Not a place I would ever go back to.
Jan 23, 2025 Fire4Trails Brooklyn Park, Minnesota
Before I go into too much detail, I do want to point out some special people that worked at this resort. If it wasn't for these individuals and their attention to our family, our trip would not have been worth half the money we paid. The following individuals are the reason we left Jamaica with some solace. Moya (Privilege Lounge)... Thank you… Read more
Before I go into too much detail, I do want to point out some special people that worked at this resort. If it wasn't for these individuals and their attention to our family, our trip would not have been worth half the money we paid. The following individuals are the reason we left Jamaica with some solace. Moya (Privilege Lounge)... Thank you for listening to my wife and I! We see and feel that you care about people and their experiences. And your boys are adorable! Akiem (La Conda Restaurant)... your service was by far the best we have ever seen at an all inclusive resort. From the moment that you started taking our order and asking the woman in our group first (which is personally huge for me), to the attention to detail with every action you took at our last meal, you saved our trip! I am not exaggerating. For the management of this hotel that reads this, this man is a gem of a human being and you are more than fortunate to have him on your staff. I am humbled and honored to have met him. Demarley (Privilege Beach)... your service on the beach was very much appreciated and far and above the other servers out there. Thank you for taking the time to help our family have at least two GREAT days on the beach. These three individuals are stellar people! One Love to You! So... why did I give this trip a *poor* rating? Well, it started the moment we arrived and sat down at the check in. I should start by saying that there were nine of us in our group. Not a small group by any means... but not a huge group either. We saw folks with 14-18 people in them. The nine of us arrived on three separate (but together) reservations. Meaning, they were shown as three reservations, but linked. Three on one, four on another, and two on last. We did this based on the room occupancy and billing. All of us booked the *upgraded* option to what the resort calls "Privilege". What this is supposed to give you is an upgraded service, which includes your own butler service for the week. Moya, listed above, was one of our butlers. The butler service is not staffed with the same butler all week. This is done to accommodate the staff's lives and their schedules, which is absolutely great. But, for the most part the butlers are consistent there and you may have someone that is off for a day or two during your stay. There is always someone on staff at all times though, which is supposed to elevate your experience. We saved for two years to pay for this trip with this elevated service... so we could have an amazing experience. I wish that is what happened. After sitting down with the check in folks we were informed that not all of our reservations were for privilege upgrades. One of our reservations, which was made and paid for at the same time, was said to be the normal service. We were not sure how this could even be possible. Just be very careful when you select your room, that if you want privilege, that it is just that! We were taken by surprise with this, and after trying to express our concerns... we simply paid the additional fees they were requiring to upgrade that reservations. It was over $1000 more! As ridiculous as this sounds that we paid this, we wanted all of our group to have the elevated experience and not begin our week with a negative vibe, or have a different level of experience. If I would have known what I know now, we would not have done this to any of our reservations. The day just kept getting more "declined" as opposed to elevated. When we got to our rooms, we were extremely taken back by how dilapidated they were. Once of our rooms was supposed to be the top tier room with two levels, one being a rooftop with a giant hot tub to relax in during the evenings. That room in particular wreaked of mold and rotten wood. We eventually asked for a new room, which they did accommodate. The rooftops were not maintained at all. Weeds were growing out of the ledge that was supposed to overlook the ocean. The other two rooms had broken drawers, tables, and refrigerators. It honestly looked like it had not been maintained in a very long time. Not to mention the paint which was splattered all over the curtains, floors, desk, tables, and furniture. I am not exaggerating when I say all over. Black & White paint was all over the place, including on a white couch. After this experience... it is hard to not take notice of all the little (and bigger) items of disappointment as we wandered throughout the resort. From broken tiles everywhere, to the huge stains on the cement throughout the resort. Stains as large as cars were located all over the place. From the pictures you see on the listing, you can not see any of this. Their marketing team has done a good job of not posting items like that. I took a bunch of photos, which I have attached here. If i could have attached the smell of sewage that we experienced, I would have. I will say the landscaping was very nice. The two gentlemen that worked on the landscaping all week did an exceptional job! The pool