First Sandals Whitehouse review from Chrisncheryl's webpage
Enjoy everyone!!!
Posted: Thu Feb 17, 2005 12:15 pm Post subject: The long review Part I (Arrival, Check-in and Rooms)
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Ok, sorry that my review was so synical last night. It was 2:30 AM and I was more than tired of the crap we had to get through to get home. It's a story for another thread and has nothing to do with my Whitehouse review, so I'll skip it for now. Ok, let's get into it. Pictures pending but there's A LOT of them and some are pretty good.
I. Arrival
First of all, AirJam cancelled our 7 AM flight out of ATL so instead of getting to the resort by noon, we weren't there till like 3 or after. The lobby was a zoo but they did a pretty good job of keeping the peace (lots of champagne and Red Stripe). It took us about an hour of continually asking people to check us in for them to GET us checked in, but 'no problem, mon! Just glad to be here!' The Spa was also giving out free chair massages (about 5 mins a piece) to anybody in the lobby who wanted one. Got one, it was awesome. If this is a continual service (I don't know, it was while we were there) it will be $1.50/minute. They're Swedish Massage was $90 for 50 minutes.
The lobby was not complete, but nice. No marble on the countertops. It's smaller than it looks like it would be from that drawing in the brochure, but it's nice. Marble floors and such. All that you would expect. People are just amazingly friendly. Really, they are. Clueless, but friendly.
On our day (opening day) everyone was checked into the French because it was all that was open. We got no upgrade and, come to find out, we were so happy we didn't!!! We loved our room. It was on the first floor of the French and we just walked in and out to the pool all day! The rooms are just incredible. Some said they would have preferred carpet, but I loved the tile floors. Very easy to clean. Four poster beds. Furniture very nice. Blah blah blah.
A NOTE: Continental Room Service available for ALL ROOMS!!!!!
Normal SpectraVision movies are available and they have like 100 on that database you can choose from. They are $4.95 per movie or $14.95 for the more 'adventurous.' Internet access also comes through the TV for $14.95/day or $21.95/3 days. I think that's right. They also have high speed internet on the desk. Something, I don't know. We didn't do it.
I decided our room was in the best French Village block (there are four blocks in this village). It goes blue, ourangish, yellow, another orangish. We were in between the blue and yellow. This looked right onto the pool and ocean (pics later). The blue looks straight into the grill (at least first floor would), the yellow looks back at the mainland rather than out to sea, and the other orangish isn't connected to the pool! We later ended up in this fourth block which is like if you drew the little dipper, it'd be the handle. It looks straight out to see and is closer to the water, but it's not by the pool, so that sucked.
So, as stated, we were moved after a few days because we had constant problems in the first room. Our light fixture in our bathroom leaked water (never good), another light bulb went out (on the second day???? how does that happen?), and the bath tub flooded everytime you showered. DavKat thought maybe we were getting too wild in the shower, but it was just faulty. At least that's all you'll know about it!
All the rooms look the same. We saw a room in the Dutch Village which was many many categories above our entry level Deluxe Room and looked IDENTICAL....identical to our room. Except it was on a higher floor and in a different Village. So don't sweat the categories. Unless you get a suite, they'll all look the same. Even furniture and everything. Same square footage and all. The same.
Ok guys, stay tuned to Long Review Part II (Resort Layout)! This will be my favorite because the layout absolutely blows! I wish I could sit down with ol' Butch and just say 'dude, really, come on.' It's a big resort, which I'm not scared of (I actually prefer it to the small SDR we went to last year) but if you have 'big' you have to make it convenient. You can do big and still have things near you so that you never recognize how spread out it is and have happy guests. SWH did not do this. They spread out things all over and, as a result, you definitely are always aware of how much walking you're doing. Ok, there's the teaser.
_________________
--the doc
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Posted: Thu Feb 17, 2005 12:15 pm Post subject: The long review Part I (Arrival, Check-in and Rooms)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ok, sorry that my review was so synical last night. It was 2:30 AM and I was more than tired of the crap we had to get through to get home. It's a story for another thread and has nothing to do with my Whitehouse review, so I'll skip it for now. Ok, let's get into it. Pictures pending but there's A LOT of them and some are pretty good.
I. Arrival
First of all, AirJam cancelled our 7 AM flight out of ATL so instead of getting to the resort by noon, we weren't there till like 3 or after. The lobby was a zoo but they did a pretty good job of keeping the peace (lots of champagne and Red Stripe). It took us about an hour of continually asking people to check us in for them to GET us checked in, but 'no problem, mon! Just glad to be here!' The Spa was also giving out free chair massages (about 5 mins a piece) to anybody in the lobby who wanted one. Got one, it was awesome. If this is a continual service (I don't know, it was while we were there) it will be $1.50/minute. They're Swedish Massage was $90 for 50 minutes.
The lobby was not complete, but nice. No marble on the countertops. It's smaller than it looks like it would be from that drawing in the brochure, but it's nice. Marble floors and such. All that you would expect. People are just amazingly friendly. Really, they are. Clueless, but friendly.
On our day (opening day) everyone was checked into the French because it was all that was open. We got no upgrade and, come to find out, we were so happy we didn't!!! We loved our room. It was on the first floor of the French and we just walked in and out to the pool all day! The rooms are just incredible. Some said they would have preferred carpet, but I loved the tile floors. Very easy to clean. Four poster beds. Furniture very nice. Blah blah blah.
A NOTE: Continental Room Service available for ALL ROOMS!!!!!
Normal SpectraVision movies are available and they have like 100 on that database you can choose from. They are $4.95 per movie or $14.95 for the more 'adventurous.' Internet access also comes through the TV for $14.95/day or $21.95/3 days. I think that's right. They also have high speed internet on the desk. Something, I don't know. We didn't do it.
I decided our room was in the best French Village block (there are four blocks in this village). It goes blue, ourangish, yellow, another orangish. We were in between the blue and yellow. This looked right onto the pool and ocean (pics later). The blue looks straight into the grill (at least first floor would), the yellow looks back at the mainland rather than out to sea, and the other orangish isn't connected to the pool! We later ended up in this fourth block which is like if you drew the little dipper, it'd be the handle. It looks straight out to see and is closer to the water, but it's not by the pool, so that sucked.
So, as stated, we were moved after a few days because we had constant problems in the first room. Our light fixture in our bathroom leaked water (never good), another light bulb went out (on the second day???? how does that happen?), and the bath tub flooded everytime you showered. DavKat thought maybe we were getting too wild in the shower, but it was just faulty. At least that's all you'll know about it!
All the rooms look the same. We saw a room in the Dutch Village which was many many categories above our entry level Deluxe Room and looked IDENTICAL....identical to our room. Except it was on a higher floor and in a different Village. So don't sweat the categories. Unless you get a suite, they'll all look the same. Even furniture and everything. Same square footage and all. The same.
Ok guys, stay tuned to Long Review Part II (Resort Layout)! This will be my favorite because the layout absolutely blows! I wish I could sit down with ol' Butch and just say 'dude, really, come on.' It's a big resort, which I'm not scared of (I actually prefer it to the small SDR we went to last year) but if you have 'big' you have to make it convenient. You can do big and still have things near you so that you never recognize how spread out it is and have happy guests. SWH did not do this. They spread out things all over and, as a result, you definitely are always aware of how much walking you're doing. Ok, there's the teaser.
_________________
--the doc
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