Bonvoy GOLD and we used 44,000 points per night. I emailed the property
[email protected] asking for an upgrade and they wrote back immediately confirming a Classic suite with a free bed for our child. And by suite I mean heavy thick doors that sealed off the large bedroom from the main sitting room/balcony.
Because we were gold, breakfast was NOT included but we received a pre-purchase discount rate of $40JOD for three. Confirming that platinum and above gets free breakfast (they noted this only because we are a few nights away from platinum). Welcome gift was a box of sweets.
We were assigned a butler, a woman named Mirage, who found out that it was the birthday of someone in our party and surprised us with a cake and roses on the bed. She read our "dietary preferences" in our Bonvoy profile that I forget having filled out ages ago and therefore she knew our dietary issues and made sure the cake (delicious!) met those standards. Great touch. She was totally fantastic in helping us and accessible by whatsapp even on her day off.
The hotel is beautiful but the service, though always very friendly, was uneven at best. Before I get to that, if you are there you need to find Omar the pool manager and make friends with him. I won't say here specifically how but he did some workarounds and enhanced our pool and Red Sea swim experience. DM me for more details.
Service complaints: there are two Bonvoy desks for check-in and we sat waiting and despite telling another clerk we needed help (and then flagging down a manager-looking person) it took about 20 minutes for a clerk to arrive to the desk and check us in before he was pulled away and replaced by a second clerk. Not fun after a hot long drive. Another complaint is that one of the managers at the breakfast restaurant literally FOUR or FIVE times tried upsell us on some dinner buffet at their beach club with a DJ. Mind you we are a middle aged couple nicely dressed and with a child, not exactly your "DJ dinner buffet" kind of audience but we politely thanked him. Yet he would not stop trying to sell us the entire morning. Breakfast on a weekend in this full hotel was utter chaos. People slamming into each other at the buffet like a mosh pit. Children -- in their pajamas -- were piling on 10 donuts onto plates and running to their tables -- and their parents completely on board. Be sure to sit outside to avoid the noise and chaos. In the lobby kids were zipping by on their scooters and neither parents nor security were doing a thing.
Because of this I absolutely would avoid Friday/Saturdays at this hotel.
Late check out was offered but we had an early flight. Beds and pillows were to die for. View of Israel and sunset from our balcony!
We hired an outside service to take us to the south beaches for shore snorkeling (this is hard to find as everyone is selling only boat trips). Great outfit that supplied everything including transport, equipment, and a snorkeling guide. If you want the info DM me.