Julie Joys
Google
Not as advertised. Not worth your money. Not a 5-star hotel. I stayed at 4-star, even 3-star, hotels far better maintained, with far better services. How would I describe this hotel? A beachfront location with beautiful natural vistas, but a poorly-maintained place that perhaps saw better days 20 years ago. Today, it is a place peppered with tourist traps and aggressive salespeople, a ripoff.
We stayed here in late August, our first family vacation in a very long time, certainly since the pandemic, and our expectations for a quiet gateway were quickly dashed upon arrival when, 3 flights and thousands of kilometres later, an aggressive salesman jumped on us, even before checkin, pushing us to sign up for “the presentation,” falsely claiming to be a presentation about the activities the place has to offer and luring us with promises of free boat excursions. It turned out to be a trap for tourists to sign up for timeshares, so be aware of this, a highly-unnerving experience that bordered on intimidation. Throughout our time there, salespeople came around breakfast tables, interrupting and asking tourists if they signed up for “the presentation” yet. Outrageous. These people should take a lesson or two on the pitfalls of overselling - hint: it drives customers away!
Then came the construction work at Villa 27 (Santiago), where we stayed. The drilling, the noise did not stop for days, although whenever we called, reception would tell us it would last only two hours, lying to our faces each time. No power or running water one night (had to go to bed with our sunscreen still on), poor room services (had to ask three times for fresh towels), bathroom and toilet doors that would not close, power switch coming off, and the list goes on. At 40% occupancy rate, they could have easily moved us and the other tourists to a different villa. Oh, and the main pool bathrooms were locked at some point, was it a cost-saving tactic to limit the flow of all-inclusive drinks by the pool? Not to mention that if you wanted to spend the day at the beach, the only option was to rent a cabana bed at a whopping $200/day, as there were no chaise longues/ sun loungers or umbrellas on the beach, obviously to force tourists into renting the expensive cabana beds, a money grab. Finally, speaking of money grabs, the hotel added an unsolicited donation of $9 to Coppel (owner of the hotel chain) at checkout, the nerve on them, hazme el favor! Unbelievable.
The only positives were the food and, of course, the nature, ocean views and good, sunny weather.
I don’t expect this company to take any responsibility for this, they are not even responding to the negative reviews here. I’m not in the habit of making public reviews, but this particular experience really compelled me to speak out in the hope that others may not have to go through a similar one.