kayexalate

How was the breakfast? COntinental being Juice, fruit, and mufffins? Or a full on buffet with hot and cold foods? Being a Gold HHOnors member, the breakfast is big plus, but not if it's just some flimsy juice and bagels.

I heard the executive lounge is gone, but you mentioned a private room. Were there also snacks and drinks during the day and cocktails in the evenings?

Debating on this property vs the Conrad in terms of the Gold benefits

When I emailed Hilton San Juan, they said they have no exec lounge and the gold benefits are only are what's on the website: choose ONE of :continental breakfast and room upgrade for 2, extra 1000 points per stay, or free wi-fi

Conrad also said continental breakfast and room upgrade for Gold members (wifi is included free for everyone)

sounds like the Conrad is the better deal just based upon this.

Portolan

Over New Years on a GLON award:
"Upgraded" to Garden Wing 6th floor ocean view (through the palms) room (not multi-room suite). Room/view was OK. Broken latch on the sliding door reported first and every day of stay with the only result being they removed the broken latch and left the door without a latch. Not a big concern since 1) 6th floor, and 2) nothing left in room of value. One large glass bottle of water and some bon-bons waiting in room; two plastic bottles of water delivered the first night. Bathroom had (very large) shower only...fine with us. Major issue with the room was the lack of adequate sound-proofing...the frequent loud and boisterous folks passing in the hallway were very noticeable (spouse problem...it takes a LOT to disturb my sleep).

Other experiences/observations:
* no resort fee charged (bill was food and parking charges only)
* Continental breakfast area for gold/diamond was very crowded until after everybody left on New Years Day (hotel appeared to be fully booked through New Years Eve then less so)
* Continental breakfast was adequate: sweet rolls (several kinds), bagels/toast/English muffins, juice, fresh fruit, coffee/capucino/expresso via 3 machines (quite good, actually), dry cereal, bottled water (have to ask); breakfast could be "upgraded" to full buffet/cooked to order omelets/etc. for $11
* self-parking was $15/day, valet (for guests) $20/day
* food on-site (as many have noted) was pricey and of varying quality:
--Pina Colada Bar/Grill had good namesake drinks and excellent ceviche and other appetizers
--Lemon Grass (Asian/Latin fusion) was quite good and has nice garden/lagoon setting...this is the only restaurant we'd recommend for dinner on-site
--Rotisserie il Giardino was terrible: way over-priced, poorly presented and poorly prepared Italian cuisine...would have been disappointed in this at an Olive Garden (at a quarter the price). No ambience. Same venue as the gold/diamond breakfast, much of the setup for which is still in the dining room for lunch and dinner. (OK, so why the heck would we eat there?...I had no intention of going off-site on New Years eve...not that interested in competeing with the extraordinary traffic heading to Old San Juan).
--Morton's: didn't try...I can do that at home (though after our experience at the RilG, I regret not either going to Morton's or Lemon Grass
We ate in Old San Juan every night except our arrival and the aforementioned New Years Eve. Highly recommend the Parrot Club, El Jibarito, and the Old Harbor Brewery (food was sophisticated with local specialties...not your average pub food; beer was great)

Bottom Line (aka, would we do this again?): Yes. We were looking for a base of operations to explore Old San Juan (walkable from hotel...about 1-1/2 miles) and Puerto Rico, not a resort to vege out at. For this, it was fine and more conveniently located than the other Hilton properties. Turns out it was a good thing that we weren't planning a resort week: due to circumstances clearly not Hilton's fault, they had extraorinarily high surf for 3 days that forced closing of the beach, most pools and all perimeter areas (waves were breaking over the sea wall, flooding the grounds, contaminating the pools). The waves were beautiful to watch, however.

sharonsimon

Anyone know something about the Condado Lagoon Villas at Caribe Hilton, which come up as a separate but obviously intertwined property on the Hilton website? I am a lowly silver member looking for a one night stay. the recent reviews of the Caribe Hilton on this board are mediocre, but perhaps the villas are better?

mnredfox

Villas are great and an UG there is awesome. But in the 20x+ I stayed there, I only was there once...

jordieboy

The jordieboys were peacefully vacationing at the Caribe Hilton this week. Quite frankly the N.E. weather was just way too much for the likes of me.

At 6AMish all of the power and water was shut off in the hotel. I was told that there was a fire on the 5th floor. Everyone was gently coaxed down the fire stairs.

It was kind of concerning as none of the emergency lights were working!

I carried my offspring using the flashlight app on my iphone to guide me down. Once I got near 5, however, there were staff with flashlights guiding everyone down.

Despite perhaps being under-equipped the staff were great. They were passing out glow-sticks to help guide people out.

The lobby was a bit of a mayhem with people mulling about sort of frantically. The fire alarms were sounding every 5 min or so.
I didn't see any fire trucks, but there were tons of security.

