polish.
The manicure and pedicures were each 5 CUC. The haircut was also 5 or 10 CUC (I can't remember exactly at the moment).
They also offered massages. Ranging from just foot massages to full body, whole hour massages. We didn't try as we found these to be expensive in comparison to other resorts. The foot massage was 10 CUC and it went up from there to 25 CUC for a full body massage for half an hour I believe.
Overall, we really enjoyed our stay. We would definitely recommend this resort and would go again if we didn't want to try a new resort each year.
The manager of this resort (tall, young and bald) is always walking around. He's glad to talk to tourists and often comes up to people randomly and asks them how they're enjoying their stay and if there's anything that needs changing. Feel free to introduce yourself to him, he looks scary but he's very friendly. If you have any kind of problem that you can't resolve in other ways, he's always happy to help.
Also, keep in mind that this is a very small and very, very quiet resort. I would definitely not choose it for a spring break vacation with my friends. But it's perfect for R&R and families with small children (which by the way, they do have a daycare for). |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
The main buffet restaurant was where everyone ate generally. Since the resort was not even half-full, all the seating was outside though they also have inside tables which they set up if there are a lot of people.
The food was good. Every night they had a different theme such as Asian night, Italian night, etc. The food was very varied from day to day. Breakfast was generally always the same thing, but lunch and dinner were always different from the day before and from each other (this is something that at other hotels bugged me because they used to have the same food 2 or even 3 days in a row at times).
The waiters were all amazing. If you stayed long enough like we did (2 weeks) they had memorized our drink orders. They were always smiley and eager to get you whatever you needed.
We didn't try the pool bar, as we spent all our time at the beach but I'm sure the service there is exactly the same as on the beach. The beach bar was actually being extended while we were there. The service was good. The bartender was always at his post and made whatever drink you wanted. The only thing I personally disliked was the lack of martini just at the beach bar. It's pretty much the only alcohol I drink and I had to find something else to enjoy while on the beach. In the end it wasn't a huge deal but it would've been nice. I assume with the new, larger bar they'll have all the drinks they have everywhere else in the resort.
There are cats in this resort and they enjoy strolling by while people eat as some insisted on feeding them. And yes, they're fuzzy and adorable but they have fleas so I recommend you stay far away from them. |
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| Rooms |
The rooms were very nice. They appeared to have been renovated recently.
Contrary to some of the reviews I read before we went, the safe in the room was free.
There was plenty of room for clothes and the such. The closet was roomy (and the top shelf has blankets in case you need them) and there were drawers in and out of the closet.
Each room also has a minifridge which is stocked daily with beer, soft drinks and water.
The AC in all the rooms was centrally controlled which we have never encountered at another hotel (this was our 8th year in Cuba). This bothered me slightly because if you turn it off, you fry overnight but if you leave it on, it tends to get very chilly some nights, which is when I was very glad for the blankets. Also, contrary to many hotels, the card slot only controls the electricity and not the AC. The AC runs all day unless you turn it off.
The maid came by everyday. We found that there was a different maid almost every day. Which didn't concern us in the least. However, I noticed that some of them cleaned more thoroughly than others. Sometimes our floor was swept, other times it wasn't. Some would wash the bathtub and others would not. Just little things. The room was by no means ever dirty, just not always as clean.
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| Ok place but has potential to be so much more |
| Hotel Be Live Playa Coco |
| User Rating:
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Christine >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jun, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| First, thanks to all for the negative reviews as it set our expectations so low that our experience could only go up from there. We were a group of 6, my husband and I traveled with our 2 kids (13yrs and 6yrs) and my husbands parents. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| We didn't do any excursions, so I can't comment on those. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| We were there with low occupancy so not all the amenities were open. There was a small pool right outside our building, but the bar beside it and the ice cream parlour were not open - too bad or that would have been our spot all week. Main pool was good, with a swim bar - staff were always friendly. There is also a mini-putt and new playground equipment but was too hot to use. The Beach was great. I dont know that I would travel again in June as the bugs were bad, even though they resort sprayed every night (how people can blame the hotel on this is beyond me - try staying at a resort in Huntsville Ontario this time of year you'd have the same problem!). Also, it was HOT HOT HOT - and humid, even at night there wasn't a break. The temperature may drop a couple of degrees but it was still humid and little breeze. |
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| Other Comments |
Overall, we still had a good vacation. Not sure I would go back unless I got the same great deal again - we paid $400/pp (with taxes!!) so that helped us overlook things in our room. I would only recommend this resort if you see it at a good price - would not pay full price for it. I think they should rate it 3 star. This place has all the amenities & potential to be a great place, if they could just take care of details like the grounds, housekeeping and maintenance of the rooms.
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Food & Beverages - I don't get the complaints about the food at this resort - it was good. No worse or better than other resorts we've stayed at in Cuba. We always found something to eat. The Japanese restaurant was great, food was awesome and the chef was very friendly. The Italian restaurant was a disappointment. The food was very bland, which I didn't understand since they had garlic at the buffet - why wouldn't you use it at the Italian restaurant?! We didn't get into the Seafood restaurant as it was already booked. The snack bar at the beach was hit & miss, sometimes they had food and sometimes they didn't. As for beverages, there were times when one of bars wouldn't have beer - but there wasn't ever no beer in the resort. They seemed to have the basics in stock, rum, gin, vodka etc... To get any premium shots (ie Johnny Walker, Baileys etc..) there was a cost, but if your sticking to basic drinks you'll be ok. |
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| Rooms |
Our room - #9112 - was very musty smelling when we walked in. I've been to Cuba 5 times prior and know that sometimes the room can be a bit musty when you first arrive, however this was really bad. We asked to see another room, but it was musty also so we didn't bother changing. The room my in-laws had - #9114 wasn't as bad. We lit some candles and put the air on, it helped but there was always a bit of an odour. Another disappointing thing about the room, was the repairs that were still needed. It appeared that in the past they may have had a leak in the room as we could see where they made a patch in the ceiling. Also, in the bathroom the mirror had rust around the edges and the 2 pot-lights over the mirror were rusted around the edges. Although the room was clean when we arrived, these are little things that should be fixed to give a better first impression. Room #9114 didn't have these problems. At one point room #9111 was unoccupied and the doors were open to air it out, we walked in and it looked better than ours too. If you can pack your own pillow - do it! The pillows were hard & lumpy.
As mentioned, the room was clean when we got there, but the housekeeping service during the week could be better. It would appear they only sweep/mop the bathroom and the main walkway from the front door to the back patio door - in-between the beds, tables were not swept. We also had sand in the bed - I didn't expect sheets to be changed but getting any sand off them would have been nice. I've stayed at 3, 4 and 5 star resorts all have been great with housekeeping - except this place. Also, it appears that they just sweep anything out onto the grass, and they even through out the plastic tealight holder onto the grass instead of the garbage. |
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| Your Arrival |
Flight - With Westjet - first time flying with them and loved it! Staff are great, funny and friendly. Both flights there and back were on time.
Check in - Very fast, front desk staff were friendly and even tried to joke around - first told us we didn't have the right papers from our travel agent, but they would sort it out if we wanted to come back tomorrow - haha, the look on my father-in-laws face was priceless. |
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| I Love the workers at this resort, second time there and would defiently stay again. |
| Hotel NH Krystal Laguna Villas & Resort |
| User Rating:
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Shannon >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jun, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| My sister and I have just gotten back from a week at the N.H. Krystal Lagoon, this is our second time here at this resort and can't wait to go back. From the Bartenders to the Gardeners to the entertaiment staff and the maids it was a wonderful stay, the only complaint that I would have is the bathrooms on the pool side had very limited of toilet paper and wern't very clean, but over the week it had gotten better, we had just gotten back so it is very slow this time of year so there was not much to choose from at the buffet, but always somthing to eat. Alexander the bartender at the main pool we meet our last stay there two years ago and soon as he saw us remenbered us right away he is a amazing guy, very friendly and prompt at trying to help with anything you need, there was always a drink in our hands. The garderners also great and friendly people, would do anything to assist you, weather it was to give you a coconut or make you something handmade they would do it tip or not they were just happy to give you something.the weather was amazing, very warm this time of year, alittle to warm, but the pool was there to cool of anytime you got hot, which was often. you had no problems to find a lawn bed due to low season, out of 690 room there might have been 200 guests, which was great for service if you wanted a drink or anything for that matter. Check in when we arrived was very slow due to low staff this time of year, it was a hour wait to check in, they served coctails while waiting in line which was very nice. The room were very clean and spacious, the maids kept it very clean and if you run out of something she will always go out of her way to try to assist you. There was 3 out of the 7 la carts open for service, the Steakhouse, seafood and Italian, you book them the next day apon arrival, from 9am to 5pm, they take ahour for luch.there is a bank on site and you can also get cash at the front desk but better to change at the bank, there is also a gift shop and hair salon open daily. During the day for luch you can visit the buffet resturant or snack bar which is located by the main pool, which serves from 10am in the morning sanwiches and fries and 12 noon pizza, chicken, pork, salads this is open until 5pm. the buffet resurant opens for supper at 630 and is open until 10. So if you are looking for a great place to visit for the price I would recommed this to you. If you are looking for a 5star resort this is not the place to go, but like I said this is cuba and for the price I would stay a month or longer if I had to, I hope my review was a help to you, CHEERS and have a great stay if you deside to make this your destination,I would call the people here my family and my home. |
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| Excellent time at La Salina |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
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Gary >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| May, 2010 | Leisure | With Group
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| Our trip was from 1 to 8 May, we had a excellent time and would return to and recommend this resort to others. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Went on 3 day excursions while there, Jeep Safari, had a very good time, long and hot and was able to see allot of the beautiful country, hand a very nice lunch at Rancho Gaviota, spent lot of time there. Overall very good and would recommend to anyone that wants to see Cuba.
We also did the Catamaran....very nice and enjoyed very much, except for some obnoxious people on the boat we had a lot of fun...
did the day trip to Havana on the Friday, very nice and clean City, would recommend this one to all, I would do it again if i go back to cuba |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| We spent only a little time at the beach, it was very nice and not to crowded. We were usually there late in the day after spending time in the quite pool and then moved down after lunch. Water was beautifully warm and clean. The pools were Ok and sometimes not very clean but what the heck. Only went to the activity pool once, very noisy and crowded, |
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| Other Comments |
| Overall our trip was very nice and relaxing, would recommend Cuba and this resort to anyone. Yes the resort is big, but if you cant walk about a Km to go from the lobby to the beach then you have a problem, once you see some of the other resorts along the way and how cramped they are then you will like the openness of la Salina. It only took us 15 Mins to walk the resort at a leisurely stroll. I would definitely return to this resort Next year |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| We ate breakfast everyday at the buffet, very good food and no complaints about what you could eat....something for everyone, didn't eat lunch there usually ate at the snack bar by the quite pool one day we ate at the beach grill and had the best pulled pork sandwich ever, the bbq chicken was good as well. the snack bar at the quite pool was very good to. Had the a la carte breakfast once at the beach grill, it was good but that was about it. A La Cartes we had were Italian- was good and the Japanese- it was excellent.We usually drank at the pool bar in the quite pool, didn't matter if you tipped the bar staff, service was the same either way, some nights we drank at the Tacon theater bar, drinks were good and service ok. Never went to the disco at the piano bar, was never up that late. |
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| Rooms |
| Our room was in Building 29 on the first floor, however our friends that traveled with us were in Building 40 Near the center of the resort, tried to change rooms but no luck, as well we had 2 single beds instead of a King as requested, no big deal, we just pushed the beds together. The room was clean and the maid cleaned the room everyday and restocked the fridge if needed the bathroom tub did leak, however i think this is just due to poor design |
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| Your Arrival |
| Our arrival was about 1030 at the Varadero airport, lots of people coming in on different flights, however we were in the airport quick and found our luggage after a bit, however this was due to other travelers taking it off the carousel thinking it was theirs and not putting in back on. We arrived at La Salina about 1130 after stopping at about 3 other resorts on the way. Check in was quick and we were in our room at about 1200. |
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| Well maintained lush spacious grounds and beautiful flora/fauna |
| Hotel Occidental Allegro Varadero (Formerly Playa Varadero 1920) |
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Richard >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| May, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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Very seasoned cuban traveller. I rate this resort as 4 star in most categories
but in LOW season only 2 star for food variety,quality and avaliability. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Very good nightly entertainment with quality dancers,singers and comedians.
Shows every night even low season.Support the staff they deserve it.
Also karaoke,live bands and music. Well done. Truly 4 star plus. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Nice well maintained pools.three separate areas.No complaints here.Two cold water jacuzzi's.Comfortable padded lounge chairs.
Beautiful spacious well maintained grounds. Lots of flowers and srubs.Forested
walking trails and lots of excerise capacity. A series of attractive goldfish ponds. Overall 5/5 here. |
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| Other Comments |
Most categories are four star.However low season food issues have to be addressed since people pay similar prices in may as march/april and expect
good food quality and avaliabilty. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Here is the heart of the problem. I was expecting that the main buffet restuarant be open every night for dinner.It was closed all week.Only open for
breakfast which is 3 star variety and food. Even for low season this should
not close for dinner or lunch.
Only beach restuarant and snack bar open for lunch buffet.Very limited and repititious.Beach grill one 0nly cannot handle lunch crowd rush of 100 +
people and many walked away with no meats or waited 30+ minutes.Food buffet
I would rate 2 stars worse than many cuban 2 star resorts which are better.
We ate a la cartes every night which are ok but very repetitive with the same
choices nightly. Quality 3 stars. Thin cuts of steak,chicken or pork not up to
cuban 4 star.
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| Rooms |
cuban 4 star older resort quality room is accurate. Clean,bedseats changed daily.Maid service consistently good.central A/C No bugs.No mushy odours.
New electronic safe.Colour TV with 15/20 channels.Comfortable bed and lounge
bed great for younger child. Quiet.Nice granite bathroom with bathtub,plenty of Hot water.Great water pressure better then most hotels in cuba.Separate
toliet with excellent flush pressure.Small balcony.
Hallway in main building older and 3 star feel.Only complaint door did not shut properly and you had to lift up and force to close. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Professional english speaking courteous front reception staff.Fast room checkin and excellent service from Richard.No complaints here. |
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| It was amazing! Plan on going back in 6 months |
| Hotel Be Live Playa Coco |
| User Rating:
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Emmy >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| May, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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This was my first trip to Cuba. I went with my husband and 2 of our friends
We were not sure what to expect, because we heard so many different points of views about Oasis Playa Coco..after just a day we loved it
The rooms are not bad, a bit too many sand bugs but not too bad. The food was good, the Japanese restaurant was amazing. The pools are nice and relaxing, beach is beautiful. The bartenders/chefs and especially our friends from the animation team were all super friendly. We became friends with so many of the staff members, their all so easy going and real easy to get along with. We plan on going back to same hotel for our next vac.
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| A very good hotel!!! |
| Hotel Iberostar Tainos |
| User Rating:
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Nelson & Mary >
1 contribution(s) Cuba |
| May, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Every day it makes games of participation in the beach area, during the
afternoon in the pool, eg: petanque, volleyball, bingo, etc. The
animation in the pool I think it could be more widely throughout the
day, more music, aquatic handball games and things of this kind would
give more life to a space that is kept full of clients throughout the day.
Every night in the showroom of the hotel feature a different show. The
shows are very good, the hotel has a wonderful animation team which
participates in all shows. The nightly shows give much life to the
night of hotel, is a space where you can laugh, enjoy good Cuban and
international music, and even dance if you want, etc.. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The pool very clean and with plenty of sun loungers. The beach, crystal clear waters, fine sand, so beautiful!!!. The
well-kept grounds, divinely decorated, gave pleasure to walk through the
hotel and enjoy the pleasant company of nature in all its splendor.
The hotel has a gym. |
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| Other Comments |
Our stay at the Iberostar Tainos was simply exceptional. They were
four days of dreams at the end of these day we didn't want to return home.
The service of this hotel I think it is his more important treasure, its
workers are wonderful. In this hotel we made friends, rest, enjoy a
friendly atmosphere. We have become there!! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
The hotel has two restaurants, a japanese food and other local food.
The two really excellent and outstanding.
Criollo Restaurant: The exquisite meal with several dishes to ask for a
menu that includes fish, beef, pork, etc.. You have a mini buffet
table. The service of this restaurant is wonderful, always aware of
how to serve, how to make them feel better. This restaurant is just
perfect!
Japanese Restaurant: Eating at this restaurant is only enjoy our food,
is witnessing a cooking show is a spectacle. The decor of this
restaurant is very elegant and tasteful. Those clients are located
around an chef, he is going to cook every dish for those clients that
surround it. If you go to Iberostar Tainos do not miss eating at this
restaurant.
The Tainos Iberostar has three bars, a beach bar, a pool bar and a
lobby bar. The best of the three is the lobby bar. This bar is always
full of customers sitting at tables around him, smoking, talking,
playing cards, sharing, the bar allows the creation of a friendly
atmosphere around him. The bartender and waitresses in the bar are very
friendly, very competent, the service is wonderful. It is a very good
atmosphere and very lively.
The buffet table is very well, I think very well stocked for a 4 star
hotel, I went to several four-star hotels and this was the best buffet
table.
The cafeteria of the pool is amazing that more than a coffee shop is
almost a miniature buffet table. It has Italian food
(pizzas, pastas), Creole (rice, chicken, beef and pork), sausages,
cheese, ice cream, fruit, sweets, bread, beverages and spirits. In the
morning breakfast and serves as the basis of 11 as a restaurant -
cafeteria. They offer very good service, variety and quality. We
hadn't seen a cafeteria like this before ... |
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| Rooms |
The large room with balcony included, very pretty, painted, very
clean, odorless and traces of moisture, and with a different decor
every day.
We carry a child and as we requested, the room had a small bed very
comfortable. The double bed rather broad. Refrigerator with
refreshments included in the price already paid, to change every two
days. Hot water service never lacked. Plenty of shower gel and
shampoo.
