JW Marriott Lima, Peru [Master Thread]
 

Anybody been to the Marriott in Lima, Peru? Did a search and didn't find anything. How's the location and hotel quality?

Thanks.

Anyone been to this hotel? Thinking about a vacation to South America towards the end of the summer close to a beach location with some other activities.

Hi eduboys,
I stayed at the JW Marriott Hotel and Stellaris Casino Lima last year for a night. The hotel is great. The rooms are very nicely appointed, everything is new, spacious layouts, and excellent location. The hotel overlooks a fantastic beach and a huge indoor/outdoor shopping mall with restaurants. Very cool place - I would say one of the best American-style hotels in Lima.

I posted real hotel photos from my stay at HotelScoop. For hotel photos and reviews of the JW Marriott Hotel Lima click here: http://www.hotelscoop.com/z1_Hotel_P...riott_4660.php

Email address for JW Marriott, Lima
 

It was a bit of a challenge to get the email address for the Marriott, so thought I'd post and save others the effort. I had to call the internet help desk to get this.

[email protected]

I got an impressively fast and helpful response.

I have now stayed at the Lima Marriott twice. My experience was mixed. The hotel is great, the rooms are modern and fresh, and the Executive Lounge is superb. The front desk staff was a bit frustrating, however.

The hofel is located in the upscale suburb of Miraflores, overlooking the ocean. Other chain hotels in Lima include the Sheraton, in downtown - a marginal location - and the Doubletree, also in Miraflores. It is my impression that the Marriott is the most luxurious of the 3.

If you arrange transport thru the hotel, it costs $30 from the airport. If you charge it to the room, it gets a 29% markup. Thus, we paid the driver directly. There is no licensing of taxis in Lima, and it is safer to use the hotel service. The hotel is about a 30 minute drive from the airport.

If you use taxis during your stay, you have to go to the street to flag them down. (There are plenty passing by.) You need to negotiate a rate, as taxis do not run meters.

Check in is on the second floor. Doormen and bellmen are very attentive, and your luggage is taken from you on arrival. I am platinum, and was given executive lounge access on both stays. On the first stay, the room was the smallest on the floor. Avoid -01 rooms. It barely had room for a chair by the bed, and was an awkwardly sized room. On the second visit, we had an -07 room. We had 2 easy chairs in addition to the king sized bed. The bathroom had a shower enclosure as well as a bathtub. On the first visit, our amenity was going to take over an hour to arrive. Since it was 1am and we wanted to go to bed, we eventually canceled it. On the second visit, we got a nice tray of assorted cheeses as well as soft drinks.

The executive lounge was well appointed. Breakfast has both hot and cold items, and is quite extensive. "Tea" is served from 1-5. It actually includes cheeses, crackers, nuts, and olives in addition to cookies or other sweets. "Dinner" is served from 6-10. It is a generous range of hot and cold appetizers, salad, and dessert.

I attempted to use premium pounds on my stay, and was denied. The interchange was frustrating, although in the end, they were in their rights to say no.

• I presented my premium pound on arrival. They were not familiar with it, and said I had to call reservations to apply it.
• I called reservations, who said my rate qualified, and that I should have the front desk call them if they did not know how to give me the credit.
• The front desk took the premium pound and said they would investigate.
• Several hours later, the front desk said I could use the premium pound but they would only credit it as $100. They only deal in dollars, and had no way to do a currency exchange.
• I challenged this. Then, the front desk manager called Marriott finance office in the States. At this point, they determined that I had a corporate rate and so could not use the premium pound.

The different messages I got regarding the voucher and the amount of time I had to spend left me with a negative impression of the front desk staff.

The final negative was that we were charged $50 for local calls, at a rate of $.40/minute. (We were attempting to change an airline ticket, and had about 90 minutes on the phone with the airline involved.) We had seen no information in the room regarding charges for local calls, so this was quite a shock.

I find if you have to make any quick calls in order to avoid the high ratse, I simply ask in teh Exec Lounge if they could Please call and order me a Car or reconfirm my flighst etc. Ive never been told no, nor have I been charged for those calls.

Hi All,

Thanks for the review of the hotel. I will be staying there in Mar on an award stay, so any other advice given would be appreciated :)

Thanks!!

Sounds a bit frustrating considering that according to other thread the hotels actually get about 80% of the face value of the PP back from the Marriott. When they use bad exchange rate as the hotels always seem to do they get close to 90%.

I was considering staying here and perhaps to use couple of PP's but maybe I should reconsider.

How far is the hotel from say... Parque Kennedy? Walking distance or X minutes by taxi is the answer I'm looking for

The walk is less than 10 minutes.

I would echo the sentiment of SanDiego1K. First they said that they cannot apply my PP, later they said that they can, and finally they said that they cannot.

On my case too they did have the right not to apply because I was on a corporate rate too.

Also you should be a bit careful with the taxes at the airport. We agreed a rate of $15 and later the taxi's boss who was raiding with us told that it would be 500 SOL's ($150). They didn't know that I knew what the exchange rate was.

JW Marriott - Lima - platinum upgrade success
 

Just wondering what people's success has been when paying for a or using your marriott points for a deluxe room. Where you upgraded to the executive level? Any suite success? Any comments on the suite? Specifically, is it 2 separate rooms, with a sitting area, and then the bedroom? Thanks in advance.

I did receive an upgrade to an executive king twice in the last 12 month's. No suites which as you know is not part of our elite benefits. Wish Marriott would change that policy :mad:

I'm planning on staying here during the last leg of my honeymoon in Peru. How much is there to do in Lima? How many nights should I stay? Right now I'm thinking 2-3.

Any other must do's in Peru? So far, we are planning to take a flight up north to Mancora or one of the other beaches (looking for a good hotel if you have a recommendation, please let me know). We are also planning on hiking the incan trail up to Machu Picchu. We've got 2 weeks to travel, so we are planning on doing about 3 days up north on the beach in July (I can't find any good information on what the temperature would be like then). I feel like we'll have the potential for one other destination as well, and I have some guide book reading to do, but would welcome any recommendations.

I'd book 2 nights max in Lima - and then book a sightseeing tour of the city.

I recommend going to Arequipa and Colca Canyon. We really enjoyed seeing the condors soar.

You might do a search in the Trip Report forum on Peru. hauteboy wrote this report and Stewie Mac wrote this. I found both very helpful when I was planning my trip.

In Lima, don't forget to visit La Mar for lunch and Astrid & Gaston for dinner. These are both owned by Gaston, a sort of peruvian version of Emeril. Both are excellent restaurants. La Mar is located in Santa Cruz, San Isidro on La Mar avenue. A&G is in Miraflores by Parque Kennedy.

If you are staying at the Marriott, obviously check out the nice sea-cliff mall right in front called LarcoMar.

In Mancora, I stayed at Punta del Mar this past December and liked it a lot. It is not in the Mancora town and is about a 5 minute moto-taxi ride away, which is a good thing if you want privacy. I'd pay more and get the ocean front rooms. http://www.puntadelmarperu.com/punta_e.php