Iberostar laguna azul

The resort was ok. Maintenance needed on many parts of the resorts. Lights in hallways at night to see and feel safe going to your room. Staff was horrible pretty much everywhere. The odd staff 1 or 2 were nice. I Tipped them.

Extreme Disappointment!

In a nutshell, our first to Cuba and this hotel was extremely disappointing. We are very well aware that Cuba is experiencing issues with food sourcing, among other things. Iberostar Laguna Azul resort made our stay unforgettable in a negative way. Of course, the food was terrible; some of it was even unrecognizable. I never knew that cabbage can be disguised and prepared in at least 10 different ways! Hamburgers at the ill-stocked grill were cardboard-like and anything fried in oil mus [... read more]t have been done so in very old oil. Overall hotel service was extremely poor. The bar staff were more interested in speaking and laughing with eachother, rather than serving a 15-person lineup waiting to order. This resort has a 24-hour snack bar available to serve anyone who may be hungry. On two occasions, the snack bar closed at 13:00 (1pm) without reason and opened only the next day. To my understanding, this is not 24 hour service. On 2 out of the 10 days we were there, our room was not cleaned. We contacted reception to report this and the room was eventually attended to by the evening. Since our room was not cleaned, we did not even have fresh towels once we returned from daylong excursions into Varadero. We also noticed dirty bed linens and only a bed cover without a bedsheet. The grill person started the charcoal grill at 14:00 and a lineup was already present. Imagine how long it took to heat up the grill and cook the little bit of food which was put on. Also imagine a resort bar running out of beer, rum and cola. Yes, this did happen. As a concluding comment, upon our return home, my partner had to see her doctor because of what looked like bug bites on her body. Her physician agreed and prescribed medication to control the swelling, itchiness and discomfort. I am also sending our review of this hotel to the management of Iberostar Hotels worldwide. We travel alot worldwide and have stayed at Iberostar properties in other parts of the world. We expected something more than we received at this property. Customer service at this property needs to be addressed promptly and concretely. I personally am a Hilton Hotels Lifetime Diamond Member. I am confident you are aware of the amount of travel was required by me to achieve this status.

Beautiful resort we definitely will be back

This was our 3rd time staying at this resort we booked the relax section this stay well worth the extra, amazing staff pabluin in the cegar bar is the best, we look forward to our visit next year . You could always find a lawn chair in the relax section main pool was quite busy but could find a place to sit once again I look forward to our next vacation in Cuba

Great resort

We arrived on April 21 for a 7 night stay. We booked the Vip relax section which was well worth the extra. You have a nice large pool a bar and a sit down lunch and breakfast that you order off the menu. The hotel was clean and the staff were very kind and friendly. The main buffet was always the same and there was good shortages there but your in Cuba you have to expect that. The ala carte were great witch we booked a different one every night. The drinks were good they did not have crystal  [... read more]beer which I found very weird but found another beer which was similar. They also were short on different pop as well for mix. This has been our thirty time to Cuba so we no what to expect. If you are considering this hotel I would pay the extra and book the vip well worth it. Hope this hotel helps you while you are looking for a hotel in Cuba.

Will never go back there again

do never go to this hotel. Its very mouldy service is no good. Food is no good. Drinks are no good. The beach was not even clean. the bedsheets in the room are never changed. The pillowcases are never changed. Customer service don’t care for their customers. I was sick and my friend too for the whole week that we are there. I do not recommend this place at all.

Don’t believe the negativity!!

Just got Back March 6th and everything was Great!! Only shortage was coka cola one afternoon and no eggs for 2 days!! There is plenty of food, beach is great and rooms were very clean!! Definitely go back !!

Cuba has seen better days

Had to move rooms 3 times (bloody sheets, broken faucet, balony door would not close). Bad wifi connection. Limited food selection. Elevator did work and part of pool was closed. On positive side beaches are still wonderful.