The room very well located right next to the pool. |
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| Your Arrival |
Arrival at the hotel the day May 20, 2010. The check in was quick. We
are happy to receive a welcome cocktail, a nice gesture that was
greatly appreciated. |
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| beautiful swimming beach/well maintained restaurants/lovely staff |
| Hotel Gaviota Playa Pesquero |
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kenneth >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| May, 2010 | Business | Solo
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| I have been returning to this hotel every year since it opened in 2004,it is almost my home away from home, the staff are lovely people, respectful and pleasant, always willing to satisfy. Especially beautiful is the swimming beach with almost no wave action, almost a lagoon with transparent water 100 ft off the surf line 10 to 15 ft deep. (There is also a small sheltered bay near the river, but sand flies can sometimes be a problem there.Don't lie on bare sand!!!!).
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| Arrival |
| There is usually a cocktail reception on arrival, but as the bar is also in the very large and beautiful reception area, there are many varieties of cocktail that the barmen will be happy to make for you!!!! |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
beatiful large pool with swim-up bar, comfortable lounge chairs and sun shelters. An exercise gym also contains a jacouzi pool.Lots of pool activities.
The vegetation is beautiful once again,(3 yrs after the hurricane Ike passed through),many palms have been replanted. |
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| Other Comments |
| The hotel is especially popular for marriage ceremonys, and welcoming parents with small children with open arms.There are organised baby-sitting/playing to give the parents a rest!!!!, and private baby sitting can be obtaines too I believe. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Very good variety in the restaurants, for the ladies who like to dress-up at least once for a special night the Romantica restaurant is a favourite. The buffet resto is very good too, as is also the pool resto for lunch which is very clean.Five "a la carte" restos are on the grounds with wine service. |
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| Rooms |
| The rooms are large and spacious with a well equipped bathroom, (bidet and hair dryer and 110v plug-in). Repeat clients also receive an upgrade from a standard to a superior room. There is a TV, a dial-in security box and a small refrigerator in the room, plus coffee machine and ironing board with iron. The bar is refreshed every day with bottled water, beer and soft drinks at no charge. |
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| Was a great time |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
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vicki >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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Loved this place and would go again
be prepared to walk |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
we took the bus into varadero, 2 bucks there and 2 bucks back. did the carriage and horse ride,
did the catameran with the dolphins.... neat experience. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
grounds - clean and beautiful,
the beacch was eroding away... locals are not sure why? this is the first time that they have seen this. sometimes hard to find a spot on the beach.
pools--- fun and clean... love the cave swim up bar |
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| Other Comments |
I would go back to this resort, but we have a tendency not to return to the same place twice...
It's not all that bad...., Cuban people are the best and they try to do their best. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
didn't have a problem with the food, except for the FRENCH - GOURMET.. the food was cold and the service was not too good. Don't book that ala carte.
the buffet was fine
the beach buffet was great.
the ala carte - cuban, waas awesome !! |
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| Rooms |
rooms were well equiped.. mini bar was stocked every day with beer, water and soda, maid made nice decorations from our towels, beach towels were in our room. bed was a king size bed, toilets were the low flowing, energy efficient ones. the bathtub, yu had to step on a woodend step to get in.
very clean and big |
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| Your Arrival |
we arrived late at night, we flew skyservice ( skyservice went belly up during out stay, and we had to stay an extra night at the hotel at no cost. we had an excellent rep who figured this out for us), the room was big we stayed in room 33205, by the ocean but far from the lobby.
They escort you into your room we were camelon gold so we had a seperate check in and fast service to our room with a bottle of rum |
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| Great service, pool and beach, food not so good. |
| Hotel Tryp Cayo Coco |
| User Rating:
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will >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| We would certainly go back to Tryp, the grounds are lovely, it was hot with a nice breeze, the staff was extremely helpful and friendly. Though the food was disappointing we had a terrific time.
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| The pizza place on the beach is excellent, with really friendly waiters. There is a very nice little lobster shack just down the beach with tasty lobster tales for $12, ask for Franklin. The entertainment was good, though much of it is provided by volunteers from the audience. There is very little to see around the hotel, though they have lots of avtivities for kids, plus tennis, etcetera. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The main pool with the swim-up bar was terrific, with somewhat loud music but games and entertainment and a party atmosphere all afternoon. The other, smaller pool was very quiet.
The beach was amazing, with warm water and a cooling breeze. |
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| Other Comments |
| Be aware that you need to take cash to exchange for CUC (Convertible Cuban dollars). You can use VISA at the stores but to get a cash advance on your VISA you have to walk to the resort next door. You can not use you bank cards at all! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
The service at all of the bars was fast, though they do not have several of the drinks and mixes we are used to in Canada, such as club soda, scotch, pineapple and cranberry juice. The beer is okay. The bartenders did not seem to care whether you tipped or not, theey were just as fast and friendly.
The food at the buffet was poor, you really have to be picky, though the breakfast omelets are good. Their orange juice is great. We had turkey one night which was great, sometimes the meat is not cooked enough, such as the hamburgers at the restaurant on the beach. Even when we went to an a la carte the food was disappointing.
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| Rooms |
| The room was aging but fine. Few rooms have a view of the ocean but most are a short walk to the pool and lobby and buffet. Our maid was terrific. We had problems with our TV, though we didn't watch it much, but they fixed it right away. |
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| Your Arrival |
| The check-in was very fast. Though the front desk staff aren't very friendly. |
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| Wanna Bang for the Peso ! ( Kinda Short but Sweet ) -- > SuperClubs-Breezes-Jibacoa CUBA |
| Hotel Breezes Jibacoa |
| User Rating:
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The Derry's >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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Travelled from Gander, NL., Canada on the 31st of March 2010 and flew out of Cuba on the 7th of April 2010.
I used a very good agent at a.buckle@tpi.ca who was patient and found us a very good deal & resort combination.
Sunwing was beyond our expectations. Flights ahead of schedule both south and northbound, great onboard staff, meals, ammenities and on the ground resort personel available 6 days a week to address any concerns. Takes a private airline to set the benchmark eh?
Super resort 4.5 / 5 and very good value for the $$ money. No kids under 14 years of age permitted. It only has 250 rooms thus no line ups or crush of people for a beach chair, meals, drink, etc.
This resort is not on the Varadaro peninsula. In fact, it is west of Varadaro in "Jibacoa Bay" (on north side of Cuba aprox 80 miles south of Miami. Also known for some of the best coral reef snokeling)about 1 hr by comfortable air conditioned full size charter bus from the airport. That suited us just fine, a resort ~ with privacy. The captial of Cuba - Havana - is only 1 hr away, again west, from this resort which we found convenient for excursions. One gets to see the country side enroute to exploring Cuba!
* If you want to party like stray dog or cat ~ this place is not for you *
Relax to the max or pedal to your own speed ~ and hit the bunk by 11PM or 2 AM (if you enjoy the disco)then you've found it ~
Good food, clean rooms, beverages of ones' choice, safe enviroment, and varied clientele. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We, as a family or four with two teenage boys 18&16, had a grand time at this resort. They boys bumped into some Albertan male buddies, were maintenance free and us secure in them being safe / well-behaved for our stay. They attended the nightly outdoors theatre shows with us that were put off by the resort @ 9:10 PM to 10:30 PM, and then slinked into the disco to socialize, sans parents,afterward.
As parent were never concerned about thier safety on the resort or swimming. Most here are Canucks and look out for each other I must say!
#1 two boys did resort scuba diving x2 $30 each for 1.5 hours , #2 my wife and I had a massage $20 each for 1/2 hour each, and #3 did a hike up a mountain (free by from resort), the base of which the resort is situated upon.
#4 We all did an excursion to Havana by taxi vs a bus and the driver walked us around old/new Havana/huge flea market, spoke good English and had an exceptional knowledge of his countries history. Regretably, I've got my doubts most Canadians could recite a similar history lesson. He could also press the flesh to get us bumped up in a lineup in this busy city. It cost 4 of us $70 peso's total or about $100 bucks CDN - we left at 8:30 AM and home at 5:30 PM ~ awesome. Just enquire around.
#5 I rented one 2-seater scooter on the resort for about $15 for three hours and booted around at my own speed. Went to St. Cruz nearby and took photo's of that small town about 20 km west of the resort. A photographers ~ mecca.
#6 We did the Costa Blanca catamaran excursion, the only excursion we went through the Sunwing representative to book. We did the $69 dollar tour to just "watch a dolphin show" (don't pay double to swim with dolphin's unless you choose) At 7:45 AM the bus departed from our resort to the Varadaro peninsula, a nice air conditioned drive to get there, only 1 hr, but scenic . At 9:00 AM we left Varadero peninsula on the catarman and steamed to set anchor at 10:45 AM and did some group snorkeling. All equipment provided but if you have your snorkeling gear bring it will save you "water time" ! Lots of room for gear/kit bags on board. How big ? we are talking a 64' boat here folks ~ no slouch of a craft. All drinks, free. At about 1:30 PM we arrived at Waterworld, an island, where we docked and swam in the whitest, warmest of beaches, shopped at a market set up for the day and had lunch; lobster, crab, chicken, favorite beverage, ~ again fill your boots.
A very good tour and good value.
Again, you could do all of the above, some of it or, none of it ~ tasters choice :) |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Clean, large pool and two jacuzzi tubs on the same deck.
Grounds are tended to daily by ground personnel so no coconuts fall on YOUR 'coconut'. No issues. |
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| Other Comments |
Bring stuff for the kids and adults........
Cubans love baseball hats, esp., the one with the ProFit head band. These folks (from walking to the gereatric ward) practice baseball with everything from a junk of palm tree and a rock, to a bat and ball, if fortunate enough.
Also medicine (and oddly disposable diapers) are very expensive or not attainable. I regret not bringing more "stuff", giving money is one thing but despite that Cubans often cannot attain what they "need"
My suggestion, when you have your next visit with your family physician, ask for few/bag full of the sample pharmacutical products that medical pracitioners get from drug representatives and take them to Cuba. Check the visitor site, one is only allowed 10, get this, "kilograms" per person.
Since our stay was over the Easter break, and Cubans are Catholic, my wife brought down Easter Bunnies and on the moped tour we went to the hardest spots (not crime ridden - very little crime/drugs in Cuba)stopped and gave out items to the kids. Not one melted !
The DERRY's - NFLD
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Buffet - great.
Most evening there is musical entertainment. These groups could easliy be cover bands in Canada and amass a small fortune. The breakfast egg omelettes are remarkable (with or without the yolk). Full variety of hot/cold food, soup, fruit, if you can't get it here ~ stay home and eat TV dinners.
Beach bar - wicked fries (I like them crispy, cheese burgers x2 or x3 patties, chicken & pizza - fill your boots - justifies the selection of no egg yolk at breakfast, see ? )
Both the Italian and Cuban restaurants are good and formal in the sense of a dining experience. With two teenage boys, or big eaters, don't expect to "dine and dash" You are entitled to visit each only once in your 7 day stay.
If I had to pay out of pocket what my two 'seagull' sons ate during the week at this resort ~ I would be a pauper. |
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| Rooms |
Cleaned daily.
Again are clean, modern, comforable (for the time spent in them) and a good night sleep after a day in the hot Cuban sun. Rooms have a key locking safe, small fridge 2'x2'x2', a hairdryer, and a converter from 220Volts to CDN voltage, all provided free. TV's are on satelitte 20+ channels.
NFLD'ers even get NTV news on channel #36 ~ daily. |
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| Your Arrival |
I made 2 boo boo's ... #1 I failed to heed the previous posts and did not bring a thermal mug for beverages. A MUST have, for both hot and esp., cold beverages. Saves repeated trips back and forth to the bar. Beer / hard drinks come in a 6 oz plastic cup on each endless serving. Oh, and for smokers (I am not) cigarettes are .60 cents a pack. No tax on anything, the sticker is what you pay.
#2 Take a hoodie/fleece or 3 season jacket and long pants/sweats for the nightly outdoor stage performances on the resort. You won't want to miss them ! Evenings, despite being a low of 18C, with the wind and your sun burn can feel cool. Ironically enough ~ have a fall outfit at the ready and in your suitcase if you want to be comfortable and enjoy a cold beverage at the same time.
Nice to know :
If you are a 'face cloth' person (we were not) you will need to bring your own, only towels of the standard size (ample) are provided. |
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| Great vacation at a beautiful resort |
| Hotel Gaviota Playa Pesquero |
| User Rating:
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Francois >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| I traveled with my wife and 2 year old son from March 21st to March 28th 2010. This was my first trip to Cuba but my 3rd all-inclusive vacation in the Caribbean’s. The weather was just great, mostly sunny and 30ish every day, and the resort was excellent. Here are some thoughts on my personal experience and impressions of the PP.
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| À la carte |
| Reservation was a breeze; I didn’t bother on the Sunday, but when to the reservation desk around 10h00 on Monday morning. There were three people taking the reservation and only two were busy. It took five minutes and I had four reservations for 6h30. We booked the Vegetarian, Seafood, Italian and Caribbean. They were all very good, if I had to choose a favorite, I would say the Seafood one. The service was good at all of them and they have some decent wines also. They give you the bottle of wine, which is nice; they had a selection of Chilean and Spanish wine. It’s a lot better then the “house wine” they are serving at the buffet for dinner, which taste like what my father makes in his basement(not very good). I did book a fifth reservation on a day we didn’t have any. I just went to the reservation desk and asked nicely if there was a spot available somewhere for 6h30. The lady was very nice, as I didn’t realized it was already 3h15(the reservation desk closes at three), so she couldn’t enter us in the system and she had to make a few phone calls. It took her five minutes, but she did get us another reservation at the Vegetarian for that night, which was great as we preferred the à-la-carte to the buffet. Beware of one thing, when they serves you a plate and they tell you it’s really hot, you better believe them: my wife and at least 2 other people got a burn after lightly touching the side of the plate that was just served to them at the veggie – it seems like they cook the dish in the plate itself! At the Italian, they have a separate kids menu and at the Seafood and Carri bean, they offered to cook something for my son that was not on the menu, like burgers and fries. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We took a cab to the Guardalavaca market one morning. It’s about a 15 to 20 minutes ride and it cost 12CUC each way (for the cab, not by person). The cab driver was great and he waited for us to bring us back to the resort. The market itself is not really big and was pretty crowed, we didn’t stay there long, there is a beautiful beach just a short walk from it and the kid played there for about an hour and we walked around a bit and then we got back to the resort. There are a few small bars around the area also. There are other options to get to the market, there is a train( which is not really a train, it’s the same sort of train that runs around the resort all day ) and it leaves around 9h30 to come back around 1h30, it is 5 CUC’s each way. There is also a double Decker bus, that you can hope one, I believe it’s the same price as the train and it goes by the resort around 9h10 and stays at the market for 2 hours. You can also take one of the horses-trolley to get there, if I remember well, it’s around 35 CUC’s if you go by horse.
We did take a horse ride, for an hour, it was 15CUC’s and we rode to the small village of Melia, where most of the resort workers live. It was an interesting ride, too bad the driver wasn’t very chatty, but we did see the living conditions of some of the locals’ which are pretty basic. There is also a small school in Melia, if we have known that before, we might have brought some school gears with us to give to the school.
We also went to the dolphin aquarium, and I did swim with the dolphins, and it was a great experience. It was 79CUC’s for swimming, 35CUC’s if you were not swimming and it was free for the kids under 4. It’s only a short bus ride from the resort, around 10-12 minutes and then a 5 minutes boat ride to the aquarium. We left the resort at 8h45 and we were back at 1h30. It was really hot over there and a bit too long with the kid, the sea lions and dolphins show were nice to watch, but they were pretty short and there was a lot of down time with nothing much to do. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
I thought that the beach was great. It is kind of split up into two portions by some rocks/corals. The portion to the right where is the longer beach area where you can walk to other resorts, and a smaller beach area on the left side of it. We tend to spend our time on the smaller part of the beach, since it was closer to our room and felt less crowed. The kid had a blast at the beach and the water was very calm all week, even thought some days were quite windy. Yes, some portions are a bit rocky, mostly on the smaller portion of the beach and it is not the smoothest sand I’ve seen, but it is still a great beach with the water having beautiful different shades of blue/turquoise. As I’ve read in a lot of reviews, it’s probably not like the Varadero beaches, I’ve even overheard that comment a few time on the beach from other guests. So, my suggestion on this is: If you want the beach to be like the ones in Varadero, then you probably should go there. There are a lot of free activities available and you can have some decent snorkeling not very far off the beach. There is no problem getting loungers, as some guys will even bring it out for you anywhere you want. As for a spot under the palapas, like I’ve mention before, unless you go later in the afternoon, you will have to wake up pretty early to get one.
Pool:This is one huge pool and it’s beautiful. It’s the warmest pool I’ve been in at an all-inclusive. The main bar is the pool bar, which was really busy, but there are smaller bars around the pool. It was great with the kid, since a lot of the sections are very shallow. It’s not the cleanest pool I’ve seen, but I did see some staff trying to clean it a few times during the week. There no problem to get a lounger, but if you want one under a palapas, then I guess you will have to wake up early, as the towel game (which I’ve never understood) is played intensively on the beach and at the pool. We would usually go to the beach in the morning and at the pool in the afternoon, after the kid nap, around 3h30 – 4h, it was not a problem to get a good spot at that time. |
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| Bugs |
| We didn’t see any mosquitoes are got bitten until the last night at the resort when we went to eat the Italian restaurant La Gondola. I don’t know if it’s because it’s at the far end of the resort or because it has ponds of water around it, but we did got a few bites that night. Me and the kid didn’t got much and they didn’t bother us, but my wife started to have a bunch of bites coming out, mostly on her legs as soon as we were back home. Seems new ones were coming up for at least 2 days. Fortunately, by Thursday it was getting a lot better. Make sure to bring Benadryl with you if you are a mosquito magnet and usually react to bites. |
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| Other Comments |
Yes, it’s a big resort and you will have to walk quite a bit during your stay, it’s not a problem for us, but if it’s not your thing, then it might not be the best place for you. A stroller is definitely a must with a young kid.
A Bubba Keg, or something similar, is also a must if you want to have drinks. Because at the beach/pool bars, they will only give you small plastic cup, that holds maybe half a beer.
Before leaving, I had read a lot of reviews about the different bathroom on the resorts being disgusting. I’ve visited, at one point or another, pretty much every bathroom on the resorts and my only problem with them was that most of them don’t even have a window. So, it’s like a sauna in there and obviously it will not smell like roses, but they were all kept clean and it was a non-issue.
There are some Internet workstations in the Lobby, you have to buy card at the Lobby desk with an access code on it. It sells by the hour and it cost 8CUC/hour. The Internet connection is quite slow, but it’s good enough to check and send e-mails.
