Average trip to Cuba

Starting with the beach it was awesome!! This is the reason we travel to Cuba. Food was very repetitive at this resort, although we did not starve the a la cartes all offered the same menu options (chicken,fish or pork) that is pretty much what we ate all week for dinner. Beach snack var had hamburgers, ham and cheese, pasta, hot dogs. Coffee was hit and miss, ran out some days also beer. We were booked in the Alegance section so didn't have any issues in that area with drinks. No shows a [... read more]t the theater at night, there was some entertainment in the lobby every evening (singer,sax player, band) The hotel seemed to be in its low season as there were not many guests the week we were there, maybe 100 total. That could be the reason for the lack of food options and entertainment. No activities at the beach or pool areas during the day. All in all it was a relaxing vacation, not sure I would return to this resort unless it was a super great deal $$ to go.

The perfect get away

This resort is the perfect get away for me. It has delicious foods, friendly customer service, clean rooms, friendly and cheerful cleaners, waiters and waitresses are very down to earth superb specially at Alegance ( I’ll give these people two thumbs up for their services), gardeners are friendly as well and greet you “Ola” all the time.

Very disappointed

Rooms were very filthy, VERY poor mattress, feels like I slept on springs the whole week . They would NOT give us water everyday in the room. They did not change the sheets the whole week. They did not give us new shower towels everyday. Beaches were awesome and coffee also. Food was awful. No butter At all.

Wonderful resort

This hotel is a five star resort that has expansive grounds covered with lush mature foliage. It is so beautiful and well kept. The layout is really good with the pools in the center and all the buildings encircling the pools. The beach is very natural and flanked by trees all around. It's beautiful but you can only see it when you are on it because there are so many trees. That being said, there are no ocean view rooms on this resort, you can't see the ocean for the trees. We booked ocea [... read more]n view and got a pool view which was fine. If you want a beautiful ocean view you won't get that here. Anywhere. We booked ALEGANCE and it was certainly worth the upgrade. Our first night there were no ALEGANCE rooms available so they put us in a regular room. It was large with a kings size bed, bathroom with tub and shower. The bed was not very comfy and we both slept poorly on it. The shower had good pressure and the was lots of hot water. Only 2 towels were provided in this room so you had to use your own pool towel. There is no towel exchange at this hotel. The next day we went to our ALEGANCE room and it was wonderful. 2 bathrooms a separate living room with flat screen and sofa. The private bedroom had a king size soft comfy bed and a patio that led out to the grounds and pool. Really nice. The bathroom had a 6 foot soaker tub and a walk in shower. There was never an issue with hot water or pressure, everything worked as it should. The AC was nice and cold and worked well. We got 4 towels in this room so we were able to use 2 at the pool and 2 for showering. They only changed the towels 1 time when we left them in the tub otherwise they were just hung to dry. The room was really clean and we only had 1 cockroach and 1 gecko in our room all week. There are several restaurants as well as the main buffet all with limited menus due to the food shortages. The food they do have is well cooked and well presented, but the lack of variety is notable everywhere. The liquor is also in shortage. They can offer only rum and beer at most of the bars. The lack of bailey's or rum cream for coffee was a real let down. There are no liquors available and you have to make due with rum or beer pretty much. I will say they did have red and white wine at the restaurants. The food shortages is highly apparent, there was no butter at all, they gave Mayo instead if you asked. No potatoes, no fries at the buffet, no pancakes, waffles, very limited vegetables mainly carrots, cabbage, and cucumber. One day they had tomatoes and 1 day lettuce. It is known by most that you don't go to Cuba for the food but this was the worst I have ever seen it. The main pool is large freeform with a swim up bar. It is 3 feet deep or less around the outside. It was green and got worse til they had to red flag it and close it for health reasons. They finally added some chlorine and cleaned it and it finally went beautiful blue. We just stayed out and swam at the allegiance section because the pool there was clean all week. All in all a good week. I would definitely go back to this resort in the allegiance section but not until the food and liquor shortages are over.