I was told that there was an air conditioner fire on the fifth floor. I have no confirmation of this, nor did I see anything myself. I was also told that everyone was evacuated without issue and that no one was hurt or injured - thankfully!!!

In the lobby...
I was surprised to see that they were still offering breakfast in both of the breakfast rooms (probably because they had it set up already) - no hot items or drinks, of course because no electricity.

They rolled out a small buffet table as well to offer complementary items to all who were awaken. Lots of OJ, no coffee, of course as there was no electricity.

Since things looked to be a bit hectic, the Jordieboy's walked off to the old city to do some exploring. Came back about 12PM and was told that the power was just restored a few minutes earlier. Sound like the CH had quite a morning!

kay7

We woke up at 7 am to an awful chemical smell - no alarm. In fact, we were told to go back to our room when my husband went into the hallway. We left on our own because the smell was so overpowering. No one ever told us there was a fire - in fact, the manager told us the next day that we were smelling sewage and that there was no fire. What floor were you on? Who told you about the fire?
There clearly was one since another woman said she had smoke in her room. I didn't see anyone evacuating until later in the morning. More info would be great. I'm four months pregnant and don't know what I was breathing in or for how long. The staff was awful about giving me information and clearly lied to me.
Thanks.

Seat13F_AC_CRJ

Dear kay7 -- a very sincere welcome to FT!

I'm surprised there haven't been any other updates to this story since the original post. It appears the hotel was not very forthcoming with information. I stay at this property multiple times per year, but since the lounges closed I have been enjoying my stays less and less.
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13F

emma dog

I'm scheduled to arrive the Villas on Sunday (burn, points, burn!) and am looking for an update on how this affected the property.

qazw1

If I remember correctly, the villas were nothing special. Just a longer walk to get to.

By the way, the Conrad in San Juan seems to be offering special rates via Travelocity or Priceline. Makes it comparable to the Caribe. But if you are using points, would not be relevant.

mnredfox

If you're entertained by bidet's, the villas have them...

emma dog

Stayed here using an award. Overall observations:

-It SHOULD NOT be a tier 7 hotel. It's a tier 6 at best.
-Room overlooked the Condado Lagoon. It doesn't seem that nay of the Villas have a view of the ocean. Original room was on 10th floor with a pretty severely obstructed water view (I was switched before arrival... I figured out what my original room was).

-Food... way overpriced. Ate dinner at Lemongrass. It's interesting creative Asian. Food was decent, drinks were super-expensive. We paid ~$250 for dinner for 2... drinks, appetizer, main, and dessert. I'd expect to pay ~$150-200 for this meal in Atlanta or DC.
-There are 2 breakfast buffets. One is for Gold/Diamond members and is "free". Food is marginal and isn't what I'd really consider to be par for a Hilton continental breakfast. The other restaurant has the more standard Hilton buffet. It costs ~$13 to use your certificates here, even though all I got was a bagel, cheese, and sliced meat (what I'd consider to be a standard continental breakfast at other Hilton properties).
-The bar food is OK. Not much more to say. Drinks are expensive here, too.

Pools. They're small, nothing special. The Conrad across the lagoon has some slides and the pool is a bit larger. The pool restaurant at the Conrad is also more versatile (more options for food and drink).

Service. OK. Nothing special. No recognition of being a Diamond beyond asking my "my way" preferences. Waitstaff is OK... nothing special.

All-in-all, I'm disappointed only because this hotel should deliver a lot more for the $ and/or points. For the same points, I think I'd stay at the Conrad located across the Condado lagoon. Overall, I rate this hotel 1 ^ and 1 "meh".

qazw1

Sounds about right for the hotel. At least you were lucky and avoided the Italian restaurant in the hotel, which is both expensive and awful. The Spanish restaurant (if it is still there) is not bad. And the Hilton dinner buffet is actually decent. I have no problem with the Lemongrass prices if the portions were reasonable.

Based on your description, seems like they improve the property a little.

mnredfox

Agree with this assessment, sounds about right for the Caribe. Never was an impressive hotel. Spanish Tapas place is probably best $$ worth there, Lemongrass is good but very $$$$.

DaChief

I stayed in the Lagoon Villas a couple of weeks ago and was pleasantly surprised based on all the reviews I had read. I was on the 10th floor, large room and looked fairly new. The view wasn't much to talk about but I didn't spend much time in the room anyway. I thought the pool area was decent and they did stop people who weren't authorized in there. The breakfast area had fruit, bagels, some danish etc and was plenty as far as I was concerned. They took the breakfast cert from everyone who came in and I saw them turn a number of people away who did not have one. I can't comment on the restaurants as I did all my dining in old San Juan. Self parking was a pain in having to turn in the ticket each time you wanted to leave for validation.

Seat13F_AC_CRJ

I agree this plasce is the best. But because it is not part of the hotel, you cannot charge meals to your room. I think it is called Madrid-San Juan and it's located on the ground floor or the tower.
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13F