There are a few shops on-site, where you can buy cigars, alcohol and some souvenirs and stuff like solar cream, chips and pops. There are also some vendors around the pool everyday selling stuff. They rotate each day, so if you see something you like, you might not see it again if you are only staying for one week. As for the alcohol, the best rum were : Havana Club 15 years : 150CUC, Havana Club 7 years 11.90CUC, Havana Club bullet proof 29.50CUC and Ron Santiago 11 years 40 CUC. The prices were pretty much the same at the airport and the bullet proof was even more expensive as it was selling for 35CUC. So, unless you are worried about your luggage weight allowance, I don’t see any benefits of buying it at the airport. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
The food is not great, but it’s pretty good. I’m not a fuzzy eater, but they had plenty of selections at the buffets and you also had other options to eat during the day. It is a bit confusing at first, as there are a lot of different places to eat at different time of the day and some places have different names during the day and at night. They could certainly do a better job of giving you a good document (at the front desk checking-in) with all the different options you have for breakfast / lunch / dinner. The paper they give you, doesn’t have half of the options on them, it should definitely be updated. But, if you want to eat, there is always a place you can find food 24hours a day, same for drinks. And, unless you don’t like fish, pork, chicken and pasta, you should not have any problems finding something you like. The fruit selection wasn’t great, as it was pretty much bananas, pineapples and goyaves for most of the week. The last two days, we started to see some apples, cantaloupe and honey melon also. There is also a very good ice cream bar that is open until 10pm. The buffets and all the restaurant (except the Romantico) are open air style places. So, yeah, like any other open air buffets I’ve been before, you do see some birds flying and the odd fly, but it’s was not worse than other all-inclusives I’ve been too. Neither of us had any stomach issues whatsoever and I didn’t heard of anyone having issues either during my stay.
You won’t have any problems getting a drink at the resort; there are bars pretty much everywhere. They have Crystal, Buccaneros and Mayabe for beers and even some Beck’s at the beer garden. The higher-end alcohol is at the lobby bar, the best dark rum they have is the Havana Club 7 years. The Mojito’s at the Mojito bar were excellent! Most of the bars are closing at 5pm, except for the beer garden and the lobby bar that are open 24 hours I believe. At night, they have the usual entertainment shows at the theater, some nights were pretty good when they had Cuban musician playing. Some other night it was pretty lame, but that’s where the action is at night. It’s was always full of people, the same for the lobby bar. They had musician playing at the lobby bar the nights they were not playing on stage, which was kind of cool. There is a nightclub beside the theater, I just took a peak inside, it’s not really big and it was pretty dark, but it had a decent amount of people dancing. There are also always people hanging around at the beer garden. I’ve always had great service from the bar staff and I’ve never felt like they were expecting a tip, or that tipping was making a difference in the service. I believe, that a: Holà, por favor, gracias and a smile goes a long way on the kind of service you get. I did tip here and there, and they were always grateful for it, but they do put it in a pot and split it amongst all the staff.
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| Rooms |
| We had a second floor Superior room, in building 46, which is not the best location, but not the worse either. The room was quite large which was great with our son. At our arrival, the maid was waiting for us and as soon as she saw the kid, asked us if we wanted a crib in the room (it wasn’t in the room even if we had requested it in our reservation and by email prior to our arrival), but within 5 minutes they brought one in. The small fridge was already filled up with 2 colas – 2 beers (Bucanero) and a big bottle of water. A few minutes later a guy came in and brought us another bottle of water and two more beers (Mayabe). He also had a 700ml bottle of white rum (Ron Cubay) for us, which I believe we received because it was a superior room. I saw the rum selling for 4.50CUC’s at the airport. It’s not an expensive one, but still pretty good with cola. Inside the room there is a small TV, with around 20 channels. I really didn’t pay much attention to the TV stations; most of them were Spanish, with a few English ones and one or two French. There is also a small portable cd / radio / tape deck player in the room, it’s very basic, so there’s no Ipod connexion on it (I had an Ipod FMtuner that worked great). The bathroom was big, with a full bathtub with shower, a toilet and a bidet. We had more than enough closet space and there is a good size balcony with two chairs and a small round table. We also had a small hair dryer, iron and ironing board in the room. The in-room safe was big enough to fit my portable DVD players and all the stuff we wanted to put in it. The air-conditioning in the room was not great, but it was good enough to keep the room at a decent temperature. You do have to have a key in a slot for the air-conditioning to work. One of the first things I did was to get another key for the room (as they only give you one at check-in), so the air-conditioning could be running all day. The kind size bed mattress is somewhat hard, but it didn’t bother either of us, as we found it quite comfortable. The maid did a great job of keeping it clean and overall it was a great room. We did see some small ants in the room, they are everywhere outside the room, in the stairs and outside the building, so obviously some were in the room also. We really didn’t notice them until we left some food on a table; not a good idea. Make sure any food you have in the room is sealed. |
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| Your Arrival |
| The flight was with Sunwing and it was great. Nice friendly service, free earphones, hot breakfast, gift bag for my son and a glass of champagne. Plane was on time for departure and arrived on time at the Holguin airport. Bus transfer was with a comfortable air-conditioned bus, but without a working toilet. It took around 1h to get to the resort, with one stop along the way. We arrived at the Pesquero around 11h45 am, and they had welcoming drinks waiting for us. Since we had book a superior room, we even had a choice of having a glass of champagne instead of the usual drink. The room was ready, and it took 20 minutes to get all our stuff and be carried over to our room. |
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| It was all right |
| Hotel Barceló Marina Palace |
| User Rating:
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MJ >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| My husband and I stayed at Barcelo Marina Palace in the Cayo Libertad section in April 2010. This was my 4th trip to Cuba and certainly won't be my last. However, we thought the resort was just okay but we would be unlikely to return. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| I’ve taken the Havana day trip twice before so I didn’t do it again this trip. It’s great, though. This time I decided to do the Matanzas – Camaguey tour, which is only 28 CUC (7:45 a.m. to around 2 p.m.) It included a stop at a pharmacy museum in downtown Matanzas, a visit to one of the markets where locals buy their groceries (a real eye-opener), a drive through the countryside past lots of farms and a stop in Camaguey to get a drink before heading back to the hotel. It was a really good value and gave an opportunity to see interesting things. We also took the beach bus all around Varadero – it was packed in the morning but the crowd thinned out in the afternoon. They were also offering a free transfer to Havana and an overnight stay at another Barcelo hotel one night while we were there - I would have liked to do that but it happened to fall on my husband's birthday and he wasn't keen on it. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The resort is sprawling, not compact. The Cayo Libertad section is more efficiently laid out. The landscaping is still quite young, and many areas need to be “finished” (i.e., there are areas with construction debris and areas with no grass). The buildings are quite attractive in all areas of the resort.
The beach is not as nice as the main beach in Varadero (few beaches can rival that) but has the advantage of being private, in fact almost deserted. However, sand fleas were a huge problem and even though I only went to the beach for a total of about 2 hours, I ended up with huge itchy welts all over my legs (I’m very allergic to their bites). We saw a few mosquitoes but they were a minor issue next to the sand fleas. They fog the property from time to time with a chemical smudge on the back of a truck – if you see it coming, go the other way. One surprising thing was that in order to get to the beach from El Penon, you have to basically pick your way through a field of sharp twigs and rocks and even some construction debris. It is unbelievable that they wouldn’t build a walkway down there since it is a very common place for people to walk barefoot.
The Cayo Libertad pool was a good size for the number of rooms it served, and it wasn’t a problem to get a lounger. The water was too cold for much swimming when we were there but it was refreshing to take a dip from time to time. We didn’t spend any time at the other resort pools. Beach towels were provided in our room and changed each night by the maid – no need to deal with towel huts or cards. |
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| Other Comments |
| The service had some highs and lows. Usually in Cuba, it’s not very hard to find someone who speaks fluent English. At this resort, not so much. We were surprised that the staff at the Cayo Libertad check-in area spoke very little English or French, since that is where most people will naturally go for assistance and a large proportion of them will probably know little Spanish. We had a problem with our door lock and it was really difficult to communicate about it. The guys who drive the long golf-cart type luggage buggies are really friendly – you can flag them down and get a drive with them if they happen to be passing by while you are walking. One of those guys, whose name I forget now, had much better language skills than the desk staff. Another time, we were offered cigars by a staff member and when we declined, we were hit up for money or gifts (first time this has happened to us in Cuba). The currency exchange always seems to have a very long queue. However, when I got very sick on the same day I had to fly home, I had to get the resort doctor to come to our room and she and the nurse accompanying her were wonderful. They didn’t have any injectable Gravol or antibiotics on hand so they personally went out to the pharmacy to get them for me and brought them back within an hour. I was not in great shape on the return flight but thanks to their efforts I managed to keep it together enough to get back home. Our maid was also quite good and kept everything in order. We tipped her a couple of pesos per day and left behind our unwanted toiletries, etc. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
The food was a disappointment and normally we enjoy the food in Cuba. However, what seemed to be missing were the traditional Cuban foods – i.e. rice and beans, ropa vieja and other stewed meat, pork of all kinds including ham, good bread… The El Penon restaurant on the island tried so hard to be complicated and stylish but usually some ingredient was unavailable and the menu descriptions were quite deceptive. The best things were the simplest - grilled meat and seafood. And the bread products throughout the resort were really not that good and tended to be undercooked and doughy, which shocked me because usually the bread products in Cuba are excellent. There was no toast at El Penon the entire time we were there – apparently the toaster had broken. Most of the fish and meats were overcooked although we did have a lovely lamb dinner one night. However, the coffee at El Penon was probably the best coffee I’ve ever had in my life. One of the waiters there deserves special mention – Michael. He is one of those instantly likeable people who has a special ability in the service industry and he would be able to hold his own in any good restaurant in a big city around the world. We also ate at the main buffet restaurant a few times and it was fine, and that has the advantage that you can see what you’re getting without having to rely on a menu description. The supply issues were also present there, though. Hamburgers with no buns or ketchup, salad with no lettuce, etc. The pasta bar was good, and the cook who ran it was entertaining. More seriously, there were issues with food temperature control and I experienced a bad bout of food poisoning on the last day (more on this later).
We loved the cigar bar! It was a lovely, uncrowded place to have a drink in the evening and relax while listening to a very talented pianist. The restaurant bar at El Penon was also very good, as was the pool bar by the Cayo Libertad pool. We didn’t care for the main lobby bar – very noisy and crowded, and hard to get served. Those were the only ones we tried.
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| Rooms |
| Our room was excellent, and I doubt there are any bad rooms in the Cayo Libertad section. However, I noted while walking through the main part of the resort that I wouldn’t want a room on the bottom floor of some of those buildings because the footpaths go right through the building past your door and I’m a light sleeper. The balcony in our room was huge, with padded wooden loungers and a drying rack for towels and swimsuits. The room itself has an entry area with a little table, and there was a bottle of rum and some Cuban chocolates waiting for us on arrival. There is a bar fridge (including a tiny freezer) that is stocked with water, soft drinks, individual rum bottles and beer. The TV is basic, with satellite service carrying about 20 channels, a few of which are English. There is a DVD / CD player. The bed was not great – rather lumpy, and instead of a king-size bed, it was 2 twins pushed together and made up separately, not exactly the most romantic configuration. The pillows were almost completely flat – you would have to use 3 of them to get one regular pillow. The bathroom was spacious, with double sinks and a large tub with shower. The toilet is in a separate room, and there is also a walk-in closet including a safe and bathroom scales. There are no drawers in the room but there are a few shelves and a suitcase rack. There is a 115V outlet in the bathroom and 220V outlets elsewhere with the type of opening that allows either the European or North American style of plug to go in (nice feature that I haven’t seen in other resorts). We also had a look at the Grand Palace Villa, which was close to our room and was absolutely gorgeous, with private pool etc. It was unoccupied for most of the time we were there. I saw a sign saying it's $300 per night to upgrade but I’m not sure if that’s per person or if that’s on top of the extra you pay for a Cayo Libertad room. |
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| Your Arrival |
| The transfer from the airport was in a standard Havanatur bus - no issues. Barcelo Marina Palace is the very last resort on the peninsula so naturally we were the last ones to get off. Even so, the transfer only took about 55 minutes. We were dropped off at the main entrance and a porter on a golf cart came and delivered us to the Cayo Libertad lobby where we had a private check in. Our room #3204 was not ready at 1:30 p.m. when we arrived so we had to wait a couple of hours by the pool (since the towels are exchanged in the room by the maid, we had no beach towels...however, I liked not having to deal with the towel exchange routine every day so in my mind, the slight inconvenience was not a large issue). Eventually the very friendly porter came back and showed us to our room at around 4:30 pm. |
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| awakening |
| Hotel Brisas Guardalavaca |
| User Rating:
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joe >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| This place was truly heaven for my familt and me the people are amazing that was most important. As well i found that the people visiting this resort were amazing i look forward to seeing my friends there again soon VIVA Cuba lol |
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| Excellent trip - BEWARE CanJet |
| Hotel Gaviota Playa Costa Verde |
| User Rating:
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steve >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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My son and I recently returned from Playa Costa Verde.
It was just as we had hoped, a nice relaxing vacation.
However, we do have a major complaint against CanJet Airlines
I packed (among other things) a Battery charger for a Sony digital Camera
AND a charger for my son's Nintendo DS game
Upon my arrival to Cuba, I noticed that both these items were missing from my luggage.
I would find this extremely difficult to believe they went missing on the Cuban end of my trip.
The Cubans do not have, and cannot get devices for which these chargers were meant to power.
Also, their voltage and shape of the plugs is different than our own.
As such, I believe a handler within the Ottawa airport siezed an opportunity to confiscate these items as their own.
Of course, their official stance is "we are not responsible . . ."
So that's the bad.
And I will not fly CanJet again . . . but I need to talk about the good as well |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We took the "swim with the dolphins" excursion, and it was really special.
I really struggled with the balance of trying to please my son, and trying to be environmentally responsible.
In the end, we took a "once in a lifetime" excursion, that will provide a lifetime of memories. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Beach, what can I say ?
That's why we go to Cuba !! And this beach did not disappoint.
Nice shallow entry (for my son), good snorkelling right off the beach (bring some bananas from the restaurant).
My favorite beach is still "Cayo Santa Maria" but this is quite nice too.
The grounds are always being maintained by hard working staff.
I like to bring these guys a beer from the bar, or give them a peso, or a ball cap, or something small . . .to show them I appreciate their effort to make MY vacation as nice as possible.
The bartenders, maids, servers make decent tips . . .but these guys are working as hard or harder.
While a peso here or there is really nothing for us, it could be the equivalent of a days pay for them.
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| Other Comments |
Remember you are on vacation.
Chill out, walk a little, smile at the people you meet, dance a little, make new friends, try new foods, swim in the ocean, try that blue drink, be respectful, get a massage, go to the gym, so sailing . . .have fun.
When I go to Cuba, I usually bring my gently used clothes, some toiletries, some small toys to give to the families.
Let me tell you, a little gesture like this goes a long way.
So when I say I go for the beach, I also go because the Cubans are genuinely warm, friendly, appreciative people, who go out of their way to ensure your time on the resort is as good as possible.
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| Restaurants and Bars |
We mostly went to the buffet restaurant, because in the past, we found this to be the most convinient.
My son likes to try a bit of this, bit of that . . .plus we have a fairly rigid schedule at home, we didn't want to have fixed time to eat.
That being said, the buffet had very good food, with lots of variety.
There was a grill station, in which you could get chicken, beef, and/or pork.
We always had something from the grill . . . Mmmmmm!
On our second day, on our way to lunch, we saw them roasting a pig over the coals.
My son was little reluctant to try "wilbur", but once he did he said "I hope they will be roasting another pig tomorrow" . . .and they did . . .every day . . . Once again Mmmmmm!
We tried to taste everything in the restaurant, but there was too much variety.
Must tries:
- Something from the grill
- Pizza
- Fresh juice (my favourite - Canteloupe)
- Bananas Flambé
- Coconut Ice-cream
We went to the Japanese restaurant, one evening, and it was quite good.
Our preference is definately the buffet restaurant(s).
After 6 Cuba trips, 3 Mexico trips, 2 Dominican trips, 1 Jamaican trip . . .we know what kind of travelers we are
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| Rooms |
Our room was large and clean, with two twin beds.
As we were on the first floor, we had a large terrace (upper floors had a balcony).
One of the bed-frames was broken, so I contacted the front desk.
We were told not to worry, it would be fixed before we retired for the night.
We washed up and went for dinner.
Upon our return, the bed was fixed . . . no problem |
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| Your Arrival |
Thankfully, there were no other flights ariving at the same time as us.
Holguin airport is quite small, and this can sometimes create a real bottle-neck at customs.
This is not something you can control, or your travel agent, or the airline.
It just happens at small airports.
Our arrival through customs, baggage claims, onto the resort bus went very smoothly.
Once we arrived at the resort, our check-in went quite quckly as well.
Unfortunately, due to the timing, our room was not ready yet.
They gave us our bracelet, so we could enjoy our "all-inclusive" experience.
They have a luggage room where we left our suitcases, got into our swim suits, and off to the beach.
When we returned from our day (approx 4:00) our room was ready.
They took us(and our luggage)to the room. |
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| A vacation to remember. |
| Hotel Sirenis Playa Turquesa (formerly Occidental Grand Playa Turquesa) |
| User Rating:
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Janice >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| This resort is built on a hill with a spectacular view and beautiful grounds.The gardeners work hard to keep the grounds looking so beautiful and are always friendly with a smile.Depending on where your bungalow was situated, you may have to climb some stairs, however the resort had many golf carts running and readily available that would pick you up and drive you to your destination,simply by calling the front desk requesting a drive. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We enjoyed the nightly entertainment. The aqua entertainment was fabulous! A must to see. And get your seat early, it was packed. The entertainment staff were always present in the dining room every evening, dressed in their costume(depending on the theme that night), they too are very friendly.