Good Beach, peaceful, complicated to have snacks after hours

The place was beautiful, with a great beach and spacious rooms, and the staff was very friendly. However, a couple of details were not pleasant. One issue that did affect my stay was the malfunctioning washroom light. While it wasn't a problem during the day, thanks to the ample sunlight, it became a significant inconvenience at night. I found myself resorting to using my cellphone flashlight just to take a shower. Several nights, we tried to have food in the snack bar that was supposed  [... read more]to be open 24 hours, but we got the "we ran out of" reply. At some point there was just no food at all. The Gastronomy restaurants were a hustle to get a booking, We arrived at 11:30 am to the resort and when we asked, we were told that the reservations were done between 9am and 11 am, the next day when we stopped by to make the reservation, the availability was for the day after, (our last night). When we visited the restaurant, the menu had 12 items, but only 3 of the 12 were actually available. And at last THE POOL WAS NOT AVAILABLE

Do not come to this resort

The management of this place is absolutely ridiculous, we arrived at 12 pm and our rooms were not ready untill 7:30 PM. The pool was off for the whole 4 days we were there, the water was green you couldn't see the floor on it. The beds did not have sheets after we asked for it they brought sheets that had yellow stains on them, this is not a 5 starts hotel at all, I will give a 2 if anything.

We'll come back!

We really liked the way the resort was set out, with small, two-storey buildings in well maintained grounds. Lots of flowering shrubs and trees. Our room was lovely and clean, and the housekeepers made sure that we had everything we wanted. The pool was great, the beach was sandy and fabulous. Lounge chairs were in demand, however. Get there early! We enjoyed the omelets at breakfast, with plenty of fruit available.There were line-ups for coffee in the morning, but the coffee was worth it. [... read more] We found the fresh fish and chicken options the best choices for lunch and dinner. The staff are friendly and helpful, and made our visit really enjoyable.

Very bad

We did not check in on time, they made us wait for 2 hours,room was not what we asked, no clean bedsheets/towels, no toilet paper, room lock cards did not work at all times. The staff at the hotel was rude, did not want to cooperate at all.

The resort coul use some upgrades.

So we got off to a bumpy start on the day we arrived. I had paid for the upgrade to the Alegance section of the resort,having been to the resort 3 time previously I knew the section and were definitely not in the adults only section. Our first room had many deficiencies too many to list. We slept in the room we were given but I got no sleep that night. The following day we went to the concierge in Alegance and she was amazing, her name is Jolie. By 2 pm that day we were given a room in that se [... read more]ction. Had it not been for Jolie our vacation would have been ruined. The Alegance section service and food were great. The grounds were well maintained and the weather was perfect. I will return to this resort, Valentin El Patriarca however I will be asking for confirmation prior the leaving of the section requested. All in all we had a great time, made new friends, and came home relaxed and our tanks were full. J. Harwood

Stay home!!

This hotel is possibly the worse place we have ever stayed. They ran out of everything, except for the alegance part, they had food and alcohol.. 23 chairs around the pool for the guests. Not nearly enough. Guests were stuck sitting or laying on towels on the concrete. Rooms had no ac, fridges that even when turned way down froze anything put in it. Beds were uncomfortable and there were no clean towels or toilet paper most of our stay. The rooms were cleaned once in awhile. They were short staf [... read more]fed all over the resort. The staff in the buffet ignored guests requests for basics like water, utensils, glasses etc. We arrived at 10 am and knowing ahead of time that our room wouldn't be ready till 4, we relaxed and waited, and waited and waited. We didn't get our rooms till 730 at night. We were exhausted. There was no explanation given. The WIFI will cut out continuely and you will gave to sign back in each and every time. The beach! This is possibly the worse part of the hotel. It's almost non existent. What there is, is on a slant, to the left is full of coral and to the right is covered in seaweed. It was never once cleaned. It certainly doesn't stand up to the standards of Varadero Beach. The activities people aren't around much. Neither are the gardeners. The grass was crazy long and the blossoms from the flowering trees were left to lay on sidewalks the entire time we were there. No one bothered to clean up at all. This hotel is gorgeous, the grounds are lovely and it is the only reason I'd give this resort a 1 star. Even the coffee bar ran out of coffee more times than we could count. We all understand the shortage issues and we were ready to accept these problems. But when part of the resort has eggs, bacon, cheese, vodka etc, and the other part doesn't? Then shortages aren't the problem. Other guests at other resorts reported no shortages at all. My husband had to go behind the grill one morning to heat up his cold food (i ate toast every morning), not a single employee stopped him, in fact, one of them told him rather than reaching over, just walk around. I was sure he was going to get into trouble, but after waiting over 45 minutes (and constantly being told "uno momento), his patience ran out and he took matters into his own hands. His breakfast that morning was finally hot. The buffet was just sparce and cold. We've been to Cuba over 40 times . We started traveling there in the 80's. Before Cuba was a real tourist attraction. This hotel doesn't even come close to those days...back in the 80's Cuba was just learning the tourist trade. Save your money, or spend it elsewhere. Stay away from this resort.

