johnaalex

Thanks for posting this. It looks promising for my planned stay in August

piyush

You're welcome!

I may stay at this hotel prior to August. I will post how they treat elites staying on points if I do.

tomy77

Category seems too high. Even the JW Jakarta is only cat 3.
Hope it comes down to at least cat 4 next year.

johnaalex

Thank you.

piyush

Staying over here now on points. MR status is gold. Nice hotel and nice location. Received an upgrade to a deluxe pool view room with a tub on the balcony! No mention of gold status at check in though.

My reminder e-mail says that as a Gold Elite member, you can enjoy the following benefits during your stay:

•Guaranteed Concierge Lounge Access/ Free Continental Breakfast
•Complimentary Room Upgrade (Based on availability, at time of check-in)
•Free Internet Access

However at check in that they said are an Autograph collection hotel and a resort so no breakfast on an award stay. They do not have a concierge lounge. I have e-mailed the front desk the reminder e-mail and copied Marriot on it. Will post back if I hear back during my stay. If not I will take it up with Marriott once we leave.

Will post a review in a few weeks!

BKKLEE

any prop listed as a resort is technically exempt from providing guests (G/P) brekkie unless they unilaterally want to...............it's also been previously reported that Auto Coll props will not provide brekkie to guests on points (as I recall, was stated in one of the Boscolo reports).............
"Outside the U.S. and Canada, you are entitled to continental breakfast 7 days a week. (Not available at resort locations.) "

Bacai

But this hotel is not a resort.

From their web site, the name of the hotel is:

The Stones Hotel- Legian Bali, Autograph Collection®

I would avoid any hotel try to cheat on the benefit.

BKKLEE

agreed that this Bali prop is not classified as a resort, but don't be misled by the lack of the word "resort" in the hotels name as there are several props that are resorts that do not contain the word resort in their respective names................ yes, it's very confusing (but then again so is the distinction between AC by Marriott and AC XXXXXX, an Autograph Collection prop)!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://www.marriott.com/hotel-search/resort.hotels/

JC5280

I'm here now staying on points. Beautiful property, and for this Platinum guest, they upgraded me to the top floor (5th) Deluxe Pool View room from a garden view that was the only option when booking the reservation. I look out over the middle of the pool. The rooms all appear to be the same size, with the exception of a few suites. The manager here told me that two exceptional suites, one a presidential, are still being built. I am guessing those could be on a mysterious 6th floor. From the pool, you can see there is a helicopter pad up there too.

On arrival, they offer a cold towel and a popsicle. nice touch! No breakfast is provided for Plats since they call it a resort. No lounge there either. Everyone gets free wifi, and the signal is strong. I was offered the Platinum arrival gift though. A few ice cream and drink selections on there, but I opted for points. Breakfast is supposedly $30 USD in the restaurant, I ventured out and found b-fast for half that at several places. Interesting too, because most items on the room service menu are under $10.

Rooms not facing the pool would look out on less desirable views - neighborhoods, rooftops, fences, etc.

The pool is huge, and well laid out. The staff is awesome here. The food is good. The drinks are the only think pricey - about $10 USD for a cocktail, and $4 to 6 for a beer. Not bad at all. About what some nice restaurants here charge.

The rooms are small by US standards, but normal for Asian hotels I have been in. Espresso machine, cool decor, and nice furniture. The king size room I am in is probably best for no more than two people.

The bottom floor rooms have a splash pool on the patio instead of the tub and patio. But I like the higher floors for the view, ambiance, and privacy. Though all patios have a cool curtain that can be drawn for full privacy.

There is good security coming in and out of the hotel from the street. Cars are thoroughly checked, and that means opening trunks, glove boxes, and there is a dog that sniffs the car. There is a security checkpoint as you walk in too. They check you every time, regardless if they recognize you. This is a good thing in my mind, Bali has been a target in past years and I would rather see decent security.

The beach is across the street, the hotel doesn't have any view of the beach. But it's very close.

It seems that it's not too crowded here right now. The hotel is in its 9th week, and most of the guests seem to be Australian. I will post more later in the trip and include some pictures too. It's a very nice place. Keep in mind all of the pics on the website are renderings, not real photos. But the hotel lives up to its marketing.

johnaalex

Looking at the web site they say there are, in rising price order:
Deluxe Garden view rooms
Deluxe Pool view
Premium Pool view
Deluxe Corner

Given that all the rates include free internet and breakfast it seems Golds and Plats have little to look forward to other than some sort of upgrade.

