Diplomatico

Funny how you read through this thread and the hotel has gone from being paradise on earth to the biggest dump in SE Asia, lol. All in the span of - what - a year? Only on FT.

(People who haven't even been to the property are advising others to email the CEO of Marriott to complain. Priceless.)

SkiAdcock

That's strange. I'm seeing award inventory for most of April, May, June & July. Just picked random months.

Cheers.

Baby61212

Sorry, I was unclear- the plate of snacks is an entire plate of canapés and is quite generous. The happy hour wine is Chilean if I recall correctly- a Sauvignon blanc and a cab. The Sauvignon blanc was OK, nothing to write home about but it was drinkable. The margarita was good. Haven't tried the red wine.

flo_147

True! Seems like they are now offering award rooms, but just not for Jan-Mar :/

estnet

Had an awkward and annoying start to my stay, but service recovery was remarkable and I figured out how to avoid some of the problems. IMHO the biggest problem here is the staff - they are extremely friendly and want to please but due to language (or lack of) lots of things go wrong. The solution is to find the one (or two or three) people who speak (and understand) your language - in my case English- and deal only with them, not phone the concierge or whoever answers the phone. Double check everything, and be prepared for lots of misinformation that is given with the best of intent but often wrong (eg concierge told me there are NO restaurants out on the main road - in fact there are many but maybe he thought local places weren't to be recommended. Another staff told me the correct info and recommended some places).
As for the night market - the hotel's free shuttle is a blessing b/c it is quite far. Yes it is very touristy, but not a bad bit of fun. Tons of restaurants with the same fish on display (and the same prices) and some other interesting food stuff but loud, crowded and certainly not a local market. That said there are also a few restaurants down the street from the market that seem reasonable (and quieter). I ate in one that had reasonable prices and good food.
As for construction - yes there are problems - the cement and stone walkways are disintegrating and being replaced piecemeal, but my room (which I don't believe was ug'd despite a folder saying I was) is fine as are the photo's in my building (at least the ones I've seen) as is most of the building (except for some pooling water in the hallways which seems to be the result of not properly leveled floor.
This is a uniquely designed and very whimsical place on a nice stretch of beach (with water that is totally dependent on the winds - which are not under the hotels control) and while swimming in the ocean is impractical at times there are pools that are pleasant and have comfortable water (quite a nice change after the cold water in the hotels in Saigon where the pools never get sun b/c of all the high rise buildings).
The offered classes are a nice touch and many are free.
While there are lots of training issues (a new luxury hotel on an island is probably not the easiest to staff) and the difficulty getting correct information can be challenging it is, nonetheless, a beautiful property in a beautiful location without (for the moment) the horrible overcrowding and beach hawkers one finds in similar places.

SkiAdcock

Thanks for the update. Much appreciated.

Cheers.

azepine00

Woohoo i am bringing a rolling cooler to buffet (and of course plat reception)!

AbelianGrape

Just got back from a one-week stay. I think the comments here, in the aggregate, give a very fair description of the property. Here's our experience and impressions:

We had a garden room (Jardin), literally the one they show with the flanking hounds. (Only downside was that some other guests entered our little grass area to take pictures.) I think this is considered an upgrade, though other than having a semi-private grass area, I think its the same as the base "standard" room. It was spacious with a marvelous bathroom (roughly half the total floor area). A few quibbles with the room:
- The room is billed as 1.5 baths, but it's really 0.5 + 0.5 = 1.0 -- one small powder room with a toilet and little sink, and one huge room with a shower, separate tub, and two sink vanities.
- The little hallway (inside our room) and powder room had a moldy smell -- which fortunately did not extend to the rest of the room.
- I think the refrigerator wasn't as cold as a "real" fridge. Not a big deal for just cooling water and soft drinks, but not great for storing milk (for a child).
- There was construction going on just outside our room the last few days, which meant that whenever we entered through the main door (as opposed to the glass door to the grass) we had to pass through and track in construction dust (particularly with a stroller). Had it started a few days earlier we would have asked to switch rooms.

The staff are very friendly and helpful, but, as others have stated, not everyone understands English well. We had a few instances where our requests weren't handled properly (presumably due to language), but nothing terribly annoying. Estnet's suggestion of always going through a couple of good-English speakers sounds like a good suggestion.