Stay away from this hotel!!!!

Literally no food, no sheets,no towels,not enough beach or pool chairs, people reserve their chairs in the middle of the night. Terrible service as well. The only good thing was the wheather. I will never go back to that place. If anyone wants to go because of the low price take with you food,towels and sheets.

Awful

The hotel was ok to look at. A bit run down in room. Food was awful. Staff were racist to black people. Felt like I wasted my money. Never going back. The check-in was really bad. They didnt give us the wifi info. AC stopped working 2 days in. No white towels. Had to ask for clean towels and water 5 days in

Much more than we expected!!!!

We were extremely pleased with the resort, the staff, the location and the food. Though the rooms were a bit tired looking especially the bathroom, they were kept clean, and were spacious and comfortable. No issues with bugs. A spider got in once and a few pesky flies that bit me (but not my husband) as we left the window in the bathroom open, and it had no screen. Nice sliding/screen door leading to a porch or patio if on the 2nd floor. Room service came daily to make the beds. Th [... read more]e bath towels were replaced once on our 10 day stay. The beach towels were huge and plush. We did not run out of toilet paper or bottled water in our room. The common washrooms occasionally ran out of tp but I always had tissue on me in case. On any day trips we took, we needed to bring tissues with us, and to pay the attendant for some toilet paper (they expect a tip either way for keeping the washroom clean). I had read up a lot before we went to Cuba on the food shortages and lack of tasty food. The food far exceeded what we expected. The a la carte restaurants were fabulous. I stuck to fish for most of my meals and it was extremely tasty. My husband had fish, chicken and beef. His only complaint about the food was that it was often cold. Some of the buffet food was not great but there were also some very good options. They had a few grilling stations which were very popular. The bread and cheese were so good and available at every buffet meal. It was open 3 times a day: 6am-10:30am. 1-3pm and 6-10:30pm. You need to sign up for your three a la cart meals starting Monday between 8am-12pm. The sign-up is available Mon-Fri but not many spots left after Mon. The snack bar by the pool was great. It was pretty much open 24 hrs. It offered simple meals: sandwiches, hot dogs, hamburgers etc... Ranchon was an amazing lunch restaurant near the beach that was open from 12:30-3pm daily. This restaurant offered an app, main course and dessert as did the all the a la cartes. Coffee was available at Mikes coffee bar, the main lobby bar and the snack bar. Mikes offered amazing coffee choice. The resort ran out of coffee grounds for a couple of days but offered an instant substitute that most people thought was good. There was plenty of beer, rum, tequila and whisky. Wine was hard to come by and vodka was only offered in the piano bar. The staff was amazing. They were helpful, cheerful, pleasant, positive etc... They appreciated all the extras were brought with us. The store shelves are pretty bare. We were glad that we brough a 50 lbs duffle bag full of items to give out to these wonderful people. We also left some of our personal items and all our remaining sunscreen, bug spray(a must) and medicine. The beach of course was amazing. To the left it was rocky (you need to have footwear for the first 10 mins if you go for a beach walk) but to the right it was the typical endless sandy beach. We had heard that beach and pool lounges were hard to come by. This is correct. If you want a lounge chair by the pool you need to be up by 7am and reserve with your towel. If you got the beach by 8:30am, you could usually find a few open lounges. The most annoying part is the guests who put towels on lounges and don't show up until the end of the day to retrieve their towels. Very selfish.

Okay but not quite what we expected

The Valentin El Patriarca Varadero is okay and they DO try hard to make your stay pleasurable. It's not their fault that they have so many shortages. I realized during our stay that I am a bit of a food snob and I also have high standards with regards to hygiene. We stayed for 2 weeks and never once had our sheets or towels washed which was disappointing. The selection of food at the buffet is amazing however, food items you expect to be hot (or at least warm) are only room temperature which [... read more] may be okay for some people but personally, I like my hot food to be hot. We had our share of challenges with the wifi and for sure we were never able to connect in our room so just be aware of this. Our shower door was poorly fitted and every time we used the shower, we had a flood on our bathroom floor. The pool area is amazing but you can never get a lounger around the pool OR on the ocean. The pool bar/restaurant is great with great food and drinks and sadly, as a result of the shortages of loungers and chairs, guests take the chair from the restaurant out around the pool so finding a table with chairs to enjoy lunch is often a challenge. Great people and they try very hard. Al A Cart Restaurants are good (except The Gourmet with chairs that are not very clean and actually smell, plus the food is not desirable) but the other's are good. Night shows are fun and evening music, entertainment in the lounge is enjoyable too.

