The recent review had me a little worried but I was really glad I didn't cancel.

MumbaiDan was right about the atmosphere of the place, it definitely doesn't have the vibe of other Ws but as I was hoping for R&R that was actually a bonus for me personally. If you are looking for the same sort of vibe as, say, the W Bali then look elsewhere. To me this felt more like the Ritz Carlton Bali in its sleepiness although the service isn't nearly the same level as the Ritz.

This is entirely down to the demographic of the guest this property attracts, overwhelmingly Chinese families. Clearly they won't be taking the kids or grandparents partying and tanning by the pool or on the beach isn't a past time traditionally associated with Chinese families. I did check with the staff and the fact it was CNY didn't really change things, apparently the majority of guests at the property year round are Chinese families.

The specifics of my stay: I was booked for a 5 nights stay with points into a Jungle Oasis. Check in is at 3pm and we had to wait until then to get the keys to the room due to occupancy levels the night before. We waited at the lobby bar and to be fair they were very prompt with keys at 3pm.

The room itself was amazing. Without any fanfare - they literally didn't mention anything - we were upgraded to a tropical oasis villa for the duration of the stay. The villa and the private pool itself felt much more spacious than the pool villas at the W Bali. It was well maintained and the grounds staff kept the garden area pretty clean although perhaps not as fastidiously as the staff in Bali.

From what I can see, the villa is identical to the beach access havens which don't have a sea view and I definitely wouldn't pay to upgrade to given the proximity (30m) of all the villas to the beach. As mentioned, the sand on the beach isn't silky smooth but that's fine if you know in advance. The facilities on the beach were OK but not amazing. The food was fine but the service lacked a little, this ain't no Ritz and it showed in the lack in attention to detail that the staff showed. Not what you expect for a $1000k per night experience and really one of only a couple of let downs of the stay.

One great touch for plat premier guests was a sunset boat trip on Friday evenings. We were invited to take the hotel motorboat out into the bay to grab some sunset photos, enjoy complimentary drinks and get dropped off at the local 'fishermans village'. There wasn't a fisherman in sight at the village but there were plenty of F&B outlets and a night market.

I used my plat benefit for breakfast which was a good value given the price of breakfast and length of stay. This wasn't proactively offered at check in but they were happy to allow me to do so. The breakfast would be the other let down in terms of the quality and quantity of the spread. The egg station was pretty basic, no crab/lobster meat of the St Regis Bali, the fruits were pretty limited and the quality of pretty much everything was so-so, not particularly great on any count. Breakfast was practically the only time we saw any other guests and boy was it hectic inside. We used the balcony each day but going in to get our food (there was zero table service other than tea & coffee) it was pretty full on with kids screaming, yelling and running around all over the place. The balcony was much more chilled so we escaped the worst of it.

The location of the hotel is a little removed from everything so you'll need to think about transportation. I rented a car as I had read that the taxi drivers on Samui are charging ridiculous rates. The one time we did use a taxi (Grab, which is the equivalent of Uber for south east Asia) it cost us around $15 USD to drive less than 2 miles. I'm familiar with driving in Thailand so renting a car was a really easy was for us to get around and explore the island. We made frequent use of free parking at the Central Festival shopping mall which is located in the middle of the Chaweng area.

I've stayed at the Vana Belle in a grand ocean view pool suite and I think, for the money, I'd go back to the W again if I was to choose between the two.