Rick L.
Yelp
We spent a week at this Westin "resort." Turns out "Sunset Key" is not the real name, the real name is Tank Island, just to highlight what a facade this location is. These cottages were built on top of dredged up sea floor so that the massive cruise ships can come and dock between you and Duval Street, definitely not romantic. The Navy used this landfill for holding the oil tanks, hence the true name Tank Island. The few guests we spotted were geriatric and probably are not filling out the favorable reviews you read here, so I highly suspect all the glowing reviews are fake and invented by the marketing machine from the Westin. In fact, I am pretty sure the reservation manager spends his time filling out fake reviews rather than helping customers. We travel quite a bit to Europe, Caribbean islands, Hawaii over the last couple of years and generally stay at five star properties. At the price we paid ($1000 per night), we were sadly misled on several points.
First, I booked through Starwood SPG. I was told we were getting 35% off rack rate, so with taxes, a bargain $1,000 USD per night for 5 nights for a partial ocean view cottage. As a Gold SPG member I asked for upgrade at check in if available, but this request was not honored, the girl that checked us in wouldn't even check availability. I was tired from the flight, so I didn't make a fuss. Well, just out of curiosity, I checked online for the rate and found that I could have booked online through Westin and got $850 per night. So I was charged over the internet rate when I was suppose to get a "deal?" When I brought this to the attention of the front desk and then SPG, nobody is sympathetic, what would you expect, I am the sucker that got scammed.
Then the Sunset Key Westin property itself, quality of Comfort Inn service dressed up in Westin garb. At the Four Seasons everyone smiles and knows your name. Here, everyone seems miserable, no smiles. The lone person "tending" the beach acts like he is doing you a favor and wish you would leave his beach and the dreadful pigeons that litter the small sad beach. The 50% gravel 50% sand beach is not combed at all, littered with cigarettes everywhere, really quite disgusting. We spent ten minutes and left. Nobody goes to Key West for the beach anyway, but this stretch of gravel is not worth walking on. The sand was supposedly brought in from the Bahamas, of course they had to, since this resort is built on landfill without natural sand. Well, over time the imported sand has eroded.
Then the Sunset Key Westin cottages ... there is a serious ant problem. Small little critters came to visit as we checked in. They swarmed to any residue toothpaste, which was leftover from the last occupant. This tells you how much house keeping pays attention to details. We have a video of the ants swarming, which I will post to You Tube later. We called the front desk about the ants right away, and the girl was not surprised. But to our dismay, they also did not take care of it during our stay so the ants visited reliably every night.
The Sunset Key Westin cottage is stocked with junk food at the standard gouge rate, just pick something up at CVS on Front Street and save a few hundred bucks. The room service and the restaurant Latitude are very average hotel food, the expected gouge price, with view of the neighboring petite landfill (just check Google earth to see for yourself), better you hike on to the island and have a real meal at A+B.
The positives ... the ferry captains are nice guys, the pool is fairly empty as the island appeared fairly sparsely occupied. I learned this lesson the hard way, the waste of money really pales against the waste of time I spent at Sunset "Tank Island" Keys. The sun set on this mistake of land development sometime ago. Buyer beware of this Sunset Key Westin!