Could be so much better …

This hotel has sadly seen better days. The grounds are beautifully kept by hardworking staff, but so much else needs to be updated. They were repairing one of the bridges at the main pool, but it was slow going, partly due to the weather. My room, which was in the Privilege section was spacious and clean with a comfortable bed, but the curtains would not close properly and the thermostat was hanging by a wire. AC was not needed as it was cool during my stay but it did work. The staff work so har [... read more]d to keep up, but at the beach restaurant it was so busy during lunch that many people walked out without eating. There were no eggs, no yogurt, no butter, no fresh vegetables and very little fruit, but you won’t starve as there was plenty of fish and meats like chicken and pork. There were so few loungers by the main pool that fights broke out over reserving the chairs. The Privilege section pool got all new loungers which were great. I would say it was worth it to pay a little more to stay in the Privilege section, but you still have to go with an open mind when it comes to the shortages in Cuba.

It’s Cuba

Stayed a week, end Jan into Feb. We enjoyed our stay, room was nice AC worked, good shower. Beach is amazing, go early in the morning to put your towels on a chair to make sure you get one. Make sure to put Teatree oil in all your body wash, shampoo conditioner and make a spray bottle with vodka and tea tree oil to spray from your kneecaps down every morning and night. This will help with the sand fleas and mosquitoes. We never had any, but some people did. Yes, they did run out of pop fo [... read more]r mix and the food is not the best. We always found something to eat and drink. There was a coffee bar that served amazing hot and cold coffees.. I always bring a bottle of Baileys, and I really didn’t need it this trip. I would return, but would paid the extra to book to /privilege. I tried to upgrade once we arrived, the cost was $60 US a night and they didn’t have anything available when we arrived so we didn’t bother. With the status you have your own pool bar and apparently they have better selection and a Restaurant that people said had better selection.

Valentine el Patriarca

Medium size resort. Quite clean pretty good entertainment at night Excellent pool. Excellent coffee bar for liqueur in coffee Not impressed with food but Cuba is not a good place for good food Front desk staff spoke little English Habana and Veradero day trips were excellent. Overall for the price it is a good deal

Alegance section : A definit must!

The personnel assigned to the Alegance section of the resort was amazing!!! Caring, attentive and helpful resolving issues, if any. A private pool, bar and restaurant make a big difference if you're looking to escape big crowds and loud animation! Note : The following star rating will be relevant solely on the Alegance option.

Hey, it's Cuba

Patriarca Varadero, about 20 minutes by taxi from Varadero, 40 Valentin Patriarca, Varadero about 20 min by taxi $20 or 40 minutes by open top bus, 5$ US credit card only. The resort, like all others in the area are about 40 years old, so the buildings, rooms are dated. We stayed in the Elegance section upgrade, private pool for about 60 units or so. Separate restaurant for breakfast, lunch and dinner or other choices, 3 or 4 courses, plus as many ala cartes, choice of 5. The resort, tho [... read more]ugh dated and in need of some maintenance that they are working on.. The place is clean, the grounds are beautiful, ocean was close, beach nice. Service was great everywhere, people are great, 2 weeks which IMHO is why Cuba is special and you overlook the shortages or shortcomings. Everything they had was well presented. You don't go hungry or thirsty.

Definitely not a five stars. May be two.

When we arrived to the resort and our room we found the bath tab was out of order, no towels at all, the telephone set was out of order. Room was dark, not enough lights. Only two bath towers we got on the next day, and it never have changed during all two weeks of our stay. Hand towels they just don't have. The food was poor, include buffet and all of a la carte. There is even no tea spoons and your ice cream one had to eat using table spoon, if there was luck to get it or may be by finger.  [... read more]Also there were mosquito. Cuba became less comfortable and more poor since our last visit 7 years ago.