We took an excursion called Inside Tour. The price was 49 pesos and what a great deal! We thoroughly enjoyed this tour, can't say enough about it.First we took a ride on a relic of a train for approx. 25 min along the farm land, then from there our bus took us to a cigar factory, which was very interesting. Then off again to a restaurant that was snuggled on a hill overlooking a valley..what a view. The meal was delicious (the kids say, their best meal) and we were entertained by a talented band and dancers, what more could you ask for. After our meal off we go to Holguin visiting the cross on the hill overlooking the city.The locals come here to pray.Then into the city the bus dropped us off at a square, where we explored for 50 minutes enjoying speaking with some locals, some shopping, the relaxing with an ice cream at the square. A trip to remember! |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| It was too windy to enjoy the beach during the first few days, plus my daughter disliked the sea grass.We really liked the pools. We enjoyed the second pool, it was large and deep and you could swim up to the edge of the pool and observe the scenery below. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| I was traveling with two 16 year old's and had some concerns whether they would like the food.We came prepared with our own ketchup which they enjoyed on their favorite food item... fries.The bars all had good food. I really liked the tuna sandwich at the sports bar and the fries were great.The kids enjoyed the ice-cream for dessert. The buffet in dining room always had a large variety of foods. Any meat you wished(burger/hot dog/beef/pork) and they would grill it for you. We ate a lot of chicken, even turkey which was very moist and tasty. The kids really enjoyed pasta, especially the friendly welcome from the cook.There was always fresh veg/fruit, the banana's, pineapple and pears are so tasty, not like we get at home. The waitress were friendly. |
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| Rooms |
| We were pleased with our room. Our bungalow was in the 500 section on second floor.Enjoyed sitting out on our balcony relaxing,the scenery was very nice. The beds are rather firm...but usually we were so tired by nighttime, we had no problem sleeping. Our a/c went on the blink one day,however we got prompt service after notifying front desk. Otherwise, the a/c worked wonderfully. There was no tub in our bathroom, only a shower, but we prefer showers. The shower stall had lots of room to place your essentials. The safe was user friendly..you could change your password # as often as you wanted.Lots of storage for clothes in the 2 closets. And there was an iron/ ironing board in our room. |
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| Your Arrival |
| WE arrived at 11am., and upon checking in were told our room would not be available for a few hours. Knowing this from a previous trip, we came prepared with our bathing suit/sunscreen/hat etc. in our carrying on luggage, making it easy to access. So once luggage was stored, off we went to explore. We had lunch, checked out the beach and resort, then went swimming in pool. |
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| Iberostar Laguna Azul - Fantastic Resort, Great Setup, Good Food! Wonderful Vacation! |
| Hotel Iberostar Laguna Azul |
| User Rating:
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Line >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| We stayed at this beautiful resort April 20 to April 27th. It was a great vacation. The weather was excellent, we gained weight so that answers your question about the food, we are so tanned that our friends don't recongnize us and we are struggling to get back on track here in Canada, it's going way too fast for us! |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| We didn't do much for activities. We did go in town at the market of course. They have so much to offer and so cheap. Please, never try to bargain with the price they offer you, it's cheap enough already as it is. You'll feel bad if you do so please don't. We also went for our pizza fix at Pizza Nova at the Plaza Americas(little mall). except that, well we rested, slept on the beach, walked the beautiful beaches of Varadero, made new friends, hate great food and drank beer all week. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| The big activity pool was very busy and loud but if your in to that you will have fun. We spent most of our time at the beach and the quiet pool behind our building. Not enough shade at the quiet pool if you need it. we were up early to reserve shade but they don't have enough of it around the pools. At the beach they have plenty of shade so no worries for the beach. We did find that the beach has changed quit a bit. Lots of broken shells, sea weeds etc and it's not getting cleaned often. The Laguna Azul does have plenty of space in from of the palapas so you don't have everyone walking close to your chair but other resort were terrible for that. They were almost sitting in the water under their palapas, not good. The grounds are still very young so trees and flowers are very small but it will get there eventually. |
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| Other Comments |
| This resort is wonderful. We are returning guest of Iberostar and we are very happy with this chain of hotels. The price will certainly go up because it is a real fine 5 star resort and will only get better. We had great weather and our vacation was perfect. We left all of our leftover stuff to a girl that worked the lobby cleaning and scubbing ashtrays every night. She was about 5 months pregnant and worked every night we were there. She was just so happy with our little things we take for granted. We tipped all week cause the service was very good and it was laways appreciated but certainly not requested by them in any way. We saw approx 10 weddings on the resort and they were all a bit different from each other but still all very beautiful. Until next year! Adios! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| We tried 3 a la carte. gourment(del chef), Japonese, and the Romantico. They were all very very good. The beef tenderloin was amazing. No complaints on the food. The buffet had lots of choices and the service was excellent. I didn't really like the drinks too much. I noticed that they make many in advance and they were warm. I would always have to send the waitress back for a glass of ice cause the drink was warm. Warm pina colada's, not very good your your belly so be very careful. After I noticed the making of drinks in advance I stopped drinking them and by belly ache went away. I wasn't drinking too many of them but still got discomfort. The pool bar had slush machines so that was cold and refreshing but the lobby bar was a busy spot and I guess they tried to go fast on the drinks. We couldn't believe how fast the got our drink but came to find out that they were done in advance. Beer was safe and we had plenty. The ice cream shop was a real bonus also, yummy! |
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| Rooms |
| Our room wasn't ready when we got to the resort. We arrived around 11:00am so I wasn't surprised. It did take them way too long to give us our room, the service at the front desk was good and I know they tried their best for us but it was a busy day in the lobby. Once we did get our room we were very satisfied with it. King size bed, clean enough for our taste I guess, not perfect but it was decent. We had emailed the resort with a few choices of buildings and floors and we got what we had requested. I had said in my email that they were only preferences and not to stress it too much but they gave us what we had requested and we were very happy. Building 18, top floor facing the pool but I need to say that all the locations are good. This resort is so well set up it's crazy. It's a big enough resort but you feel right at home because the way the plan of the builgings was designed, loved it. They stocked the bar everyday. It was suppose to be every second day but we always tip well and leave a little note for more Cristal beer and we always got 2 or 3 everyday anyway for when the bars aren't open yet around 9:00 :) |
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| Your Arrival |
| We flew Air Transat Club Class and it was a wonderful experience. The service you get is just amazing really. We weren't use to that kind of service on our flights, always flew economic rates. Hum, I really enjoyed it. We took it at the airport, last minute because they had seats available and were trying to sell them so we got sucked in but we really enjoyed the experience. We were early arriving in Varadero and things all went very smooth. |
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| Fun for everyone at the Blau |
| Hotel Blau Varadero |
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Marlene >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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Hotel - Super Clean - Comfortable - Spacious - Beautiful.
Staff - Super Nice - Welcoming - Outgoing - Happy.
Food - Delicious - People should learn to give a little bit (one Pesos can go a long way) especially when the cook is making the hot food! Simple things as giving them a cold glass or two of juice while waiting for your omelet to cook can go a long way too.
Even though it was an all-inclusive week vacation, one must remember to give too and not always get :)
My heart goes out to all of the staff. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Water polo, Salsa dancing by the pool which I miss so much, Volleyball, Croquet, Soccer, Other Games, fashion show, water ballet shows and of course must not forget the Musical Quiz every night around 8:30pm followed by another show which we watched all everynight that we were there! |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Clean - Easy to Get Around - Super Safe |
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| Other Comments |
BLAU - BLAU - BLAU - GO ONCE AND YOU'LL WANT TO GO BACK AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN :)
EXCELLENT WORK TO ALL!
Our boys 13 & 21 and both were ALWAYS ON THE GO!
Unfortunately, we couldn't go snorkelling because the waters were too rough the day we wanted to go however we will go next year because we've heard nothing but good for that too. Go with the people at the ocean and it'll only cost $20.00 Pesos/Person and only about 6 people are on the special boat (katamaran). |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM - All you can eat buffet filled with loads of goodies - something for everyone "GUARANTEED"! Our 21 year old said he felt like a King and ate like a King too! His friends told him other stories about the food etc. and let me tell you, he came back and talked so much about his great vacation (place, food, drinks, people.....EVERYTHING)! |
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| Rooms |
Spacious - Clean - Comfortable
Once again, acknowledge the staff that take care of you; they'll go an extra mile + if you simply recognize them too. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Courteous - Warm Welcome - Beautiful and must not forget the champagne and orange juice that awaits you in the reception area (All day - everyday)...nothing is a problem :) |
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| Excellent |
| Hotel GC Villa Trópico (Cameleon Villa Jibacoa) |
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Susan >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| Second time to this resort. Flew from Moncton, NB with Nolitours via Canjet. Uneventful flight - ham & cheese sandwich for lunch and small glass of champagne. Customs at Varadero airport uneventful. Changed money at Cadeca in Departure lounge. Renovations underway at airport. Six CUCs for 3 beer. Bus ride to hotel was good but as we arrived at midnight (thereabouts) not much to see. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Did not partake in any activities. I was disappointed that there was live musical entertainment only one evening while we were there and this was a four piece band. They were very good but compared to the entertainment that was offered in 2008; no comparison! No singers in the restaraunt either and the shows with the dancers were done to recorded music whereas in the past it had been a live 10 piece band with percussion, guitars, trumpets, and excellent vocals. Not sure if this was due to the time of our visit (first week of May as opposed to first of March in 2008) or just the way it is now. Our main interest in this resort was and is the snorkeling. We were very fortunate in being able to snorkel all six days of our stay and any time of the day was good. The ocean was calm, no wind, and no PMOWs! It was absolutely beautiful. The only downside was seeing the brokne coral where people had walked on the reef. Please try to educate yourself a little before snorkelling and please do not walk on the reef. If you don't think you can handle mask adjustments whithout standing, wear a lifejacket and practice in shallow water before going out to the reef. We absolutley loved the snorkelling. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Beach was fantastic. Lots of chairs and shade available. Grounds were very well kept; people always raking, snipping, and generally cleaning up. Noticed many, many more dogs at the resort this time and as stated previously, as long as people keep feeding the animals they will continue to congregate and then be removed not at all pleasantly. I love animals but I am also a realist. Did not use the pool at all but it looked clean and there were activities around it. |
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| Other Comments |
| All in all an excellent vacation - a week is much too short but certainly better than nothing. Love this resort and it is getting quite popular! We will be back again. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Buffet restaraunt was fine although very warm as the week went on (temperatures were in the low 30s all week). They had air conditioners on but all the windows and doors open. Breakfast was OK, but lunch and dinner were sweaty affairs unless you were sitting in front of the air conditioner with the fan turned on you. Food was plain and good as other reviewers have stated. No complaints here. Our travelling companions found the fish quite salty and we were surprised that there were no whole fish served as on the previous occasion we had been there. We ate at the a la carte and it was OK. Had a ham & cheese sandwich one day at lunch time from the snack bar (snack bar during day and a la carte at night) and it was excellent. Done on a panini press till golden brown and toasty; MMMmmmmmm. The bars at this resort are some of the best in Cuba I think (in my limited experience) and certainly the best of any resort I have been to. The bartenders go above and beyond to make the perfect drink. Just thinking of a perfectly refreshing purple rain...... and the coffee is excellent also. |
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| Rooms |
| Requested a queen bed and got two twins but just pushed them together. Room was clean and air conditioner and fridge worked fine. Lots of hot water and clean towels every day. The only strange thing was no towel art???? This was a first for me in Cuba. The room was kept very clean. We were in villa 58 wich was a little far from the lobby and restaraunt (far being relative as the resort is certainly not huge), but was very quiet. Got flowers from the gardener each morning. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Arrival and check-in at hotel was smooth. Only one bellboy for luggage so we found room on our own. Was raining on arrival. Sandwiches in room fridge and bottle of rum and water on desk. Deposited luggage and went to pool bar for drinks. It was lovely and warm despite the rain and the drinks were excellent as usual. |
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| Housekeeping extremely bad - Told what should be and what really happens is called " The cuban way |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
| User Rating:
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Stephen >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Apr, 2010 | Leisure | With friend
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Resort was booked to capacity so very difficult to get a spot on the beach. What was left of the beach due to recent storms. Weather was off and on. 3 hot days the rest cloudy and overcast. Too windy to go to the beach.
Check in was very fast however the room location we requested during purhchase was not what what we actually received. We were given dirty beach towels the 1st day to exchange for clean ones WHEN they were available. We were told laundry was broken and that it was across the cuba. Howwever after speaking with quests from other hotels were found out this was NOT true. We had clean room towels the 1st day and then not the entire week. The shower leaked the entire week so everyday we had to clean up a flood = We used a towel to block the water but housekeeping kept taking it away. We had to beg borrow and pay through the noise if we wanted to get another towel.
The food was terrible so we ate mostly bread and veggies.
Our nolitours rep was a nice yound french guy but frankly he wasn't much help - he pretty much said when in cuba you must except that what is advertised it not exactly what you get. The cuban way is not to believe anything the sign says. If the bank is suppose to be open between a certain hour it really isn't so if you need money make sure you don't wait until the day you need it. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| very hokey activiites - need more activities that get guests interacting -= part of a holiday is too meet new people. Resort is soooooo huge that its hard to meet new people. People stay in their clicks. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Pools huge - 2 but people have a habit of tieing their towels to the beach cots so if you want to lay out on the pool or beach you have to get up early and reserve a spot. Not enough cots when hotel is booked to capacity. |
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| Other Comments |
| Staff are absolutely horrible at this resort. They are tip hungry. The first night we were taken to our room and the bell boy or should I say man would not leave without a sizeable tip. we didn't have any convertible pesos yet so he insisted on us giving him canadian $ 10 tip. They are always asking for tips straight out. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| don't cook well - food horrible. The dominican's food is gourmet compared to cuban food. Lots of drinks if your a drinker. |
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| Rooms |
| spacious - bed nice and firm. Fridge always stocked - have to pay for the safe even though we were told it was part of the package. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Fast check in/out |
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| Too windy and cool |
| Hotel Sol Río de Luna y Mares Resort |
| User Rating:
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Keith >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Too windy and cool...you can't control the weather but we were not expecting how cool and windy our week turned out to, certainly not a canadian winter, but not warm.You definetly needed pants and a sweater in the evening and we covered up a lot on the beach too! |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| There is not much in Quardalavacca, open air market, nice beach. Four of us took a taxi in for $5CUC and a horse and buggy back for $10CUC.Nice experience. The next day we took bikes in for some exercise, about a fifteen minute ride.We went on the catamarran/snorkelling excursion but nearly froze as the weather was cloudy and cool all day.We left from the port of Antilla, about an hour bus ride from the resort.The cat is fairly cramped with about 60 people on board, but it has good washrooms, and the staff serve drinks during the entire cruise.The snorkeling was not that great, but the meal on the island(Cayo Sartia) we landed on was excellent. While on the Island we took the wild Safari ride on the back of a huge truck, $9 CUC each, which our daughters enjoyed immensely. There are several species of African animals, including zebras and ostriches scattered about. Our driver, Cesar, stopped to feed the ostrich bananas. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Very nice beach, clean and no problem with getting a chaise any time of the day.The hotel staff will deliver one to any part of the beach you request...a great service some other resorts should emulate.I forgot and left my hat under the chaise the first day of our vacation when we left the beach.The next day when we returned to the beach I inquired if there was a Lost and Found,but my Spanish and his English lost something.A few minutes later he came over with my "sombrero".Where could you go in the Carribean and find such honest, kind and caring people, genuinely interested in making your vacation enjoyable.I would take some water shoes as there were some rocks exposed at the waters edge by the stong winds we experienced all week.We enjoyed snorkeling from the beach, lots of sand dollars to dive for, and some coral reefs a bit futhur out with some fish too.The other hotel on the beach is the Paridissus.The grounds of the hotel have an ecletic mixture of feral cats, horses, chickens and goats.The meowling cats and urine smell became a bit annoying near our rooms one night.We were all delighted with the animals. |
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| Other Comments |
| All the staff we met at the hotel were great and will do anything they can to ensure you have a nice vacation. The service was friendly.We tipped at all our meals and brought things for the maids we left in the room, and tipped whenever we had good service, which was everywhere. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| We ate at three a-la-cartes:International,Italian,and we are not sure what the third was.The Italian was our favorite.There was also a special Transat dinner on the beach, which was a letdown...another buffet.We were getting tired of the food after a week, however the flambayed bananas were a delight...excellent! The buffet staff were awesome, friendly and good service. |
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| Rooms |
| Our room, 2026, had just been painted. It was clean and everything worked. The AC was working and everything in the bathroom worked.That was a relief.The room was clean.We could see the ocean from our balcony. The balcony was private, enclosed. We liked that. The door did not lock, but we didn't complain about this since it hardly seemed important.Staff are very honest.Some things in our daughters rooms were not replenished quickly enough, toilet paper and hand soap, but not a major issue. |
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| Your Arrival |
| We left Halifax at 7:30pm on CanJet and arrived three and a half hours later in Holguin. The hotel is about an hour from the airport. It was after midnight when we arrived at the hotel and our checkin was handled quickly.Our request for a king bed was denied, which we expected anyway. |
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| Most awesome & humbling experience of my life, I absolutely LOVED it! |
| Hotel Cubanacan Club Amigo Marea del Portillo |
| User Rating:
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Denise >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Can't say enough good about this - hopefully sunwing publishes my review, it was too long to type here again :) Was an absolutely amazing time, spent on the resort and with the locals - very poor although extrememly happy and loving people - unbelievable time of my life. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| amazing adventures |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| awesome - again!!!!! |
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| Other Comments |
| check this out, it has become the place I want to have a home away from home |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| no complaints - clean area with fresh food :) |
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| Rooms |
| spotless albeit old. comfortable & cool :) |
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| Your Arrival |
| awesome, speedy :) |
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| Rat in the room! |
| Hotel Barceló Marina Palace |
| User Rating:
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Mark >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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By no means do we want to discourage anyone from going to Cuba. We had a fabulous time in Havana! Amazing city, rich with culture. A must to visit if in Cuba but the Barcelo Marina Palace is a disgrace!
We have traveled to many tropical all-inclusive resorts and never have we experienced what we encountered at this Barcelo resort. Rude and belligerent staff. Yes they do run out of wine. A la carte restaurants - no comment. Mosquitoes are welcome at this resort and other bugs as well.
Our first night there I got up at 2AM to use the washroom and encountered an eight inch rat in our room. Their reaction to the rat was unbelievable. They did not apologize in any way but rather made us feel terrible for the inconvenience we had caused them. After more than two hours of negotiating, we were moved from a king bed/ocean view room to a double bed room facing an extremely noisy road.