Worst trip ever

Sheets and blankets were dirty and blood stained room was dirty . Food was horrible. Staff was rude and unhelpful.shower handle broken and on the floor . Toilet seat didnt fit . Poolside view to a closed pool

Unbeilivabe nosedive of a resort: story of a very unpleasant second experience at Laguna Azul

I am someone who doesn't fuss much about travel and tends to take things easy. This wasn't my first rodeo there; in fact, it was my second time returning to Laguna Azul. Sure, there were some hiccups last year, but nothing I couldn't handle. However, this time around, the experience took a nosedive into the realm of the unimaginably awful. Let's start with the food – or should I say, the stomach-churning nightmare it turned out to be. Even someone like me, with a stomach seemingly made of iron, [... read more] wasn't spared from the horrors of food poisoning. And it wasn't just the taste; actual cockroaches were making themselves at home in some of the dishes, particularly the sweets. It's not every day you find yourself fighting for your meal against insects, let alone having to inspect your food for unwanted guests. As if that wasn't enough, there was the issue of a malfunctioning wastewater pipe that was leaking wastewater right in the middle of the resort. Picture this: every time we ventured to our room or made our way to the pools or the beach, we had to navigate through a minefield of used toilet paper and, yes, actual human waste. Needless to say, the thought of taking a dip in the main pool, which was perilously close to this sewage leakage, was quickly dismissed. Then there was the matter of drinks – or rather, the lack thereof. Rum shortages in Cuba? really? Not having any at all on some days was beyond comprehension. And forget about a classic mojito even when rum was available because there was no mint around! Worse, no coke!! so not even a rum and coke. Even when rum was available, the staff seemed clueless about what to do with it, simply adding a bit of rum and some awful-tasting artificially flavoured liquid with water and calling it a cocktail. But that was not the only problem, even those drinks were often so diluted to the point where they might as well have been serving flavoured water. They were told not to pour more than one-third of a shot of alcohol in each drink. Even Red wines were diluted. All the stored red wines were already open and when drinking them it was as if you were drinking red water! Many people were buying a bottle of rum and a bottle of code or wine from the resort stores to drink something semi-decent. Speaking of the staff, their demeanour this year left much to be desired. Gone was the warmth and attentiveness I had come to expect; instead, there was a palpable sense of indifference. It wasn't just me noticing this shift – many of the other guests I spoke to shared similar sentiments. I am a very good tipper and even extra tips didn't help. I literally heard from another guy that he stopped tipping because it appeared it doesn't make any changes. It's hard to say what exactly was behind this change, but it certainly put a damper on the overall atmosphere of the resort. Even room service was off. For instance, they wouldn't change the towels if they seemed dry (we were seeing the same dirty towel with a certain mark on it being hung again and again!). They wouldn't even replace the filtered water bottles if they were half empty! And speaking of atmosphere, it was sorely lacking in the entertainment department. No music on the beach, no nighttime festivities on the beach – just a pervasive sense of coldness that seemed to seep into every corner of the resort. In conclusion, would I recommend this resort to anyone? No, absolutely not. Save yourself the trouble and seek out greener pastures elsewhere.

Enjoyed our stay

We stayed at laguna azul from feb 15th to 23 First on arrival was at 1230am , no help for luggage and 4th floor room and elevators broken . We survived that and got our exercise. First morning I was pleasantly surprized by the garden view and open air hallway staircase . Clean and very well kept. Walk to the beach was only a few minutes sunrise was one of my favorite things always greeted by "holas " good mornings from workers starting their Day either cleaning the pool beach or general kit [... read more]chen staff . Grounds were very well maintained and pools 1 was down for resurfacing but the swim up one was enough for everyone plus 2 other quieter pools for relaxing we enjoyed them all . Beach was being dug up and wasn't quiet all week due to tractors trucks and dozers. But understandable needed to be done as sea wall erosion was evident . Our room was always cleaned and new towels made into animals daily . Water was never an issue. . We did upgrade to relax but really wasn't needed as any rime we were hungry did snack bar or buffet . Did enjoy the Japanese a la carte . Entertainment was nightly but same dancing got a little blah . Sadly was not impressed by animation , no real personal touch ,no kids shows no schedule followed or couldn't find where to go to look . All in all it was a great resort . Sun and fun you make yourself . Could be a bit more personal .. at end of our week new staff were on and things perked up and we felt the love .. thanks to oneysis and dania they went over and above

Overall a good holiday with some issues.

