frenchie2

I actually booked one night on cash and points for June 2017 a month ago when the schedule opened. But I needed to make it 3 nights minimum. However, I just grab 3 nights at the Grand Wailea on points for the exact dates I want, so I guess I will be cancelling the one night booking at Andaz. Will have to make a different trip to stay at the Andaz I guess...

Kon

In anyone's experience does this work? I just had a phone call with a pretty rude and unhelpful agent when I called the GP concierge.

Booking this hotel has been a frustrating experience so far, so I've come to the experts for some help.

I have two free nights from the Hyatt CC, and 50K points (enough for 2 nights).

I understand this hotel has minimum night stays, 6 nights to be exact for the dates I'm looking at (September 22nd-September 28th).

For these 6 nights, the Andaz Garden View room is available for booking with points. Ideally, I'd like to use my two free nights, 50k points and then pay the remaining nights with cash.

Figured this shouldn't be too difficult to accomplish since I would have a 6 night reservation. However, the GP agent said this is not possible and that the only way to book my free nights was through separate reservations. Meaning two nights using my free nights, two nights using points, and two nights using cash... So I would have to find dates where the minimum night stay is only two nights...

The agent said the only way to book the 6 nights I wanted was if I used the same "payment type" for all 6 nights.

Does anyone know if that is indeed the case? Any way around this?

Any help at this point would be very much appreciated. Trying to get this hotel for our upcoming honeymoon.

ddavid1101

At the Andaz now. Upgraded to partial ocean for 3 Nts with remaining 4 at garden view. We liked the garden view better as it was a tad bigger. Both rooms were on the far south wing on 3rd floor. Parked at lot twice for drive up to volcano sunrise which we were too lazy to get up and the other night for the tropical storm on sat night. Rest of the nights at the option everyone talks about here with no issues. Talked to the guy that lives in the van every day. Really nice guy. I parked there at 8pm last night and the parking area was very full. Maybe 15 cars. Lots of people on the beach fishing or camping etc. bring a flash light. Lots of crabs. My toddler got sick after the first night as a/c vent was pointed directly to bed. We turned it off ever since. Wife is now sick. Humidity is a problem. Everything is humid and wet. Hotel engineer said nothing can be done. Unless you blast the a/c it seems. Shower setup sucks esp with a toddler. I don't know why they have drapes on both sides of shower vs a simple glass wall. Everything gets wet. Floor mat is def a must to avoid slipping for little ones. Great pools and beach. Love the fruit infused water and lotion stations. Snorkeling is great but watch for current and getting semi trapped between reefs. Breakfast was best ever but did get old after 7 days. We typically had poke for a light dinner. Picked up a crib, extra fridge, microwave. Laundry room is a great extra. Used it 3 times.

Let me know if you guys have any questions.

ddavid1101

Just to add. The room is showing some age or at least stains, scuffs, doors don't close etc. same goes for lobby decor. Is it worth 500 plus resort fee, parking, breakfast, tax? Definitely not for me. For 25k per night when diamond. Sure!

Next stop probably Ziva Cancun and maybe Andaz Costa Rica or the one opening up near south of Cancun.

canyonleo

Nice update.

Before there was an old guy (silver hair, beard) living in a 280ZX with a cover... there's a guy in a van now too? No worries.

Number of crabs is likely due to storm surge, during normal tides I think there's normal crab activity... and you couldn't step on one if you tried as they're too fast (and small, like maybe in inch wide would be a larger one, for those that haven't yet been here).

While it's always a little humid there, I think what you're experiencing is from the storm and future travelers might not see an issue (I never find it one, but I've lived in S. Florida for part of my life).

scillyisles

I was there last week and all the Hawaiian islands are having an unusually hot and humid summer. I flew out the day before the storm arrived which would have brought more rain and humidity.

The shower setup works fine for us - you just need to remember to have the inner curtain inside the shower tray.
The airconditioning can be an issue and in particular the unit which points down onto the left hand side of the bed in the suites can feel unduly cold.
Wear and tear seems fine on the rooms that we stay in.
Pools whilst good to look at are not great to swim in - there is no pool that you can really swim lengths in. The pools are also generally quite cold - we tend to wait until early evening to swim by which time the sun has warmed the pools up.

canyonleo

Regarding A/C, I'm pretty sure one can climb up (for the vents up high) and re-position the slats to point up instead of down. This would be done one slat at a time, as opposed to the vent having a lever.

josephstern

Yup - done that both times I stayed there.

Seems I'm not alone in hating A/C blowing right on me while I sleep. Maybe the hotel needs to figure this out?

canyonleo

Well, at least three (or is it four I can't remember), and really five or six rooms (adding your two) already have them reconfigured

ssimon86

Has points + cash been impossible to get recently? Used to see them pop up now and then, but don't see it anywhere now.

josephstern

I just tried Aug 10-16 of 2017 and I see C+P.

ssimon86

Oh wow, that's far out. I was able to get (and see a bit of P + C availability) last year about 2 months before my stay in Feb.

josephstern

I was mainly looking to see if it was totally cut, or just very limited.

scillyisles

Yes this is exactly what I did in the suites we stay in

ddavid1101

Same old guy. He now has a van parked to the left side of the covered sports car.

Didn't know about the a/c vent adjustment till day 2 after the kiddo developed a cold.

We were very pleasantly surprised about how kid friendly the resort was. We prob saw one in every 4 groups had kids. They all played with each other at the main zero entry pool.

If I was to do this trip again, I would have most of my lunches at the bar or morimoto va driving out. I say that only if you are bringing kids(shower, change, pickup car etc) takes a good 2+ hours for a lunch trip. We did that the last two day of the trip and we found it much more efficient use of time.

Next time. I'll spend most of the day in resort and have a light poke dinner. I just wish it was closer, 8hr flight takes a toll.

Snorkeling was fun. Went as far as the end of the reef but came back to the same beach vs going around. Lots of fish and got about 10-15 ft from a turtle. I wish I took advantage of other activities from resort fee but was mainly playing with the kid which was just fine.