We did not go swimming in the sea. Despite heroic efforts to clean the beach (including a bulldozer and some military troops), so much trash washes up (depending on the season and winds, we were told), that we did not feel safe going by/in the water. (We saw syringes, and other guests showed us a needle they found. When we saw a family with a child playing on the beach by the water on a relatively clean beach day, our immediate thought was that this must be their first day.) We stuck to the pools, and the sand by the hammocks and lounge chairs, away from the sea. In short, don't come to this hotel (at this time of year) to swim in the sea.

We were quite happy with the children's and sea shell swimming pools. The middle pool seemed a bit murkier most days.

The place never seemed crowded. Tempus Fugit during breakfast and the Chemistry Department during happy hour could get pretty full (once or twice at the Chemistry Department we needed to sit at the bar for a while until a table/bed became available).

As of last week elites (gold & plat) were getting free breakfast (6:30-11am). The breakfast is great. We were on a bit of an odd (for us) schedule in that we'd wake up before 6am, have a relatively light breakfast at 6:30am, then come back for a late breakfast (effectively early lunch) around 10:30am. (We checked repeatedly, and were told it's fine to do this.)

Regarding food, elites supposedly get a 15% discount on all food & beverages. There's a caveat, which wasn't mentioned until checkout, that the 15% discount doesn't apply to any bill on which any other discount appears. For us this was most relevant at the French & Co "bakery", where we had dinner a couple of times and some pastries and drinks (which were a small part of the bill) were 50% off -- so we didn't get the 15% discount on any part of the bill. I think I probably could have gone through each bill and got them to give me a 15% discount on all the non-discounted items, but it didn't seem worth the trouble so I didn't bother.

I agree that opening another restaurant or two would be a positive.

The Kids Club is great. We took our toddler there every day -- sometimes for activities, sometimes just to play. It was not crowded. Children 4yo+ (I think) can be left on their own; those <4yo need to be supervised by an adult. One can hire a babysitter; though we didn't do this (and I don't know the cost), we did see one baby (<1yo?) being attended by a babysitter, and it seemed fine.

We participated in various scheduled child and adult activities (one or two per day), and generally enjoyed them. In fact, several times we were the only ones to show up, and they were quite happy to accommodate us.

Someone mentioned kids running around unsupervised. Perhaps I'm biased, having been there with a toddler, but I didn't get that impression at all.

Overall we had a very pleasant and relaxing experience. We went to the night market once, which was fine (and enough), and otherwise just relaxed (as much as one can with a toddler) on the property. I'd say everything is pretty much as advertised, with the main concern being that the sea is too polluted to swim in.

hockeyinsider

What concerns me is that this hotel is still relatively new, but is obviously having issues related to the durability of materials used in construction and wear-and-tear caused by weather. What will it be like in 5 years from now? I've seen too many resorts in tropical locales that made bad decisions with respect to construction materials and/or architectural design and then furthered the problem by neglecting preventive maintenance.

AbelianGrape

That's a fair concern, but I'm not going to worry about it until the next time I'm considering visiting the hotel.

Vince Chan

Yes, but the problem is , this hotel opened less than a year. Those cracks and defects are not the problem of " maintain" but a problem of horrible construction quality from the very beginning they built and painting , and what kind of standard contractor followed.

azepine00

how is that different from any other new construction in developing markets?

UASPG

A notable example was The Westin Siray Bay Resort & Spa in Phuket with cracks appearing in many places as soon as the hotel opened - or shortly after. And, there were many other maintenance issues as well.

From what I recall, there was, like at the JW Marriott Phu Quoc, a trash issue on the beach, depending on the currents.

We never went back.

SkiAdcock

So if I understand the last several posts, those who are concerned about trash at certain times of the year & potential cracks etc won't be staying here. Others who still like the other trip reports & overall ambiance of the property will still book here.. And those who want to basically eat for free, stuffing their Tupperware & hitting all the freebies, definitely will. What did I miss?

Cheers.

imverge

Thats a bit much. It amazes me the lengths some people will go.... sheesh