It should have been a week of R&R with family but who can relax when you don't feel welcome.
Thank goodness for the "fantastic six" that traveled with us. We would not have survived without them!
Visit Cuba, especially Havana, but don't make the mistake we did by staying at the Barcelo Marina Palace.
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| Not that impressed |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
| User Rating:
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Mike from Winnipeg >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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We went with Sunwing Vacations who said it was a "Family Friendly Resort", not so much.....
Let me begin by preficing this review by saying that it was not all bad, and that I will also point out some of the good things, but please read further to fully understand the concerns.
Let's see where do I start??
We pre-booked in Oct/09 as a group of 7 travellers, and asked for 3 separate rooms in the same building and we were not accomodated because their "resort was full". This was not the end of the world, but my parents ended up being stuck in a building full of young rowdy teenagers.
This was a large spacious resort with beautiful grounds despite all of the messy Canadians who felt obliged to throw their garbage all over instead of using the many recepticles provided!!! After seeing this I found it disappointing to recognize myself as a Canadian for the first time in my life.
The shuttle service was slow and at times non-existent, which was not a problem for myself, but my 73 year old mother found it difficult at times. This was especially true at night because the lighting was poor, but I also noted that a bunch of yahoo Canadian kids had ripped out the light posts all over the resort, and the maintenance staff could not keep up with all of the repairs needed.
We found out the next day that there is a travel tour company (from Canada)
called S-tours that caters to teenager's looking for a "good time" in Cuba that uses this resort. This was a problem. I am not sure how the resort, Sunwing vacations, or anyone in fact thinks that mixing droves of drunk teenagers and families with young children is appropriate or "family oriented". My kids were treated to watching young scantily clad teenage girls (mostly from Montreal and Toronto) lie themselves on top of the pool bar (this is where the waterslide is by the way) and have the bartender pour shots of liquor into their belly button for young males to drink from. This was Lesson # 1 of the world for my 9 year old son I guess...
Then there was the food throwing incident at 5:00 am in a few of the buildings. Apparently teens were ordering 10 burgers at a time and knocking on doors at 5:00 am and throwing them at the room occupants. Nice....
The best one for the week.. no,let me restate this. The most disappointing thing was hearing about the wedding that the teens crashed on the beach. A very nice couple from Nova Scotia were married on the beach, and the reception that followed was crashed by a bunch of yahoo Canadian teens that thought it would be funny to throw chairs and start a fight.... at a wedding. Now there's a memory that bride will never forget.
I believe that there were some teens sent home early, but the point that I am trying to make is that this by no means is representative of "family friendly" activity, and I do not think that reviews will be any different than the one I am providing until the resort decides |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Lots of day trips available for reasonable prices to go off resort.
The Havana day trip was very interesting for the culture and amazing architecture, but was a little too long for my liking. Also a lot of walking, so if you are disabled or a little long in the tooth, I advise you to do something else.
On-site activity workers try very hard to get things going, but if your over forty or under 16 they do not cater to you very much. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Smallish beach front, but well utilized by the patrons and staff. Good activities staff and they also include most of the watersports for free!!!
Quiet pool is very nice and for the most part quiet. The Activity Pool, which has the waterslide is fantastic, except that the teens hang out at this pool, so in lies my problems described above.
Groundskeepers are overworked due to the teens ripping apart the shrubs and strewing garbage all over the place, but they usually have things looking very presentable by 10:00 am every day (they start at 7:00 am) for a resort this size. |
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| Other Comments |
| Make sure you take travel health insurance. A gent over 60 got clipped by one of the shutle carts and fell and broke his wrist. The resort took him to the hospital, but assumed none of the responsibility of paying for his treatment. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Al-a-cartes were not very special, but it's Cuba, so what do you expect.
Everyone knows the food is not the reason to go to Cuba for vacation.
My family and I did find the food at the buffet more than acceptable, and actually quite tasty for the most part. Bring a small bottle of ketchup and a small jar of peanut butter if these are staples in your household, because their ketchup is not very good and they do not have peanut butter.
There is a snack bar down by the beach which is amazing. They have outside BBQs that they serve the best pork on a bun I have ever had and a decent burger according to my 9 year old son, the burger expert. |
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| Rooms |
Very large and spacious. Very well decorated and maintained by the housekeeping and maintenance staff. We had a few things that needed to be repaired and they were done within a few hours.
Bathrooms are HUGE, but the bathtubs are set too high and require a step stool (provided) to get in. Also the tub design was flawed as water runs out the back of the tile surface onto the floor. We just placed an extra towel at the back of the tub to catch the water. This worked fine, and the maid understood what we were doing with this towel so she left it there. Toilets are eco-friendly (low flow flush style), nice touch.
Each room has TV with American and Cuban stations. Also there is a CD player, so bring CD's as there are no good music stations and poor radio reception.
Fridge in room was restocked daily with beer, water, and soft drinks.
In-room safe is electronic and is 2 CUC/day = cheap.
Beds are small, but very comfortable, and they give you 4 large body pillows /room. These are very comfortable. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Front desk staff was friendly, but spend too much time talking to each other instead of serving customers promptly. This was not the case for us, but I did watch other guests get very frusrated by this |
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| This resort is better than I expected |
| Hotel Cubanacan Club Amigo Marea del Portillo |
| User Rating:
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Andrew >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| I traveled with my mother and sister here. I came with the intention it was going to be a backwash place in the middle of nowhere, but really, I dont know why anyone was really complaining. Aslong as you go to Cuba expecting Cuban standards, you will have a great time. The food is exactly what you will get for a 3 star, but you dont go to Cuba for the food, you go for the beach and pool. After the hurricane they remodeled the resort, so be sure to stay at the Farralon de Carib. It is much more elegant, with better food, and nicer rooms. Overall we found the staff very friendly,but try to find Henry (he is very nice and helpful). Come there with a flash light, because the nightly entertainment rotates from hotels every second night, and the road can get slightly dark. Also, dont go expecting to use the internet, it is expensive and takes FOREVER to load a page!!!!! I do not recomend this hotel for the young drinking crowd however. The resort is very spread out, and after a night of fun (or to much to drink) there is no food to get after dinner until breakfast!!! Otherwise, familys with kids and older citizens I do recomend this tranquil atmosphere. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| This resort is more friend orientated. There are activities on the resort, like bingo and contests. The tours were fun, but not very organized. They had ping pong, which was very fun, but the tennis was not very good. If you are a player, you are better off to walk down to the Marea del Portillo resort, because the Farallon's tennis is isolated and hard to get to. The shows were funny, and the entertainment staff were very nice!! |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| If you stay at the farallon, the beach is about a 5 minute walk, but it is worth the walk.The path ways are clean, and the grounds are very lush. There were animals on the resort pathways, (goats, horses, pigs, cows) but aslong as you avoid there poo they dont bother you. The beach at the Farallon side isn't very nice. The sand is very dark and rigid. We allways walked to the other hotels beach, which had lighter, and softer sand. The pools were very nice. They were clean and relativley warm. Other than the pathways, the grounds were spotless. |
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| Other Comments |
| The resort was better than I expected, and aslong as you go for the weather and not the food you will have fun. If you are younger I dont recomend this hotel. Overall, it was a good vacation |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| The food is what you would expect in Cuba. We found the Farralon's food was a little better than the other ones, and a better variety. The food is very simple, rice, beans, pork, chicken ,beef and salads, but the bread is amazing!!!!! The fruit was fresh, but the desserts were plain, and the icecream only came in vanilla. The bar had a wide variety of drinks, but I suggest you bring your own cup, beacuse the cups are really small. One thing I didn't like is that there was no food avaliable after dinner. |
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| Rooms |
| I cannot stress this enough, STAY AT THE FARALLON!!! The rooms were relativley nice. They were very clean, and everything worked fine except for a noisy airconditioner. There were about 5 english channels on the TV. ( You cannt scroll to CTV news because of the American and Cuban fued, but if you press channel 2 you can watch it. The room 414 had a bug problem in our beds after the wind died down, but they gave us a spray bottle. After dark besure to keep the doors closed, because once sand flies are in the room the get into your sheets and matress. This is Cuba, so if you want somthing done right, you must complain. |
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| Your Arrival |
| The flight was not that bad in my opinion. The seats are a little bit closer together, but they had a movie, food, and pillows. When you arrive in the airport you go through normal customs, and then board a bus. ( Be sure to bring somthing to do, because the bus ride is another hour and a half.) There is a bar where you can get drinks, and they give you your key and bracelet befor you board the bus. Very convinient! |
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| Great time |
| Hotel Blau Colonial Cayo Coco |
| User Rating:
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Laurie >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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The Blau is the oldest resort on the island but it is clean, modern and very close to the beach. We went over Ontario March Break and while the other resorts were overrun by out of control drunk teenagers, the Blau, with its mix of families of all sorts was relatively quiet and low key. I think other times of the year, the Trypp and DH would be fine. They are more modern than this one and seem to have more activities on an ongoing basis.
Other reviews commented on the poor food. We found to our pleasant surprise that the food was just fine. I particularly liked the grilled shrimp at dinner and ice cream became a favourite every night. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We really enjoyed the glass bottom boat that we waded out to from the beach. For 20 CUC, it would take you out to the reef for a good half hour or more snorkling. Before getting to the reef, they go along the beach and pick up people from the other resorts and it is fun to exchange stories. We went on it twice. We also really liked (especially the boys) the boat adventure. We only took the 2 hour tour and it was enough. The snorkling is pretty good and getting there in the little boats is great fun.
My mom took the two day overnight to Havana and couldn't say enough about how good it was. She particularly liked the hotel.
We also took the all day catamaran but because of wind, were not able to snorkle on the reef. Pretty good anyway, but not the best because of that.
Do NOT recommend the horseback riding. Too much trotting on very skinny horses. Very hard for beginners and even experienced riders.
The shows are quite good and the staff had everyone in stitches. My boys have now downloaded the theme song and are still dancing to it. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Spent very little time at the pools with the beach so close. Good to get there in the morning to grab a shade hut for later in the day. A beach boy will get you the lounger and set you up. The water is beautiful and was warm due in part to the shallow water. It was usually pretty windy so there were waves but that just added to the fun for the boys. You can sign out kayaks and snorkling masks from the boat house. Did not see paddle boats. The Hobbie Kats were sailed for you.
Next time would bring own snorkling mask and bougie boards to take advantage of the waves. Get your towels on arrival by getting a paper at the front desk and taking it to the towel hut. Towels can be exchanged daily. |
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| Other Comments |
Bring Canadian money and enough to tip - as you would at a resort in Canada. I spent a lot of unplanned money in tips. Bring bug spray and extra sun screen. You go through a lot of sun screen and to buy one at one of the shops was $20 Pesos or about $25 Cdn.
To book excursions, they covert the money to US then to Canadian (and I think Pesos are in there too). If you can plan your excursions roughly ahead of time, I recommend you pay in Pesos, not by credit card. They will only take Canadian bank credit cards (Visa). No bank machines were seen.
We also brought things like toothbrushes/toothpaste/toiletries. I even gave one shop lady a package of boys underwear. Also, they like Canadian stuff. Always greatly appreciated by the polite and pleasant staff.
We enjoyed our stay and would recommend. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| We enjoyed the buffet. Tried the Italian restaurant but with few waiters and lots of customers, did not like it very much. We were actually happy to get back to the extremely good service at the main buffet. The wines served at meals were quite good. The boys (12 and 14) really liked the hambergers grilled at the beach bar and the fries at the salt water pool were good as well. Our real treat every night was the Churros served up to order with a variety of delicious toppings. Another treat was the Spanish coffees from the main bar. Many of the tropical drinks were very sweet but the rum and coke and the cold cervasa at the beach were always great. A Timmy mug is good for keeping your drink cold at the beach. |
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| Rooms |
| Our rooms were in the main pavillion which was very convenient looking over the plaza, but also noisy as we were next to the disco which played into the wee hours. With closed windows and good air conditioning, there was no problem sleeping however. The rooms were clean and the maid service very good. Other reviews had talked about bed bugs but we had none and saw no bugs other than mosquitos. The resort sprayed a smoke screen of sorts morning and night which kept the mosquitos down to almost none. I did hear that other resorts had lots of mosquitos. |
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| Your Arrival |
Travelling from Ottawa direct to Cayo Coco was a delight. Our Signature rep met us at the airport. There is a big push to book the VIP room at the airport for the way back, but we had no problem with the main airport departure lounge instead. The shops actually had better souvenirs and cheaper with a money exchange right there.
Our rep gave us a good briefing on the morning after our arrival and was very helpful throughout the trip. There is also a Canadian working there, Mango, who can help you with any challenges you have. Front desk was also very good. |
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| Great first trip |
| Hotel Cubanacan Brisas del Caribe |
| User Rating:
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mike >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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We loved the people, the sunshine, and the beautiful white beach.
Only had a few windy and cloudy days. The food was ok considering.
great price for what we got and will be going again more than likely to the same hotel. |
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| Wonderful Resort |
| Hotel Paradisus Río de Oro |
| User Rating:
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Patricia >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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We were a family party of three generations ( 78, 52, 18) that travelled to this resort in November 2009 for 1 week. We all loved it. The flights were good - we flew on Sunwing in their Elite Plus section - we thought it was worth the extra money to have the extra legroom seats prebooked both directions, as well as the seperate check-in. We waited in a line of about 8 people instead of the line with about 150 people. We could also board early if we liked.
Sunwing gives you a glass of champagne and a snack soon after take off, then free headsets, choice of hot meal and free wine with the meal. Our flights were on time. Overall a good experience. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Pool- large, clean. Has a swim-up bar. You can see the ocean from the pool. Lots of lounges. People get up early to save the best spots.
Beach was nice, but very rough wtaer when we were there. There was a hurricane that was at the far west end of Cuba and Mexico while we were there. We got torrential rain one day, and the ocean was rough the whole week, so we were not in it very much.
Grounds are well looked after. Nice plantings.
Nice bonsaii around the Asian restaurant. |
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| Other Comments |
Staff in the resort were very good. Professional, eager to please, welcoming, friendly. They always had a smile and a "Hola" for you.
Over all we had a great holiday and would reccommend it to anyone. As a matter of fact I am returning there in less than 2 weeks, this time with my husband and another couple. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Food was amazing! The main buffet has endless choices, beautifully presented. We ate every breakfast here, some lunchs and a few dinners. Staff was attentive, professional,friendly, welcoming, eager to please. If you couldn't find many things to your liking at this buffet, there is something wrong with you!!!
The a la cartes were all good. (least favourite was the Cuban, but still fine)
The service was always good. They try very hard to make your meal pleasant.
The restaurant by the beach had wonderful food at lunch - fabulous seafood.
The pool area restaurant was great as well. Casual.
Bars- good.
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| Rooms |
Large, very clean and comfortable. A little bit dated decor-wise, but still nice. On 2 levels. Bathroom and bedroom on upper level, then 3 stairs down to sitting area. Sink area seperate from tub area. In area with tub/shower is toilet and bidet. Great water pressure in shower. Always lots of hot water. Lots of towels. Nice soap, shower gel, shampoo etc.
Air conditioning was adequate. Room was fresh smelling, not damp or musty, (2nd floor room), kept spotless by maid. Mini bar always replenished.
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| Your Arrival |
You are greeted at the resort with a glass of sparkling wine and a cool towel. They have you sit in the lobby, and come to you to check in. Wasn't the fastest check in I have had, but definitely not the worst.
We were driven to our room by a bellboy in a golf cart and he carried our bags up to the room. The room keys didn't work so he took them back to the front desk to re-program them, and returned with-in a few minutes.
We changed, then went to buffet for late dinner. |
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| Cuba OK, Hotel not so much! |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
| User Rating:
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Peter >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Havana was great (history and sites), tour guide excellent (knowledgeable and friendly). Scenery very good and lots of opportunity for picture taking. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Much of the beach has washed away and not cleaned up from past season storm, very messy for most (2/3rds). Grounds still developing as hotel fairly new. BBQ area best point about hotel (food and staff). |
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| Other Comments |
| Don't go to relax at March break and be ready to tip for everything. Hotel lobby money exchange very unfriendly. Roads in good condition for travel but be ready for lots of traffic. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Main buffet same food daily, poor service and long lines, |
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| Rooms |
| Room good but beds hard to sleep on. Bring your own wash cloth as none here. Maids did well with limited resources. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Check-in at 3:30 AM went well. |
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| A Blooming Paradise |
| Hotel Sirenis Playa Turquesa (formerly Occidental Grand Playa Turquesa) |
| User Rating:
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Valleyguy >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| We returned from our 10th trip to Cuba on March 10, this time staying at the Sirenis Playa Turquesa. This was our 8th resort. It is a very visually appealing resort. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
I cannot comment on daytime activities as we seldom take advantage, however, as our room was by the pool, I can report that the late afternoon activities seemed well attended, loud, and of an adult nature. The nightly entertainment was as good as or better than many Cuban resorts with only one audience participation night, and one night was the water ballet.
As we have been to Cuba and the Holguin area several times we only took one tour, Inside Cuba. It was well worth the 49 CUC (?) each and included a train ride, a tour of a cigar factory, lunch, tour of Holguin and free time in the city centre. We had taken a similar tour before but it was made more interesting as there was a Book Festival in the main square.
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The beach had lots of shade, which is important to us; however, we did not stay there very long most afternoons as the wind was quite chilly. It is a relatively short beach with exposed, dead coral at each end. You can explore beyond the ends of the sand but you need something on your feet.
The pools are one of the more aesthetic features of the resort. They cascade down the slope, going from the shadeless adult pool, down to a family pool, down to another pool with access to the swim-up bar, and ending at the shallow family pool were all the pool activities take place. Except for the adult pool, all the pools have shade cover on both sides of the pools; however, it was quickly snapped up by the unattended towels!! The one slightly annoying feature of the upper pools was that the music from the activity pool was piped up to them making for a distraction for those trying to read or sun-snooze. In addition, each pool is linked by blossom covered arches which disguise the number of stairs on both sides of the pools.
The Turquesa grounds are very lush and to my wife’s great pleasure the bougainvillea and other plants were in full bloom and cover a good portion of the resort. We found the layout good and logical. The roads/paths within and around the resort are wide and make for a good evening walk. Fortunately our room was very central, so I may have had a different opinion if we had been on one of the ends. However, I don’t feel that there was more than a 10 minute walk to most areas of the grounds.
