francophile

The menus with prices for in-room dining are available on the FS app. They are under the dining section for the Mauritius property on the app. I find that at most properties of any chain, the in-room dining prices match the prices for the property's all day restaurant, excluding the in-room dining tray charge.

ps9a

Anyone have a strong feeling on which resort has the best beach in Mauritius? It's been 8+ years since we were there and stayed at the Oberoi, and we loved the resort, but the beach was poor. We're headed back with kids + nanny next July (Covid permitting), and beach quality is at the top of our checklist. O&O seems to have a really nice beach, but seems like most people on this thread prefer the Prince Maurice, which looks to have a nice family suite setup to put our kids + nanny in. Also, if anyone has recs on a hotel in Reunion (also prefer beach to all else), I think we may head there for a few nights before moving on to the Seychelles.

m3red

le tousserok frangipani wing...

brilliant for kids and adults!

Pausanias

The Oberoi beach is man-made and, as you say, not special. The Four Seasons beaches are not great, either. There are nice beaches in the Ile de Cerf area, including Tousserok, but the best beaches in that area are still relatively remote and you need a car. I stayed at Le Prince Maurice and it has a lovely tropical setting, the rooms are superb, the food was wonderful, but the two beaches there are fairly small and shallow. Constance Belle Mare Plage (a sister hotel of Le Prince Maurice) and One&Only St Geran as well as the St Regis might be the best bet for a beach. The St Regis might have the finest location of any hotel on the island.

Mauritius's other island, Rodriguez, has stunning beaches but is very rustic. Reunion isn't known for its beaches, except for a spate of fairly recent great white shark incidents which forced the government to close the beaches. People go here for the rugged volcanic interior which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

In this part of the Indian Ocean you can't beat the Seychelles for world-class beaches.

Milwaukee

ps9a what did you end up going with? In a similar quandary (but I’m 20 years out from the last time on the island)! Leaning towards FS or One&Only. Pausanias makes a compelling case for the St. Regis, but the number of rooms seems a bit high.

ps9a

We were planning on the Prince Maurice, but based on the current Covid situation/lockdown there, we scrapped the Mauritius portion of our trip and are likely just going to visit countries that seem to have things better under control. We’re either going to spend an extra week in the Seychelles, or if Israel opens to vaccinated Americans not in tour groups, spend some time there. (Currently have both options booked.). I’ve cancelled/postponed/changed trips quite a bit over the last year.

jp-mco

Obviously opinions will differ but I would have held up Mauritius as one of the best examples in the world of having COVID "under control". 1 new case in the last 2 days and a total of 15 deaths since the start of the pandemic - those figures speak for themselves. I think it's difficult for someone from a western country where the pandemic has raged out of control for the last year to understand the position that countries like Mauritius find themselves in. Aside from 2 short sharp lockdowns they have lived virtually normal lives for the last 12 months because they had strong, closed borders. Their vaccination programme must pickup pace if they want to see a return to tourism in their country but that's easier said than done when large powerful western countries control and dominate the supply and sale of vaccines.
I would agree that scrapping the Mauritius portion of your trip is probably the right thing to do to avoid mandatory quarantine though, just not your assessment of the situation in Mauritius. Mauritius is a model for having COVID under control.

ps9a

I guess I phrased it incorrectly-- I wasn't trying to criticize the Covid response in Mauritius or offend anyone involved with that response. However, as far as I can tell from our travel agent and online searching, Mauritius went into lockdown on March 10th, and expects to be there through at least April 30th as a result of an uptick in cases. I was not speaking from a medical or political viewpoint, but from a tourist perspective, as an American with young kids, who would need to fly a long way to reach Mauritius, there is significant variance involved with planning a trip there in the next couple months.

Milwaukee

Thank you! I think I need to bite the bullet and prepare some backup bookings as well. (We’re slated for a trip in the fall, which I am cautiously optimistic about, but probably better to be safe than sorry.)

xIte

Hello all,

my wife and me are looking forward to three week trip on Mauritius this October. We're going to celebrate our first anniversary.

I'm a bit split regarding hotels. My understanding so far was that the One & Only is by far the best one. We'd chose the "beach front balcony junior suite" for half of our trip.

For the other half, I'm currently looking at the Royal Palm Beachcomber, St. Regis (which was rebranded to JW Marriot Mauritius Resort?) and the Shanti Maurice.

A travel agent also told me to look at the Royal Palm Beachcomber, which sounds very nice based on reviews, but I haven't found anything in this thread about it, which makes me wonder. The other two don't sound very overwhelming, based on this thread, but were strong recommendations from our travel agent as well. I like the idea of staying at the opposite side of the island though, if we go to the O&O.

Last year we stayed at the Raffles Praslin and Six Senses Zil Pasyon on the Seychelles, which we loved!

Milwaukee

Here's my wholly unjustified take having not stayed at any of the hotels below:

1) One & Only probably gets some extra love on the forum for being a Virtuoso hotel with a fairly recent hardware refresh. The other 3 Virtuoso properties (Shangri-La, Oberoi, and St. Regis) don't seem to have quite as positive of reviews. I personally decided to stay here for an upcoming trip due to Virtuoso benefits and the fact that they have a heli-pad on site. TripAdvisor is largely useless, but I've found that hotels that receive 90%+ 5-star ratings, in the 5-star class, usually are pretty decent. At the moment O&O us at 409/516=79% so not great. I'm severely tempering my expectations for true luxury here.

2) Prince seems to have better service and reads more like a true 5-star resort despite older hardware. The walkways over water were going to be logistically impossible with my extremely active under-2 who does not know how to swim. Otherwise, without small children, I would have stayed here. TripAdvisor ratings are skewed for the Prince because there are many locals who have stayed recently and rated, but they are 1,895/2036=93% which is pretty good. I would go into this hotel expecting a good luxury experience.

3) If you are an adult only couple, Paradise Cove also looks really nice. I'd be tempted to try it out.

Hopefully everything stays on track for October and you are able to get some decent room prices. I would imagine things are booking up pretty heavily.

vuittonsofstyle

Having stayed at all the resorts you mention, I would not choose any of them. O&O is in no way the best resort. Far better are Constance Le Prince Maurice (my top choice), The Oberoi and Four Seasons Anahita.

Smiley90

Can you shed some light on which of the properties you'd prefer if you wanted to avoid little kids at all cost? The FS hardware looks great, but it surprisingly has worse reviews than the Shangri-La or O&O, so I'm not sure what to make of those. From pictures, Maurice looks very different in style which is interesting, I'll have to look at that more. How is Anantara?

Also, somewhat random, but do any of these have a swimmable pool? Plunge pools are the bane of our existence, we love it if a place has a swimmable pool, if only in the Spa. (shout-out to the JW Cancun which has an indoor lap-sized pool that was always empty when we were there!)
​​​​

vuittonsofstyle

If you want to avoid little kids, then Mauritius is probably not for you, as it is extremely child-friendly, with some of the best kid's clubs in the world. However, I find that Constance Le Prince Maurice is the most adult of all the resorts - very stylish and yes, with a large swimmable pool. The Villas have small private plunge pools, too. It is a much smaller property than most, with fewer rooms/suites, so this helps in terms of intimacy and elegance.

Anantara is very new, but is extremely well done. However, i think it is more family-friendly than Le Prince!

Pausanias

Yes, this is all true. Le Prince is not 'splishy-splashy' and is probably more geared towards honeymooners. It is not a 'fun' place but rather quiet, reserved and sophisticated. However, I guess if you choose a high or holiday season like July-August, Christmas or New Year etc you might expect more family oriented guests at any of the hotels here or anywhere.