area, surprisingly, was just fine. We has some of our best days/service while sitting at the pool. My only mention here are the sunbeds they had. They are past their lifespan and need to be replaced. The slats which hold up the mattresses are rotted out and will be dangerous soon. A number of them were broken. The beach... all I can say is that I was disturbed by the trash everywhere. Paper straws, paper plates, discarded food waste (chicken bones, etc) were spread all over the sand. This led to a feral cat problem, where we saw at least 20-30 different cats throughout the resort. Including outside of the restaurants, sitting on the trash bins, etc. Which at night, they fight for scraps and are so loud it kept a few in our party awake on multiple nights. I'm not exaggerating when i say the cat problem is extremely bad. Speaking of trash bins... they are lacking trash bins throughout the resort. They need to quadruple the trash bins, and I think the trash issue they have would not be a problem. The nearest trash bin to the beach was well away from the beach. Which is why people would just discard their trash under the umbrellas. Our very first hours there we sat on the beach to take in the beauty. It was located next to a pile of cans (at least 30 cans and I'm not exaggerating), paper plates and food. The service on the beach was only good when Demarley was out there. The other gentlemen did nothing but talk to the same guy for hours at a time, for multiple days. It was not uncommon for him to be gone for 90 minutes after orders a simple pina-colada. I believe the guy was a regular, and he spent all his time conversing with him. So much for an elevated experience on the beach. The servers at the restaurants for the most part were pleasant. However, you could tell most of them were annoyed when we asked for something or for help. We had the feeling as a family that we were being an annoyance to them, or that they believed we felt we were some *entitled* American. I can humbly say, were are very far from that, and travel very often for both business and pleasure. Sometimes to some of the hardest places to live on earth to volunteer during disasters. We typically only do an all inclusive resort every two to three years, as we save all of our money for a trip like this. We are far from entitled. The only exceptions were Moya and Akiem. Both of whom are amazing human beings and tried their best to turn things around for us. All in all I feel like we were duped. Duped in the sense that the pictures and descriptions of the resort are no where near to be accurate. Just to expound on this... we had another guest at the resort ask us if we were enjoying ourselves. He asked because he too was very surprised at the lack of attention to detail. From the resort infrastructure, the room quality, the beach and pool experiences, and the service... were all sub par for him as well. This was on our second day, so you can imagine that our spidey senses were put on high alert at this point. If it wasn't for him, we would never have known about the dinner service upgrade that each person in the privilege experience were entitled to. They are supposed to tell you about all the elevated services you get at the beginning... but i guess they forgot to tell us about this. Or maybe they have been instructed to not say anything to try and cut corners. That was certainly the feeling we had with this, as well as a number of other items included in the experience. Our *daily* stocked refrigerator... well, lets just say it was only stocked three times during our stay. Or the service of filling the hot tub, where they came to fill it and left it running for hours while we were away and it was running off the side of the 5th floor all the way down past the 4th, 3rd, 2nd, and 1st floor rooms... and filling the swim out pool on the first floor. We estimated that it ran like this for 4 hours, and wasted who knows how many gallons of water. At least the weeds at the ledge got watered. ;-) I guess... my best advice for anyone who is considering staying at this resort... don't upgrade. Its not worth the exorbitant cost. Better yet, consider staying somewhere else. Having stayed at 6 or so all inclusive resorts all throughout Mexico and the Caribbean, this resort was by far the lowest on the quality and experience list. For about 30% less money, you can stay at a platinum level resort in the DR, which the Ocean Coral Spring should go visit and see how things are really done. This was our first trip to Jamaica. For me, it was a near and dear trip because of my love for Reggae music, Jerk Seasoned food, and just the Jamaican culture and history. I find learning about the history of the places we go, and how we can understand the challenges people have, help to keep me grounded. I try to do everything i can to help elevate peoples lives by visiting with them. Getting to know them, and doing what I can to make their lives better too. Thank you to Moya, Demarley, and especially Akiem. My life is elevated because I got to meet you three! Also, when you offer free wine as an elevated experience to your room, please put more than one wine glass in the room. hahahaha. Please note the images i have attached are only a small sample of what we saw. I did not want to waste all of my photos on the *bad* we saw. I needed to stop taking these and start taking good pictures. There were videos I wish i could share on my review. Read less