There are also the usual facilities: a store which I thought had a limited variety, until I got to the airport; a Cadeca (money exchange), the exchange was 85.6 CUC = $100 Cdn (in early March, 2010) and has good hours so no great line-ups; and an internet area.
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| Other Comments |
We enjoyed the resort but I have to admit it wasn't my favourite, although I cannot be specific as to why, it is just a personal think. My wife liked it more than I did. As I said it is very visually pleasing with a large plaza off the lobby.
This was the first resort that we had been to that actually catered to larger groups. All of the eating areas, i.e. buffet, ala cartes, snack bars, and bars, had large tables capable of seating 8 or 9 people with out having to pull tables together. I did not see any, but I got the impression that the suites were good for families and larger groups. In addition, there were 2 weddings in the week we were there. As well, the Turquesa had one of the largest Kid’s Club area I have seem at any resort, complete with shallow pool and cute kid sized sun loungers.
The resort staff were very friendly, helpful, and quite efficient by Cuban standards. I had read several reviews that talked about being ignored by wait staff or not being served at bars without tipping but I never found this on any occasion.
My biggest complaint (and this has happened at other resorts) was the lack of live musicians (as opposed to dead musicians!). There was a trio each night for a short time in the buffet, but not at the ala cartes, and there was either a pianist, singer, or saxophonist at the lobby bar for a short time early evenings. However, to be fair at least the canned music they played at other times was Cuban (one resort we stayed at a few years ago played "Hotel California" 24/7).
Overall, you will enjoy the Playa Turquesa.
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| Restaurants and Bars |
A very nice lobby bar with early evening entertainment. The buffet was good with a good choice of fruits, salads, carver items, casserole dishes, cooking stations, and above Cuban average desserts. The 4 ala cartes (Cuban, Mediterranean, Grill, and Italian) we ate at were good; in fact, I think the food at the resort was some of the best we have had in Cuba. My main observation with the ala cartes was that although the service was okay, they did not seem as "special" as in other resorts; or that is to say that in many Cuban resorts the staff seem to attempt to make the dining experience more special than the buffet, even if they often fall short. The Italian was the best, although they have not completed the decorating. With Air Transat we were allowed 5 ala cartes, but we did not go to the Oriental ala carte due to the poor reviews and we are not that into Chinese food, if it had been Japanese we would have tried to go twice! However, we heard several favourable comments about the Oriental.
We had several lunches at the Beach snack bar, where the table service pizzas were the best we have had in Cuba. Through Air Transat we were offered the Beach snack bar for a continental breakfast, we only went twice as the selection was limited, however, there was no waiting for my omelette. We did not try the 24 hour snack bar for food.
The 3 bars we frequented most were quite good: Lobby, 24 hour, and Beach snack bar. They have 2 of the best bartenders I have encountered, 1 at the lobby bar and the other at the beach snack bar, they make the best Pina Coladas, my new favourite the Mulata and the guy at the Beach snack bar makes the best Mojitos going. The bar on the beach was limited and made the Pina Coladas with slush. I only used the swim-up bar a couple of times as the water was quite cool, but it had one of the most entertaining bartenders I have ever seen, and was featured on stage one night, think Tom Cruise in "Cocktail", only for real!!
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| Rooms |
| Perhaps because we were first to check-in or maybe it was advance email (?), we got a room directly by the pool, which was a perfect location. I had emailed and asked for an upper floor room, however, our first floor room turned out to be good. The room was very typical to most of the Cuban resorts we have stayed in. An entry hallway with large closet (containing safe and iron & board), large bedroom with patio doors onto good sized balcony. Although almost of the buildings are only 2 stories, the ground floor is off the ground so the balcony does not step out onto the ground, thus avoiding low level insects or other creatures. The bed was typical, hard with thin long pillows. We had a daybed/cot in our room (useful for piling junk on) and an armchair, with another desk chair at the dressing table, TV and bar fridge, which was stocked each day. The only 110/120 volt outlet is in the hair dryer in the bathroom (usually meant for razors). The bathroom we had was in 3 sections, the main room had the sink and vanity, a separate toilet and a separate shower (no bath). It was adequate as bathrooms go. Overall the room was quite functional. |
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| Your Arrival |
| We flew with Air Transat out of Halifax. Arrived at 10:00 and breezed through the airport, to the bus, to the resort. We were almost the first off the bus, (without any pushing or shoving, I hasten to add!) I got the luggage while my wife went to the check-in. It was so fast and orderly that the only slow down was them waiting for me to get there and be banded (1st note: only Air Transat guests get banded, like true snowbirds!), I had to stop for my welcome cocktail! A bellhop took us to our room on a golf cart and we were in our room by 11:30, THE FASTEST check-in we have ever experienced!! |
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| Friendly fun group at Caracol |
| Hotel Club Amigo Caracol |
| User Rating:
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kate >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With friend
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My girlfriend and I just came back from the Caracol in Santa Lucia. We found the hotel rooms clean. The staff very friendly. The service to be great. The meals were a little lacking. Not much to chose from. But other than that everything went just excellent. They have an excellent massage person there! The beach is nice. There is security so no need to feel afraid. You are not bothered on the beach by beggars or persons trying to sell too many trinkets. There are no time share pitches. So overall... I'd say Cuba is WAY more fun than Mexico!
If you do decide to travel to Cuba. Do the people of Cuba a favor and bring along extra old clothes that are in good shape that you may have outgrown or decided to discard. Take along a whole spare suitcase full if you can. They especially would love used shoes, baby clothes, shampoos, lotions, medicines like tylenol or advil, makeup, essentially anything you are willing to bring is fair game for a well appreciated tip. |
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| Great hotel, perfect location |
| Hotel Barlovento |
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Debra >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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We just returned from two weeks at the Barlovento Hotel in Varadero. We flew with West Jet Vacations out of Thunder Bay
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
There are three pools at the resort. The two near the lobby are the busiest....as well as the noisiest. The music and entertainment team are always there. If you like the involvement then that is your spot. The kids pool is next to it. There were a few small ones enjoying it. When it is windy on the beach this pool is more sheltered so not as cool. The pools were always being cleaned. The one night the aqua ballet was done in the larger pool...they are really amazing artists. There were always enough chairs by the pools...never saw the towel game played.
The beach is beautiful...what we go to Varadero for! There are too few beach loungers so get there earlier in the morning....9ish is fine. Coming at 11 you are not likely to get a chair. They do need to invest in a few new ones. Beach bar was a fun place with one of the nicest bartenders I have ever met. She is always smiling and happy....even when it was a little cool and windy. They don’t have beer at the beach but she can come up with something for you. There are hobi cats, kayaks and paddle boats to take out. The water doesn’t get deep fast but is not too shallow either...perfect for everyone...my grand daughter loved jumping into the waves.
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| Other Comments |
This hotel is at the edge of the town so is a perfect location. You can walk to the flea markets and restaurants in town. If you need a taxi the most we paid to get to the other end of town was $6. I would go back to this resort in a second and would recommend it to anyone. We loved it!
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| Restaurants and Bars |
We booked all of our al a cartes as soon as we got there as they fill up fast. We went to all three...they were all great. Mexican was the most fun and the food was very good. We were the last sitting so we never felt rushed. The tequila shooters were funny....”no lady the camera never worked we have to do it again!” A great bunch of guys working there! The Cuban restaurant...in the same place as the Mexican...was really good too. The Italian was a nice quiet change from the others...the music was more classical....food tasty.
The food in the dining room was basic. We always found something we liked. Some days were better than others. Breakfast was really good as you have the fresh juice bar, eggs cooked the way you like them....bacon too if you take it to the grill. Lunch is at the beach restaurant with burgers, pasta, fish, sausage, chicken and pork....you wont go hungry! For supper there was something different at the carving station every night. We had a very nice white and red wine at meals also...it came after day two.
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| Rooms |
Our room was great. We were in a bungalow just down from the beach, across from the out door lunch buffet and the quiet pool. The room was smaller than our friend’s but our balcony was huge. The room had a fridge that was stocked with bottled water every day so we never had to buy it. The maid service was very good too....no too many fancy sculptures on the bed but that’s ok as long as the room is clean.
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| Your Arrival |
| Check in was really quick...front desk has an amazing group of very friendly and helpful people. There was a bell boy there to take our luggage to our room...no waiting. |
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| The reviews didn't do it justice |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
| User Rating:
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Sherri >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With Group
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| I can honestly say I have little complaints with respect to this resort. I read the reviews before I left and was terrified we had made a mistake, but what I learned is that I don't think I'll take to heart reviews in the future. My thoughts are that your vacation is what YOU make of it. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Shows at the theatre are excellent, a must see. Disco, kind of sucks, but again it's what you make of it. Catamaran tour was a blast. We had a great crew and had lots of fun. Havana tour was very interesting. Our tour guide was awesome. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Very very clean. People complained about bugs. I rarely saw any. If I got bit, it wasn't noticible. Again if you are getting bit, cover up, same thing happens in Canada people, adjust for it. Always saw workers cleaning, and keeping care of the grounds. |
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| Other Comments |
| Amazing resort and would go again for sure! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Beach Grill, by far the best restaurant. Japanese a la carte was excellent. Lots to eat in the main cafeteria. I read some complaints about cold food, but that was never an issue for us. Loved the quiet pool bar and the bar in the main lobby. Janet at the loud pool bar, Maylan at the beach bar, Eddie at the lobby bar, friendliest on resort, for sure! There were lineups if you chose to eat at standard breakfast lunch and dinner times. You just learned after a couple of days which were the busy times and you adjusted your eating time. Not a big deal. If you don't like crowds why would you ever book at a resort that has 1035 rooms. People be smart about it. If you are impatient, and need to go by a strict routine, this is not the resort for you. If you are looking to relax and just wing it, you will love it! |
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| Rooms |
| Very clean, spacious, well kept. The only problem was our toilet paper dispenser was broken, but that really wasn't a big deal. I had heard that about 400 kids were at the resort the week before and had done a lot of damage. Housekeeping was there at the same time everyday and did beautiful art with the towels every day. Fridge stocked daily, with the exception of one day we had no water. I found our chambermaid and she gave it to us immediately. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Upon arrival we were greated by staff with a tray full of a fabulous cocktail drink and who ushered us to the counter to receive our room information. |
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| Multi -Cultural |
| Hotel Blau Costa Verde |
| User Rating:
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Jane >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With friend
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The Blau Costa Verde in Holguin is a great place to snorkell. There is a coral reef right there along the shore with all kinds of fish species. This beats having to travel out to sea to snorkell!
The hotel rooms are spotlessly clean, large and comfortable. The air conditioning is centrally controlled and they often turn it down in the afternoon and through the night. This is a pain but a phone call to the front desk will quickly correct it.
The hotel staff are all very polite and accommodating. They all encourage tipping. The coffee with milk at the Snack Bar is delicious. The steaks at the Cuban Restaurant are cooked to your liking and grilled to perfection. The water activity crew at the beach are all excellent. Make sure you go for a Hobbie Cat ride with "Ray"! He is very handsome, charming and extremely good at what he does! This place is a great Family vacation resort! |
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| Great people |
| Hotel Be Live Brisas Santa Lucia |
| User Rating:
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Tony >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| Room was OK, Food was plentiful, the entertainers and hotel employee's were great. We are intending to go back just because of the people there. |
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| Great time, great resort for the money. |
| Hotel Sirenis La Salina |
| User Rating:
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Mark >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Overall great time! We travelled with 3 small families. 6 couples 3 kids all under the age of 2. All had a good time no real complaints. I think the complainers are people who think they are going to a $5000 resort in Barbado's and expect to be waited on hand and foot. If you are looking for a good place take take a family and don't go with huge expectations you while be pleasantly rewarded with a nice resort, very new and overall clean and affordable. The vast mojority of people who complain I think are just the people that complain all the time anyway. If you are looking for a party time there is a bit of that but i think its a better family place. It is a big resort but you can walk from one end to the other in 6-8 minutes, we did every day with kids and strollers so its really not that far. Take a stroller if you do have young ones. Besides you can get food and drink anywhere! So if you don't want to walk you don't have too. If you are too lazy to walk don't complain about waiting for the shuttles, those should be used for sure at check in and check out though. (make sure you call for one 30 minutes before you check out) |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
We didn't go too far with the little ones. the wives went in to Veradero on day had a good time shopping. The men went golfing one day, the golf was expensive but worth it if you are a golfer. Take a cab when you split the fare its about the same as a bus anyay. If you do golf go in the mansion after for a pina colata upstairs, great view.
Daycare area was great too to get the kids out of the sun for a while, and there are a couuple of play ground areas too. I would suggest taking some dollar store toys and plan on leaving for them or with your favorite maids or servers. Many of them are young moms with very little and its much appreciated. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Pools are beautiful, kiddie pool was great for the little kids. Only issue there again was other tourists walking through it to wash sand off thier feet (when there of plenty of outdoor taps and showers for that) And a couple fo days there was little water in the kiddie pool. But we split time at the pools and beach anyway. If you are a pool person go out early before breakfast and grab a chair with your towel, it will be there when you get back. People who show up there at 11 am , yes the good spots will be gone. But there are two main pools so try another one! Oh and again directed to other guests, the kiddie pool area area should be for kids, there was one day some older 20 somethings were play wrestling in the kiddie pool, god knows why the main pool is enormous. Beach again same deal go early if you want to get a good spot with shade. But its pretty big and lots of room further down. Its just right by the Beach Bar (hut) that the most crowded. |
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| Other Comments |
Overall again pleased for the price very good. If you are looking for a big party place you can have a good time but I would suggest an adult club like a Snadles (two resorts down) You can still have fun but I think it should be and is overall more a family place. Some older folks who are not overly mobile shouls also consider a smaller resort or wait for the shuttles but don't complain about it. It is a big resort but not so big that you can't walk. Again if you are travelling with small kids take your stroller. If you are looking for a 5 star waited on hand and foot and treated like royalty you won't get that for $1200 so spend the $3-4K and you'll get it.
If you want a nice new resort with friendly staff cand walk for 5 or 10 minutes without getting winded that you can take a small family too, this place is great. I would go back for sure, and reccomend it. Up grade to the C-Club and you will have a great room location too right by the big pool kiddies are and beach. The biggest issues are with the other tourists not the resort but again for only $1200 or so you will get lots of different people. One lady was a loudmouth the whole time and got so drunk on the bus ride to the airport, she caused a scene at the checkin, and was eventually not allowed on the plane to go home! So its the other tourists you will want to watch for, but this place was great for me and my family going in with little expectations. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Plentiful you don't have to go far for either. Tips are gratefully recieved but they are not standing there with thier hands out either its optional and up to you. Tip when you want. No hard feelings either way. The snack bars by the pools the food is not the best but its convenient. My 17 month old loved the pizza at the snack bars. Main buffet is great, lots of variety every night. few lines ups for the freshly made stuff, but the only people you have to worry about are the other tourists not the staff. Very attentive staff got us high chairs when asked. Beach grill was good, pulled pork sandwiches were great, had different BBQ fish everyday. And there is another BBQ right on the beach too so plenty of options. If you are staying down by the beach you don't have to go all the way to the main buffet you can sit and order a limited breakfast menu from the beach grill. But the buffet is awesome and worth the 6-7 minute walk. Drinks are good, lots of fun rum drinks, but if you want a good night out try the whisky! |
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| Rooms |
| Clean and air conditioned. We only slept and napped there which is all its for anyway, plenty of room to unpack your stuff big closets, and drawers so you don't have to live out of your suitcase. Couple of hints, if you open the patio door the AC turns off. So when you leave your room just make sure you have the patio door closed and turn the AC back on. Also you get beer and water in your fridge, if you want more make sure you either drink it, take it with you or hide it if you want more. Tip your maid and she will take care of you, they are very friendly and accomidating for nap times for the kids etc... |
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| Your Arrival |
| We did the upgrade to the C-Club for only $100, seperate check in from front desk organized and easy. Only issue was no cribs in our rooms which they corrected either that night or the next day for all of us. Hint there are cribs in the daycare area by the kiddie pool just ask for one of those if you need one fast. |
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| BLUE BAY, Cayo Coco family trip |
| Hotel BlueBay Cayo Coco |
| User Rating:
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Michelle >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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We have been to Cuba in the past so my expectations were where they should be. I know the food is not great and the mixed drinks are not what I am use to. Having said that I was pleasantly surprised by our stay in Blue Bay Hotel.
When we arrived all was good, Baggage handling is no different then any other air port a pain but everyone gets through it. The bus ride was nice and quick.
When we arrived they had our rooms ready and served everyone drinks (nice touch). We did arrive at night so we were tired and just wanted to get to it. They delivered our luggage quickly. We had our two kids with us in a separate room. I was worried they would not be joined and they were.
The rooms were clean and well stocked. I brought some dollar store things for our maid and felt weird leaving them. She in turned wrote us Thank you notes. She was excellent the whole week.
The food was what Cuba has... I don't care for it at all but it was ok and no one got sick. Same with the mixed drinks they just are not good but everyone that reads up on Cuba knows this so no one should be complaining.
The beach was WONDERFUL they cleaned it with a tractor which was also nice. You did have to get out early for covered areas but again that is normal. My husband took the kids on a catamaran fishing for about 3 hours cost was about $75.00 CDN and they loved it. They caught three huge fish which we gave to the guys that took them out.
We also rented a jeep which is really a tracker. This is the only BAD thing that happened on the trip. Beside Blue Bay is another hotel DO NOT GO THERE TO STAY OR RENT A CAR. The beach is awful all rocks and when we took the so called jeep we new it looked a bit beat up but that is normal. After we paid them $75.00 CDN we had to put another $30.00 CDN gas in. this is when we realized the gas gauge did not work, turn signal was broken, windows would not work, and the worst there was a rag where you fill up the car. They were basically to bad for you I already have your money.
