Just completed a 7 night stay here on a mix of cash (3 nights) and points (4 nights) that I had booked prior to HRM moving to Cat 6. This was our first time visiting Maui and overall had a great stay. I had also applied a SUA to the reservation at booking. A couple months ago I had to adjust the reservation by a day on either end, which my concierge helped with, but it also spilt up the reservation into 3. Check in went fine, though had an agent who made a big deal out of 1) with a split reservation their policy is not to issue keys for the whole stay, but rather I'd have to come back each time to get them rekeyed. She said she could make an exception this time. 2) She said my SUA was only applied to the first night of my reservation, but I told her my concierge had confirmed it for the whole stay (I had double checked this issue specifically with her a few weeks prior). She asked if I could provide confirmation of this, but also said she'd check to see if one was available on her end and she got on the phone. She came back and said there was availability and they could put me in an ocean front suite and we were given 234 in the Napili tower. She was nice throughout but it felt like she was making a big deal out of the things she was doing for us. She also spent time running through Globalist benefits for us and gave us the silicone wrist brands to use. At the end of check in she asked if we were celebrating anything special and came back with a bottle of Canvas sparkling for us.
The suite was nice, but as been mentioned before, not much of a balcony area. Had room for a small table and two chairs, but maybe 3-4 feet deep. Room to just sit in the chair, but no room to really move around. Appreciated the ocean view from both the bedroom and the small balcony, as well as some of the grounds on the balcony side. I didn't mind being down low and enjoyed the sound of the waves so close to us. Plus was nice not to take an elevator the entire week. The room was in decent shape with no real issues. Bedroom and living room separated by a sliding door. AC worked great (turns off when slider is open), and the shower had great water pressure. Almost too much. Small issues with the bathroom were there was no separate door between toilet and rest of the bathroom, and only one sink. The bathroom had the motion light, as well as both sides of the bed. I covered them up as I'm such a light sleeper that them flashing on in the middle of the night wakes me up. Housekeeping was great! We'd see the same housekeeper each morning in the hallway and she would greet us and find out when we were going to be out of the room and made sure to take care of things during that time.
Other comments:
-Valet was responsive, attendants friendly and always had our car ready for us when we came out (we'd call a couple minutes prior to).
-Regency Club was just okay. Breakfast each day consisted of a couple fruit options (always pineapple, and mostly strawberries, but a few days with cantaloupe instead of strawberries. I will say the pineapple on the island is the best I've every had. The bartender at Umalu said none of the pineapple on Maui is shipped off island as it's all consumed on island), a few bread options and limited pastries, Yoplait yogurt and a few other small buffet items like small cheese wedges (2 varieties each time) and a couple sliced deli meats. Each day they had scrambled eggs (made fresh), and bacon (very crispy!) on the majority of the days. A couple of days there were sausages as the other hot meat item. Also rotated through most days with pancakes or french toast as an option. Coffee from an automated machine and served in paper cups, also a drip coffee option. Juice was via a machine that had 3-4 different choices. I had OJ most mornings and was meh quality. Stopped by a few days during the "snack time" and they had a few cookie options, whole fruit and some granola bars. Pretty scant offerings. Out of curiosity we poked our head in one time for the evening appetizer hour and iirc, had a couple of hot items, some cheese (same as available at breakfast) and maybe some deli meats. Didn't check out the alcohol options though. Overall, food-wise, not a strong offering, but better than nothing. We'd usually stop by around 9 for a small breakfast, coffee and to sit on the patio and enjoy the morning (and bird show, lol) before we headed out to do things. Speaking of the birds, they were there but usually kept their distance unless you walked away from your table with food on it. Then it was a frenzy. Staff throughout were always friendly and helpful.
-Umalu Pool Bar-We stopped by a few times since Globalists received all day happy hour drinks (no HH food options). 4-5 cocktail choices, a few beer options and Canvas wines available from 10AM-10PM. We sat at the bar each time and got to know a few of the bartenders who were friendly and helpful with good advice for island activities and information. Though the lounge offerings were meh, I did appreciate having this options for drinks available all day as a benefit. Prices were reasonable (cheap for Maui!) and they bartenders did a good job.
Pool area-we didn't really take advantage of the pool area, but each day it didn't look super busy (overall the hotel didn't seem super busy). As others have mentioned, it would be nice to have a bit more shade options around the pool. The one day we walked around to sit out there, all the shade spots were taken so we just went up to the main lobby area to sit in the couches that overlooked the ocean. I did appreciate seeing signs around the pool area saying items would be taken off chairs after an hour of no one there. Was also surprised that the pool was open 24 hours. Didn't go down at 3 AM to see if anyone was there, but we'd see people in there around 10PM or so on our way back up to the room.
As said before, we had a great visit to Maui and the hotel was solid, but nothing was spectacular about the hotel itself. Service was always super friendly, so that was definitely the highlight for us. We did like the location for West Maui and being able to walk to a lot of places up north along the beach. For dinners we headed out each night so didn't eat at any of the onsite restaurants, though heard lots of people rave about Japengo. Ubers to Lahaina were consistently around $12 each way and we ate at Honu, Mala Ocean Tavern, Star Noodle, and Sale Pepe in Lahaina and all were excellent. Really sad to see all the vacant lots and the varying stages of construction on some of the sites. Also heartbreaking hearing the stories of the fires effects on the people we talked to and the community in general. Would love to visit Maui again and would consider staying here again, but may look around a bit at other options, including outside of Hyatt.