Hi folks, wanted to share our fantastic experience at this Westin and give thanks to the wonderful people in this thread that gave really good advice while we were deciding where to stay, what to do on the Big Island. Like Intl359Widget, we had a blast and thought the beach was awesome - better than any other my wife and I had been to in Hawaii.

Context: We - my wife, 21 month old son and myself - stayed for 5 nights (points + free night) in late May. We were mainly traveling to celebrate my wife's birthday and to have a nice destination for our son's first trip. Ambassador status.

Overall: Excellent hotel, beach, staff, amenities; good food, rooms and location; only a few nits. Would 100% stay here again and recommend others do as well (particularly families with young children)!

Positives:
Like others have mentioned, property is perfectly located on an amazing beach and you can tell from the moment you step into the open-air lobby.


Well-designed lobby

Check-in and room: Upon arrival (and after having some refreshing guava juice), we were upgraded to a Premier Ocean room - unfortunately our SNAs did not clear (oh well). The room was on the highest floor on the far (most southern) part of the hotel, so the view was quite nice. Also, I had mentioned to the hotel staff member who reached out ~1 week prior to our trip that we were celebrating my wife's birthday, and we were surprised with a very nice spread from the staff (who overall were super nice and friendly).


That cake was delicious...

Beach: This is one of the best beaches I've been to. The things we look for in a beach are: a) warm, clear water; b) soft, clean sand; c) not very crowded and it fulfilled all three. Our son was basically stuck on Pacific time, so we woke up at 4 - 5 am every day... but even by 9 or 10 am, there were still plenty of beach chairs available, which was a bit surprising to me. Water was perfect all day, unsurprisingly.


Not pictured: our son eating sand

Pools: One of our biggest questions about picking between this and Mauna Kea was around how family friendly each was. Someone shared up-thread that this Westin had 2 pools (one family; one adult), which was probably the biggest factor in us choosing this property. The family pool was great and consistently not overcrowded. There was a nice, quick food & drink place next to the pool, and the drinks were solid.


From family pool; half of my pictures from the trip were sunset pictures

Food: Generally the food was quite good (B+ hotel food). We did not make it to Mauna Kea, but did drive around to Kona and Waikoloa for local fare (poke!). We're big on breakfast, so did the upgrade from Platinum breakfast every day ($25/person/day). In theory we could have gotten by with the pastries and fruit, but we were on vaca, so wanted a bit more variety. Our son ate his weight in watermelon... the staff was overly generous in giving him a full plate of it each morning.

Checkout: We were granted 4 pm check-out, which afforded us an extra half day at the pool and was amazing.

Negatives: I wouldn't call these negatives per se, more nits:

• Breakfast: Yes, it costs extra; no, it's not ideal. Hopefully this has been mentioned enough times where folks can make an informed decision prior to arrival
• Location & food choices: In general, the seclusion is a big (+). However, if you want to try a lot of local restaurants, it is a bit lacking and you do have to drive a decent ways. There are great restaurants in Kona (although we would likely never stay there), Waikoloa was decent, but Waimea was disappointing in terms of food, to be honest
• Resort fee + parking fee: Probably the biggest "negative" for me - I just hate paying both. Again, wasn't a surprise, but just annoying.
  

Overall, would definitely recommend! Hope this helps others and happy to any questions for those with upcoming travel to Hawaii.

Bonus pics:


Sunset from lobby


Super chill cat that lives on the property