Other then that Our family enjoyed our trip and the weather was hot and sunny everyday. Though I won't go back to Cuba because I have been there a couple of times I would suggest people go to Blue Bay for a clean cheap trip. The people are friendly and know what to expect and you won't be let down. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| They tried to do activities some days were better then others. People would take part and that is when it was fun and funny. Other days no one would get up so they would give up. They tried so I will give them a thumbs up. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| The pool was great and warm.. They cleaned it everyday actually scrubbed it down by hand. It was warm and they had a net etc. for the kids to play with. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Bars and food were ok typical Cuba. |
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| Rooms |
| Were clean and large. Bathroom was well stocked. I asked the maid twice to change the sheets in both my room and my kids. She happily did so. Reminder... TAKE SOMETHING TO KILL THE MOSQUITO'S IN YOUR ROOM AND SOMETHING TO PUT ON YOU. They do spray but that is not enough. |
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| Allegro Varadero: Don't Listen To The Bad Reviews, Food Is Very Good! |
| Hotel Occidental Allegro Varadero (Formerly Playa Varadero 1920) |
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Jeffrey >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| This was our 6th trip to Cuba since our first in 2005 to Tryp Cayo Coco, we've traveled to Cayo Coco twice, Cayo Guillermo once, Manzanillo de Cuba once, Varadero once and to the D.R. once, but prefer Cuba and it's people. So now back to Varadero, to the Allegro. This resort has gone through many managment hands in the last 5 or 6 years and recently has changed to the Occidental Allegro in the last 6 months and there seems to be a genuiene effort to make things better and to spruce up this huge resort to bring it up to the 4 star status it deserves. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Activities seemed light on the first few days with only Aqua Aerobics and dancing being offered the first half of the week. The last two days seen way more going on from orginised water polo to mini putt. They need to work on having the animation crew more involved with the guests and doing more around this huge resort, I never saw the archery being offered once while we were there, and they have a nice range.
We finally, after many years of trying to get on the catamaran tour, got our catamaran excursion. We have tryed previously over the years only to be cancelled by the weather at leat 4 times.
We enjoyed this trip, on the cat, and got to visit the dolphins in the huge concrete enclosure out in the ocean, way better for the dolphins then the set up in town. It is made so water flows through and even fish mingle with the dolphins and it's huge so they have louds of room.
Then off to Cayo Blanco for a lobster lounch and some beach time, The lobster was OK, being from Nova Scotia we are slightly pickier about our seafood. We would have rathered plain lobster grilled with some garlic, but this was a large tail in a tomato based sauce, good but not great.
Then we sailed back to port, with lost of singing and dancing by all.
The bar was open from start to finish, and the drinks were good.
We set into town twice during the week and wandered around and checked out the many open air markets. We took the double decker bus both times as it was most economical with $5 all day, hop on hop off.
We didn't get to Jesone park, or try any restaraunts, so no reviews of this trip. We did Jesone park two years ago and recomend anyone looking for a quite walk or a really good pina coloda to wander through there.
The nightly shows were very well done, although we were surprised that there was only 1 audience partispation show in the 7 shows we saw, not that this is a bad thing, but it makes for some good laughs.
The dancers were first rate and they even had many different singers who were quite good.
All in all worth staying up for. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
The beach is secluded from the rest of Varaderos beach by a large coral outcroup on each end. The sand is a bit darker than the average white beach, and had a good mix of shells and coral, but overal is a very nice beach, lots of loungers and a good number of umbrellas, thay have staff who will drag you a lounger to where ever you want it and whipe it clean for you, tip this guy a pesso or two as he's out in the sun all day and trying his best.
There are three pools, one main pool just off the side of the main building, nothing special a very larg squarish pool, but nice and clean with lots of loungers around. They had a guy who would drag an extra one out of storage if you needed it and offered cushions for the lounger if you wanted them, like the beach guy show him your gratitiude for his hard work in the sun. The cayo largo and the cayo coco section each have thier own smaller pools, visually nicer than the main pool and each with a cold jacuzzi off to the side and their own bar.
This resort is huge if you get to walk the whole thing you will see this for sure. Gardeners are everywhere keeping it clean and attending to the grounds and greenery. All the trees and plants are marked with a small sign saying the speciaes, we found this a nice touch. They have a long system of fish ponds linked up in fron tof the main building with a version of coy in them, most are orange in color and some are quite big, maybe 12 inches or so. There is also a white heron type bird who has taken up residence and if your patient youl see him dive in for his own version of a cuban buffet. |
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| Other Comments |
The Allegro Varadero is a huge resort with equally huge potential.
They have a good management team who seem to be around day and night to be making sure the progress of stepping back up to the 4 star level is happening.
At the moment this resort is a strong 3.5 star. With many little issues holding it back from being a 4 or more star. For a resort that saw life first start back in 1977 it's in amazing shape, but give it a year or two if the shine and glitz factor are important to you.
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Allego Varadero has 1 buffet, and 3 a la cartes, International, Steak House, and Italian. There is also 3 snack bars that are open from 12-6 everyday, one between the main building and the Cayo Largo section, one at the Cayo Largo Pool and one at the Cayo Coco section, at their pool.
There is 6 bars, La Habana beside the main pool (which I never seen closed, the others hard varying hours), the Cohiba Bar, which house a baby grand piano being played every night, and was huge with little pocket rooms and comfy couches and chairs, get there early in the evening to get a seat, and the fancy drinks, like irish coffee and other special drinks and 15 year Havana club is available for extra $$. Cayo Coco, and Cayo Largo Pools each have a swim up bar, there is a beach bar and one at the snack bar between the Cayo Largo and the main building. All seemed to serve different drinks and those that were the same were made different, so find which one you like and keep going back. The snack bar had slushy drinks but closed ar 6 so get your bubba Keg filled early and get it in your fridge if you want an evening cool drink.
We sampled all A la carts and found all to be very good and nothing like the buffet food.
The buffet was a surprise as past reviews on another site were quite hard on the buffet. Knowing Cuba and their struggle sometimes to get variety we didn't expect a lot, but were surprised to get a lot.
For lunch and supper there is a pasta station where you can get premade or have them fry up a dish for you, then a large aray of premade dishes, of rice potato and other meat and fish. then a carving station, we saw beef, lamb, meat loaf, chicken and turkey over our stay, then there was the grill section, usually 3-4 different choices, of either beef, pork, chicken or fish, and hotdogs and burgers at lunch as well.
Not sure what other people eat at home, but to me that's a good variaty.
Breakfast was your normal fare of two egg staions making basic eggs or omlets, as well as premade eggs and other dishes, bacon, sauge seemed available everyday. With your normal toast, cereal, yogurt, and lots of fresh fruit.
No worries about the food here, they even had a special area for the kids, with burgers, fries and chicken nuggets.
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| Rooms |
We arrived at room 6314 and found a very nice an spacious third floor room, not dericly on the ocean but with an ocean view. It was clean and came with a king sized bed so all was good. The room was fitted with an ironing board and iron, a small mini fridge with a large bottle of water, a coffee maker, a safe and the usual things found in a cuban resort room. Although there was no dresser to store your cloths, we have gotten used to this being hit and miss in Cuba. We found the room quite warm and stufy on our arrival and the bellboy turned the A/C on and it blew air so we though give it a few minutes and it will cool down. We dropped our bags and went exploring this huge resort, (they say it's 2 kms in size, not sure if that's 2 square kms or two kms long, but it's huge!)
We returned to a warm and stuffy room, and dropped down to the desk to see if someone could have a look, they said they would send someone up, it was almost 4 and nowing Cuba I didn't expect to see anyone til morning.
We went through the night with the patio door open and found this ok, but couldn't do this during the day as your patio is easily accessable from the main stairs or another room.
We checked again with the desk and they said they would send someone, but it seemed like they knew nothing of our previous concern.
Day tow is almost over and no A/C, now I'm getting a little miffed, we meet the tech this time and he says the third floor has no A/C, there is only 4 rooms on the third floor, but all are occupied, and patio doors are open on all. We go back down to the desk, a long walk, and ask for a new room, they say they will send a tech, we say there have been techs and it's the whole floor. We want a new room. they insist on sending a tech as they have no free rooms. We head off frustrated but it's not gonna ruin my vacation that's for sure. In the moring we call the desk after figuring out the crazy way to reach them on the resort phone. They said no problem they have a new room for us, great! The bellboy reachs our room and we load up and head down closer to the pool at the Cayo Largo section, back up to the third floor and wow a realy nice room and right on the ocean. We step in and bam, no air, he turns the switch and nothing, no way, we walk past the bathroom and I look in to see the ceiling on the floor. ARRGGHHH!
The Bellboy calls the desk and they say all they have is a room in the main building with an ocen view, at this point I'd taken a view of the street.
So off we go on the golf cart again and up to the 4th floor and walk in to toom 4318, slightly smaller, with no ironing board or iron, but that's OK, the A/C works! All is good and although we would have rathered be in the Cayo Largo Section, we are fine with this as we didn't book the Cayo Largo section and had just lucked out on that. |
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| Your Arrival |
Having only flown Sunwing once before (Montreal to Manzanillo de Cuba) I was looking forward to a good flight with lots of room, West Jet our favorite airline with Sunwing a close second. Well not sure if Atlantic Canada gets older planes or my memory is getting bad but this plane was anything but comfortable. Seemed to be an older plane, there was ashtrays built into the armrests, so that may be a sign. Flight was the roughest I've ever encountered, the seat belt light was on for 4 hours of a 4 1/2 hour flight, but that's life eh?
Check in went smoothly and we had a room immediatley, although I believe others had to wait an hour or two as our arrival time was before the stipulated check out time of noon.
The bellboy grabbed our bags and wisked us off on the golf kart to the Cayo Largo section of the resort, although far from the main area of the resort this was definatley an upgrade to the main building. |
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| Heaven <3 |
| Hotel Be Live Playa Coco |
| User Rating:
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Irene >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| This hotel is the best place ever, it's like a heaven away from reality. You must visit it sometime in your life! I wish I could've never left. The drinks, the tanning, the people, the food, just the experience, AMAZING!<3 |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Didn't do many activities, but snorkeling is a MUST! and the nightly shows & disco & kareoke night, are not to be misssed. the partys really get going around 11pm till about 2am or 3am, and its just a great time ! you meet so many memorable people |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful! Everything is so breathtaking and stunning, its amazing. And the weather there is so great! Felt like +30 degrees everyday, got such a nice tan ! :) The pool is a little cold sometimes, but very refreshing! And the ocean is the nicest. Makes you feel so much better! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| All restaurants were pretty good, but the Japenese restuarant was the BEST! Had the most delicious food ever there, and it's made right in front of you! And the bars there were amazing. All day everyday, from 10am till 2am, me and my friend drank. They make the best drinks! Pretty strong, but amazing! But if you get tired of the rum drinks, like the "Rum Punch", ask for something like a vodka & sprite, or else theyll put rum in everything! Favourite bars were the Yolanda (lobby bar) and the 24-hour bar! |
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| Rooms |
| Very big, nice and clean, bright, loved them ! |
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| Your Arrival |
| Nice plane ride, arrived there at 10am. Checked in, walked around the grounds for awhile, people are so friendly and nice! And sooooo much to drink! |
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| Perfect |
| Hotel Arenas Blancas |
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Anne >
1 contribution(s) DENMARK |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| I Love it! |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Good |
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| Arrival |
| Very good |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Very good |
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| Other Comments |
| A very nice place! |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Good |
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| Rooms |
| Good |
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| Great Time - Will go back |
| Hotel Be Live Brisas Santa Lucia |
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Lucy >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Mar, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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My husband and I traveled to this resort during March Break 2010. We had a great time.
The only problem we had was during check in. There has to be more than 2 people to check in 3 bus loads of guests at 11:30 in the evening.
I had requested a head of time a room on the second floor facing the ocean. I contacted the hotel via e-mail. We were given exactly what I asked for (and will request the same room again). The hotel is very clean. All the staff work very hard and it shows. The entertainment staff are a great group of people who do their best to make your stay a happy one both during the day and in the evening.
Every day we had good experiances at the buffet. The wait staff got to know us quickly and when they saw us coming in, they knew were we liked to sit and would have our coffee and juice ready for us. Please remember that these people work very hard and just as in Canada, a nice tip will make the differance. It was mine and my husband's birthdays while we were there and our regular breakfast and lunch wait staff baked us a cake as a surprise.
Our chambermaid Aldemira was great always a happy face and kind words. The front desk staff as well (they made my calls home stress free).
The pool and beach at the hotel are terrific. The coffee bar is great and they make a cold coffee that will put Tim Horton's to shame(I found out about this coffee late into our trip - the husband kept bringing the hot coffee)
If you get a chance get out and see the little town it will open your eyes. Ask for Enrique the coachman to show you the sites. He is a very nice and informative man. He took us to Coco Beach and we had a lobster lunch that we will never forget (our lobsters could have fed a village in Africa). If you can, bring school supplies for the little school in the village they appreciate the gifts. We met one of the teachers again very nice lady, she made us feel at home.
While at the hotel we walked along the beach and yes we met with many locals and yes they did ask for things but we always felt safe. Each hotel has security staff and they are always around.
All in all we had a great time. The smoking was an issue on the resort but that is not the hotel's fault that is other guests who only think of themselves and not the people around them. You would think that Canadians who don't smoke in puplic places in Canada would think the same way outside of Canada.
We will go back again. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| very limited on and off the resort. |
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| Arrival |
| took to long 3 bus loads and two check in people. One bus was just teenagers and no management to control them. It was not a pretty site, it did get ugly for a bit. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Beautiful, very clean. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Good food and good coffee. |
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| Rooms |
| Our room was great. Very clean and ocen view could not have asked for more. |
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| Gotta love Cuba! |
| Hotel Hotetur Sunbeach |
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malibukathy >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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My family has just returned from a one weeks stay at the Sunbeach Hoteur in Veradero Cuba and I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised at the resort after reading the not so great reviews prior to departing.
The hotel was perfect! It was clean, the staff was incredibly friendly (with the exception of one male check-in employee)the food was your "typical" fare nothing to fancy,spicey or over the top original but there was a very nice variety at every meal, it was fresh and very well prepared and displayed.
We had two rooms, side by each one for the parents, one for my two teenage daughters, ours with a balcony and theirs without. They were on the 7th floor and very spacious. Our maid Sonja, was extra nice, taking care to make sure we had everything we needed and of course took pride in her job ensuring that the room was spic and span every day.
We had one issue with water leaking in from the air conditioner during the nigt when a storm erupted, but hell you are in cuba what is a little water.
The beach was spectacular! Endless miles of white sandy beach and the most amazing blue waters.
The entertainment sounded good although we did not venture out to watch it after long days in the sun but saying that it was not sunshine every day but we can't control mother nature so no big deal.
I rate this hotel a 3+ which is beter than the 2.5 it is currently rated at.
If you want a very inexpensive vacation with kids especially this is the place to go to. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Beach and pool volleyball, daily activities by the pool |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| 1 beach, 1 pool, 1 ground, 1 lobby bar (great for the late night coffee and rum) |
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| Other Comments |
| Remember how fortunate we are and be generous with your tips or donations the Cubans are proud and honored by these gifts. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| 1 a'la carte, 1 Italian |
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| Rooms |
| 2 double rooms |
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| Your Arrival |
| February 7, 2010 - February 14, 2010 |
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| Great place BUT.... |
| Hotel Blau Costa Verde |
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Kathy >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| My husband and I stayed at the Blau Costa Verde the week of Jan 30 - Feb 6. We really enjoyed the week and the facilities but the beds in our room were horrible! They were like sleeping on a wooden plank; very uncomfortable and hard on the hips, elbows, shoulders. The pillows were also of very poor quality. Having got that off my chest, here's the rest of our review! |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| We stayed on the resort this week and didn't go outside on trips. We loved having the pool table in a covered facility. We liked the shows most nights but would have liked to have seen more "shows" rather than musicals. We thought it would have been nice if the hotel gets rid of the tennis courts (it's usually too hot to play on it anyway) and turn it into a mini golf course. We also liked the fact that the hotel allows people to come in and sell Cuban things each day. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Beautiful beach, pool area, grounds. Lots of mature vegetation, flowers, trees etc. Lots of lounge chairs at the beach and pool area. Both were also very clean. The beach is lovely but does have rocky areas; be careful when you first go in the water. We liked the Hoby Cats and the snorkelling right on the beach. |
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| Other Comments |
| Overall, it was a great holiday. The weather was gorgeous each day and as anywhere in Cuba, the people were very friendly and helpful. I'd go back again for sure and would recommend it to anyone who asked me about it but I would hope that the beds, pillows and the food choices (at the buffet) could be improved. I'd also bring my own instant coffee as I find Cuban coffee way too strong for my taste. My sincere thanks to all the staff for making our stay an enjoyable one - it was much appreciated. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| The alacarte restaurants (Cuban and Italian) were both excellent the nights we ate at them. The wait staff were quick, friendly, attentive and not over intrusive. We were serenaded over supper which was a nice treat. Desserts were not all that thrilling but everything else was okay. The beach restaurant had great burgers and fresh fish but I didn't like having the shrimp with heads and bodies still intact - plus they were messy to clean! The pizza's in the Italian restaurant were really good as was the pastas each day. The pool bar and grill was very good - food and service. The drinks at this resort are not very good - the cola and other non alcohol beverages were very sweet and at one of the bars I had the worst Mojito ever - I don't even think it was a Mojito! We missed some of the drinks made with fresh fruit and crushed iced - I think they only offered Bahama Mamas made with real bananas and I can't eat bananas. Also, they didn't offer Bailey's; only a cheap substitute which was again way too sweet for my taste. Needless to say, we didn't drink a lot (we are not beer drinkers). The cappacinos were excellent - every single one we had was a treat! The buffets are typical buffets although we didn't like a lot of the food so ate mostly the fresh grilled foods. All in all; okay but definitely not spectaular. |
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| Rooms |
| Okay. The hotel is older (I think it was another chain and Blau just bought it out?) so the rooms were typical of Cuba. Like I said above, the beds were terrible as were the pillows but everything was fine. Our housekeeper kept the rooms spotless every day. I forgot that you don't get tissues or face cloths in Cuba so we didn't have any of those and the towels were a bit rough but overall, the room was just fine. |
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| Your Arrival |
| We arrived at close to midnight and were booked into our rooms in minutes. A porter took our luggage and put in on a rack, gave us a mini run down of the hotel and smiled very pleasantly all the way. It was the best check in at any resort we have ever had! |
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| **Warning** This place is infested with bed bugs |
| Hotel Barceló Marina Palace |
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Bryce >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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My parents thought it would be a great stress reliever to visit the island of Cuba. They booked their trip through a local travel agent at the Barcelo Marina Palace in hopes that it would offer the 4.5 star quality rest and relaxation one might expect on a trip of this sort. Instead, my mother was badly infested with bed bugs. My father also contracted bed bugs from this place, but my mothers case was far worse. She went to the front desk to tell them what was going on and was told to relax and go back to bed, that it was only mosquito bites. She tried, but the bites were causing her pain so she went back to the front desk asking for a different room. They insisted it was mosquitos and even mocked her for thinking it wasn't.