BKKLEE

don't disagree that paid rates inc. breakfast, but the complaint herein is that point stays don't............

SkiAdcock

Well they could look forward to a nice stay at a nice property

Thanks for the 2 recent trip reports. Much appreciated.

Cheers.

JC5280

That's a depressing way to look at it. Not sure how much more you could expect.

And not all the rates include breakfast, those are listed on the site separately. Disappointing that point stays dont include this. But not the end of the world.

The premium pool view is the bottom floor with the splash pool. I wouldn't prefer these as much but mostly because they lack the privacy. Corner rooms could be bigger, but are not the best views/location on the building. Happy for the upgrade to deluxe pool view.

rebadc

I started this thread so I will add our trip report.

Being a smart LP member I reached out to the hotel's GM and FOM for information on their property and the Visa on Arrival process/wait time.

We had a deluxe pool view room reserved in advance and the willingness to look at a upgrade to a suite if available.

We landed at 11:30am. Visa on Arrival took 5 minutes collecting bags and immigration to 10 minutes. The other thread on FT about this would have you spend money to use a welcome/expediter to speed up the process. Not needed.

From there you bargain with the local taxi drivers. The first quoted $250k(RP) the 2nd quoted $150k(RP) I found a taxi and offered $100k(RP) knowing the meter if used would be around 75k.

Check in was easy, there is the security thing (like driving into a compound in KSA) but it keeps undesirables and evildoers out.

We were given the deluxe pool view. I asked about the upgrade and after checking in the back we were told yes but the room needs to be cleaned first. This was nice as we were staying for the week. We went to the first room to freshen up and go to lunch while our suite was being cleaned.

The deluxe pool view was a nice corner room; modern, fresh, white colors, and a tub on the balcony? (I can see an outdoor tub in Utah or Colorado but Bali...it was like 105 degrees with 80% humidity) The suite we moved into later in the day was at the end of the hallway facing the pool. The room was larger (length) and there was a nice 3 seat sofa at the base of the bed but the room was not divided into living and sleeping areas. We used the sofa and coffee table for snacks and morning coffee so that regard it was a nice addition to the room.

Breakfast was included in our room rate. I'm going to side with those who feel the property is not a resort, it isn't; the property is a modern business hotel that caters to conventions. The Hard Rock Bali is a resort property. Back to breakfast lot's of Indonesian and quasi Asian food (fresh noodle soup bar) a decent selection of western food, eggs cooked to order, turkey bacon (actually decent but not as good as pork) fresh breads, pastries, and fruit. They serve ice cream for breakfast and I brought my wife a fresh waffle with chocolate ice cream on top and that became one of her favorites. The staff will bring any coffee you like, we drank cappuccinos. and outside is a juice bar and they will make you custom smoothies. We were quite happy with the quality of the food and the service.

What we did. We hired a car and driver to take us to the temple at Uluwatu for sunset and grilled seafood on the beach at Jimbiran Bay.
We hired a car and driver to take us on a whole day trip to the temple at Besikah; it rained on us but we had a great time and even prayed with our driver and received blessings.

We drank luwak coffee which comes from the poop of a civet. had massages every day and enjoyed nice meals in and out of the hotel. We ordered lunch poolside on most days and tried all of the sandwiches and pizzas, they are quite good.

The beach across the street was very dirty. lots of wood, rubbish, and plastic. You might think it comes from Japan but it doesn't, the beach we were told is always dirty

We had a day trip scheduled for snorkeling on the north end of the island but it rained and was cancelled due to weather. We spent a day in Ubud looking at handmade silver, wood carvings and handmade batik fabric (the real batik fabric is very expensive)

After a week we were well rested and flew home to the states.

Would we go again? If we wanted to go to Bali for a "paid resort" experience we would choose another property i.e Hard Rock, Anantara, etc.

If you want to visit Bali on points then the Stones is a perfectly fine property.
The staff are wonderful and helpful, the food is good and they have a sexy saxophone man who plays every evening at the pool or on the roof of the pool bar.

honu

Thanks for the nice trip report. We have a couple of free MR nights (cat. 1-5) and were thinking of using them in Bali. Originally I thought I'd use them at the CY, just because I've really no interest in the Legian-Kuta area, but this sounds like a nicer hotel and it's newer. What would you do if you wanted a couple of days in a very quiet, relaxing place? Would the CY fit the bill better?