Eventually through persistence they were able to secure another room. The bed bug infestation continued. She started developing sores that looked like welts and went back to the front desk where they told her they had an in house doctor. The doctor told her it was a reaction from MOSQUITOS, and when asked directly if it was bed bugs he said "no".
The condition got worse, so she visited a different doctor. She got a different prescription (Benydryl) and was told to sleep it off. The condition worsened to the point where she couldnt walk around with out people pointing out the sores and locals were telling her it was clearly bed bugs. The hotel did nothing.
Apon returning home they both tried sleeping but couldn't, and made appointments with their family doctor the following day who immediately diagnosed the problem as...you guessed it...bed bugs. My fathers condition may clear up in a few days with proper medication instead of the idiotic presciption the "house doctor" provided, but my mother is requiring far more serious treatment.
All of their clothes, luggage and bedding (from home) had to be destroyed because bed bugs are known to travel on personal belongings.
They've contacted the travel agent they used who is asking if they want to use insurance to cover their lost clothing.
You should consider yourself well warned, this just happened at the beggining of February 2010 and you can see on this site and many others that this place has had multiple reports of cockroaches and bed bugs since as early as 2008 and it's still taking place 2 years later but this hotel is somehow able to continue doing business and calling itself 4-4.5 stars.
Stay at your own risk. |
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| Other Comments |
| I can't believe North American travel agencies could have the nerve to sell packages to this bug infested hole. |
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| Rooms |
| INFESTED WITH BED BUGS!!! MORE THAN 1 ROOM and more than 1 bed in the room. |
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| You can do much better |
| Hotel Melia Las Américas |
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Dylan >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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Changing Canuck bucks into Cuban tourist Monopoly money (called CUC) is a scam so try to change enough just once to get you through the entire stay. This is easily done because there is not much to buy on the beach, in the shops or at the markets.
We stayed at the Melia Las Americas hotel in Varadero, Cuba for one week in January 2010 on a WestJet all-inclusive vacation. It promotes itself as a 5-star hotel but turns out to be a 3-star. Built in the early 1990s, it is clean enough but has low wattage lighting in public areas. Many steps to the lobby, to the beach, to the restaurants, to the golf club – great exercise but not handicap-friendly if that’s important to you. Only two small elevators in the main hotel but, again, you can take the stairs. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Take the Hop-on, Hop-off bus ($5 equivalent for 9:00AM-9:00PM) to see the tip of the sand spit (but watch those private hotel/beach police!) and back to downtown Veradero and its flea markets to buy junky souvenirs and T-shirts plastered with Che Guevara’s mug shot.
Break up your stay in Varadero by taking a day tour to Havana. Have an over-priced Mojito at the bar frequented by Ernest Hemmingway. The Spanish colonial architecture is crumbling in Havana, the old-style 1950s cars are kept to amuse the tourists (most have replacement Hyundai or Kia motors) and, the government-run cultural tourist gift warehouse is full of white sales cubicles and computer-generated ‘art’ (there are a few, but very few, original artists). This will round out your excursion day.
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| The Varadero Golf Club is wrapped around two sides of the Las Americas Hotel. The beach is small and hemmed in at one end by the expropriated Dupont House (Xanadu) converted into a restaurant and clubhouse on a cliff and the Melia Varadero Hotel at the other end. The anal-retentive Cuban tourist police make sure you do not use any other beach than the one for the hotel where you are staying. Got the wrong colour wrist band? Go back! Forget any long walks along the beaches unless you stay on a property that includes a long beach. This confinement of tourists is not for any safety reason but so the Communist government can keep track of people. The public Las Americas Shopping Mall is a short walk away. |
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| Other Comments |
On departure, our 11:00 AM hotel bus pick-up to the airport was prompt and contained another Tourist Guide who explained the final tourist tax grab – the $25 CUC per person “Tasa Aeroportuaria” that translates as “Airport Tax”. Can’t get home without paying it. CUC cash only! Two sour-faced Security Department guards in military uniforms stood at the entry to the WestJet plane to collect the boarding card stubs showing each of us had paid our head tax and could depart. We will never return.
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Hotel food is acceptable and plentiful. The open-air La Robleza restaurant by the pool is pleasant but opened later every day we were there – 12:00 Noon, became 12:30 PM then 1:00 PM. And stick with the luncheon meals – our paella took an hour to prepare but was a disappointing heap of rice, turmeric, one shrimp, one small chicken chunk and a piece of shellfish. The imported wine and domestic beer are good. The resort musicians all have CDs for sale ($10-$20 equivalent) and there are theatre shows every night. |
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| Rooms |
| Rooms are basic two single beds pushed together, TV with CNN, CTV, French, German and Spanish channels, views of the golf course or the pools and ocean. Bathroom is all-beige fake marble and you get a packet of soap, shampoo and bath gel that lasts for one week. Bring your own face cloth. Electric power is 220V. The in-room fridge gets four soft drinks and two beers per day. The maid changes the bed linen if you put the reguest card on the bed (a tip helps). |
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| Your Arrival |
When we arrived at the Veradero Airport on January 17/10 we were met by maintenance staff, customs and security staff all wearing masks over their mouths and noses. So, the question is: protection from their germs or ours? Or, is this a hold-up? Given the Cuban attitude that tourists are cash cows (tourism is their largest government money maker far ahead of sisal, sugar, rum, cigars and oil), probably the latter. Our photos were taken, we passed thru security scanning on the way INTO the country, our tourist paper handed out on the plane was stamped but, not a mark appeared on our passports. The bus trip from the airport to hotel drop-offs went smoothly narrated by a Tourist Guide who told us how lucky we were to be in Cuba and how tipping vastly improved service. Yea, capitalism lives!
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| Not all it is cracked up to be. |
| Hotel Breezes Bella Costa |
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Linda >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| Bella Costa is an old hotel that needs to be refurbished. Taken over by Breezes approx. 3 yrs. ago. Staff are excellant, very pleasant and helpful. Friends found cockroaches and ants in their room, but we did not. Had a water leak on our section of the floor. Pool was fine, lots of chairs. Weather was so so, some days very windy couldn't used beach as it was too cold. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| Approx. 4 -5 games per day. Winner gets bottle. Took excursion into Havana. Not bad but because is was on a Monday some of the attractions were not open. Tour of castle limited to one area. Tour guide nice and informative. Lunch provided on tour, wasn't bad. Kids begging all the time. When you say no they will continue to ask for money. Just walk away. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Nice. Took the long walk into Varadaro by the beach, 4 1/2 klms. one way. Clean. Life guards good at posting flags water conditions and jelly fish. Lots of lounges and sunshade. |
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| Other Comments |
| I haven't decided if I would ever to return to Cuba. Once was enough. If you go outside the resort and need to use the facilities take some kleenex with you as they don't have any or they will ask for money for some. Shopping is not great, just junk at the markets, same everywhere. Wood carvings very nice, but do not think they would last in Canada because of the temperature here. Would likely crack and dry out. Vendors will bargin. We also took a taxi (old car) into town and it was a nightmare. Not all taxis as bad as the one we had. Took a taxi back to hotel from town and used the newer vehicle. Cost in the area of $5.00 p. Lots of places to drink in town, didn't try any food. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Jimmy's restaurant good. Great staff, very helpful, you ask and they try to accomodate you. Specialty restaurant's not all they are cracked up to be. Italian restaurant presented you with a menu, but didn't have everything available. Head waiter rude. Japanese rest. not bad. Fish was good. Lobster on Thursday nights at Jimmy's. Beach rest. not bad, good french fries, pizza. Birds flying around all the time.
If you decided to tip you will get great service. Seems they pay more attention to those with money. |
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| Rooms |
| Room not ready when we got there, had to wait couple of hours. Rooms cleaned every day. Our room overlooked the pool, ocean and stage. Entertainment ended at approx. 11 PM so don't try to sleep before that.Safe in the room. Towels not bath size, but adequate. No face cloths. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Trip from Toronto to Cuba was a long process as is with every trip. Arrival was fine, bus trip from airport to hotel not very long, but had to stop off at different hotels, that's expected. Greated by friendly front desk staff. Drinks awaiting your arrival. |
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| dump |
| Hotel Be Live Playa Coco |
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Brenda >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| This hotel was Not what I expected, the people are NOT happy they expected big tips for every thing. The front desk is the worst customer service I have every seen, paper products are hard to get, we did not get toilet paper in our room,when we arrived. And it took them several hours to get it. Then the maid did not leave any again, this was on going all week, LOTS of no see bugs they do not spray for them, and you well have bites all over you. Then you have to see the doctor for $25.00 then it will cost you for the drugs, bring bug spray if you go to this resort the food is plain NO taste bring spices with you as we did. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| NONE NO direction to whats going on no signs to say whats there we did not know there where bikes on the resort. If you go on the JEEP trip beware it said your OWN jeep but when you pay for this you will end up with a other couple in the jeep with you |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| very clean |
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| Other Comments |
| Bring bug spray and paper product it hard to get them there. I will never go back to Cuba as the people expect money for every thing. There was three of us and we went through $300.00 each in tipping as we did not go on any trips. Due to illness. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
the food is plain no taste and the meat was over cooked. do not go to the BBQ night or Cuban night the food was tremble. every one left and went to the buffet, they are always late in opening on time for breakfast, lunch, dinner.
the nosee bug there on the beach for the BBQ night & Cuban night are very bad they DO NOT spray for them like other resort's |
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| Rooms |
| the room was a little dirty fuss balls on the floor and NO toilet paper in the room. all week the fuss was there and always asking for toilet paper. |
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| Your Arrival |
| Bus was there for you but wanted a big tip for your ride to resort The front deck needs a lot of work on customer service they DON'T CARE, very unhappy people. |
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| Cayo Santa Maria Barcello is one of the best resorts we have visited. |
| Hotel Barcelo Cayo Santa Maria |
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D >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| We visited the Barcello Santa Maria from Jan. 18. through Feb. 1 2010.14 days of amazing weather. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| We were there for 2 weeks of sun and relaxation. We did not look for any activities, so while there were things to do we did not participate. The best part of this no one bugged us. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| Beach, outstanding. Grounds,well maintained and gorgoeus. Pools also first class.Beach was the choice of most guests and you had to get their early to get a decent spot. |
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| Other Comments |
| The bus trip was a drag.If we don't return that would be the only reason.The Barcello will be on our short list for 2011. Staff was excellent. Anything we asked for was tended to quickly.The only place we had a problem was at the hairdressers in Pueblo. It is very poorly equipped. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| Buffets, never a problem finding something to eat. Food was as good as we have had in Cuba.Really enjoyed the a la cartes, Spanish,good food, lots of it.Italian also good, portions smaller than Spanish, seafood was OK.Most of the guests loved the seafood, we had the salmon and it was so-so. Bars were well stocked. mixed drinks were great,but consistency varied with the bartender.Service was usually quite fast. |
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| Rooms |
| Clean, large, well equipped, comfortable.Everything in working order.For 2 adults it was more than adequate. |
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| Your Arrival |
Flight sucked!2 attempts @ landing in a storm before diverting to Cayo Coco where we sat in the plane for over an hour besore returning to Santa Clara airport. Bus trip to resort about 1 1/2 hrs. Arrive at the resort @ 2:00 a.m.
Check in well organized,however the 10 min the bell hop told us to get the luggage to our room was at least 30 min. |
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| Everything was wonderful except the food |
| Hotel GC Villa Trópico (Cameleon Villa Jibacoa) |
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Violet >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| This was our 9th trip to Cuba over the past 20 years. We speak from some experience. We have stayed in every mannner of accomodation, from a 5 star hotel in Havana to bed and breakfasts and very basic Cuban hotels where few tourists dare to tread, and everything in between. |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| very good. Enjoyed the hikes, the animation team tried their best to get people involved. The entertainment programs are excellent and better than we expected in a 3 star. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
| lovely- again, well-maintained and clean. |
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| Other Comments |
| Except for the food, this resort is excellant value. What is happening with the food and the corruption in the restaurants is a shame and an embarrassment to Cuba. For the sake of the many honest, hard-working staff at this hotel, it needs to be stopped. |
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| Restaurants and Bars |
| The bars were great. The restaurants: The only black mark against this place, and unfortunately it is serious enough that until it is fixed, we will not be returning. The guests are not getting the food they are paying for here, specifically, the meat. We have been to Cuba enough to know the signs of theft and corruption, and that is what is happening. The past 2 years we stayed in a 2 star with much better meat. There should have been much more of it and it should have been better quality. Empty chicken boxes out by the road behind the buffet are some of the evidence! That the chef is confident enough to be selling illegal lobster in the a la carte every night speaks to the level of corruption here, similarly with the head waiter in the buffet who openly peddles illegal cigars to the guests. We have never seen anything like that in all of our travels to Cuba. They are not in the least discreet. People who have not travelled extensively in Cuba have no idea that they are not receiving the food they are paying for here, and are actually tipping those chefs. They think it is the best Cuba has to offer. That is so wrong. We should not have been given the tough meat and bony fish we were. It was being substituted for what we should have received. And we should not have had to beg for second measely portions of the more tender meat and turkey from the meat carvers. I have no doubt that our food was going somewhere else. |
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| Rooms |
| Better than expected. Very clean, well-maintained. Better than most 3-stars. |
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| Your Arrival |
| very smooth |
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| Pleasant surprise |
| Hotel Brisas Guardalavaca |
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Maryanne >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| My daughter and I travelled to Brisas Guardalavaca for her university reading week, Feb 14-21. We wanted a week in the sun at a decent price, and our expectations were low. It was my 2nd trip to Cuba, the first time was a trip to Varadero and I had not had a good experience. So many people rave about Cuba, I gave it a second chance and I'm glad I did. I liked this area much more than Varadero. It is not as built up and seemed much less tourist-y and maybe because of this, I didn't see the hustlers, etc that I'd noticed in Varadero. I was pleasantly surprised with the hotel, which is rated 3+ some places and a 4* others. I'd read that the villas were considered the 4*; however, staying in either side (hotel or villas) you have access to the entire property. We stayed in the hotel and it was a little noisy because it was reading week, so we had a lot of 20 yr olds on our floor. I always pack earplugs, but this trip I forgot. Big mistake and it won't happen again. The hotel was decent, nothing fancy but really clean and everything in our room was functional. We ate in only one buffet (there are 2) and the food was good. We really enjoyed the a la cartes, and they do have a wine list ($) if you are a wine drinker. The beach is long and there is a boardwalk so you can walk safely past the next resort and to a flea market area and public beach. It's a nice, laid back atmosphere. We loved the staff and made friends that we did not want to leave. We also met a ton of Canadians and a few Brits and enjoyed sitting in the large lobby bar after supper for drinks. I really liked the atmosphere of this resort and would (will) return. |
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| Wonderful vaction,with great people at Brisas Guardalava |
| Hotel Brisas Guardalavaca |
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Betty from Winnipeg >
2 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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This was to be our 5th time here at Brisas Guardalavaca
We were booked in Sept this trip because it was for one month. As most canadians know most of the west had to travel via Toronto. We are from Winnipeg.Most charters only hold so many seats for 3 and 4 week travels.Also Westjet was the only carrier to Holguin Cuba.
Was very happy with the service I might add. Great luggage allowance.1 hundred pounds each plus 2 carry ons each at 10kg.Had it packed to the max
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
Always something to do/ The animation team really try to get you involved with volleyball, dancing games in the games room. They have archery with pelet gun ,Bachi ball and more.
The evening entertainment good. Modeling show my favorite :)Aquadic show, Christopher Columbus show Really funny :) and more. |
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| Beach/Pools/Grounds |
Love the beach. Just pristine. My hubby loves to snorkel and has gone fishing way out front of resort and caught alot of fish on occasion.
Pool at hotel is more lively as they have a grill bar there. Great pizzas and hotdogs and the like.Villa is nice for small kids. Little bar close by. |
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| Other Comments |
We rented a car for 5 days and toured around. Town of Banes to see friends. Holguin to visit and stay with friends.
Seaside town called Gibara. 2 hours from Guardalavaca. Really nice drive. Stopped at a home that served lobster there.Couldn;t have had a grander day. Stopped and played ball with some kids that were playing.My friend and I gave away alot of shoes and clothes on this journey.Fantastic
My husband and I wish to go back and do it all over again
Get out and meet Cuba
Bettyboop
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| Restaurants and Bars |
Two buffets to eat at. You can have your choice in the morning for fresh made eggs however you like them.Lots of fruits and veggies and more. There are 2 alacarts Italian in the hotel and Seafood down by the villas.Have yourself a drink at the cappachino bar next to Italian before dinner . Nice place for a coffee afterwards. Great service.Seafood, they sometimes have the servers entertaining you with sing or guitar. Very good.
You can also get breakfast served to you at 1o till ii.30 at the seafood if you miss buffet which closes at 10. |
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| Your Arrival |
On time and good ckeck in.We stayed in the villas as much more room and in most places quite.Our room building 6000 you walk right out to thebeach. Awsome
coffee maker and small fridge with water everyday. Maid service has always been good. |
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| not bad except for mosquitoes and the dampness of rooms |
| Hotel Barceló Marina Palace |
| User Rating:
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maria >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Feb, 2010 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
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| There was a pond right in front of the resort (not the entrance) which attracted mosquitoes. Some people had to see the doctor to get medication for mosquito bites. We all looked spotty and couldn't stay out for long. There was also the smell and feeling of dampness (no I did not experience it anywhere else). The staff was polite and kind. The meal wasn't that good. Coffee was heavenly. |
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| NH Krystal Laugna NOT EVEN 2 star as advertized 4 star |
| Hotel NH Krystal Laguna Villas & Resort |
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Alex Mak >
1 contribution(s) Canada |
| Jan, 2010 | Leisure | Family
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| DONT waste tour time and Money on NH Krstal Laguna Creep, Rotten and Fithy Food with untidy rooms and rude staff. I stayed there with my family |
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| Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel |
| always need to book( God knows when your turn comes ) in advance for GYM, Cycling, Boating and even |
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