We stayed at the Iberostar Laguna Azul from Feb 10th to 17th. Overall we had a good experience, having come in with realistic expectations. The resort is very beautiful and must have been really something at one time. A number of areas are under construction; pool, beach, some of the buildings and rooms. A short walk on the beach and you can see the splendor of Varadero beaches. We stayed in the "relax zone" which gave us access to a very nice private pool and sit down breakfast and lunch, which [... read more] we really liked. There were shortages, some days no coffee or eggs. We took a day trip to Havana that was spectacular. On our tour, we talked to vacationers from other hotel and most said their hotel had no shortages. At our hotel there were a majority of Russian guests. While most were very polite, we did have a few "bad encounters" with drunk people at the bars. For that reason, we won't be returning to Cuba any time soon.

Could be better.

Grounds are well kept, good selection of food. Service was terrible at the buffet, sometimes no service at all. Pools were under renovation, bulldozers at the beach, and elevators were not working. Not worth upgrading to relaxed as you really don’t get much extra. Not many activities going on, bartenders weren’t happy when you order non alcoholic drinks. No slushy drinks.

Would not stay here again

We just arrived back from this Resort last night. It is definity not a 5* more like a 2*. We love Cuba and its people. We were totally open minded regarding meals as food is rationed out amongst all the resorts with 5* getting best first and goes down the chain to lower star ratings. We stayed one week and when we checked into our room the mini fridge was empty. Went to front desk twice to have some sent to our room with no success. No pop either. For a resort this large, none of the elevators w [... read more]ere working. If you have small children or seniors travelling its a brutal climb. For two people we had one towel all week. We never saw any maids on our 4th floor all week. Most food were weiners cooked 15 different ways. No eggs or bacon the entire week. Lots of beans, sausages and hard biskets. Some fixings to make a salad. Decent desserts and ice cream is delicious. Ran out of coffee most days not to mention it was the same for drink mixes. One bit of advice..tip the staff. We tipped between 1$ to sometimes 3$. Front desk staff give you the impression that they dont want to be there. Restaurant and beach bar staff are amazing. Beach is ok but last week we had to listen to bull dozers digging on the beach for 3 days. Swim up pool/bar was being retiled, that left one pool for every one. We loved all staff except for front desk. Sadly to say that we will not be returning.

Very Bad Hotel - Total Disappointment

I wish we did not select this hotel. I believe that Tripcentral or Sunwing should send an independent inspector there to check it out. Until this many, many issues are resolved - please exclude this hotel from the options and please do not send people over there. This is a total shame to Ibersotar network reputation and to Cuba overall. 1. Elevators do not work in any of the buildings. We paid extra for the ocean view room and were placed on the 5th floor. We were with a 10-month old baby and [... read more] a stroller. We needed to walk the stairs multiple times per day with the baby and the stroller. We also witnessed how hard it was for people with disabilities to move between the levels. Lobby is on the 3rd floor and the buffet is on the 1st floor. Even if you do not go to your room, you are still required to move the levels. We were carrying the stroller on the stairs multiple times per day. We did not receive any warning in advance. We did not get any apologies from the hotel. We were not offered a different room. 2. Drinks quality and availability. Coffee was not available at all bar locations for days, except the lobby bar. I believe that the milk used in the coffee was powdered as multiple times we were tasting powder lumps in the milk. There was no pop, except tonic. No soda or bottled water. Coca-cola was available for 3 days out of 11 and it wasn't an original Coke/Pepsi. All the alcoholic cocktails were limited to the options alcohol + tonic. Wine selection was only red, white or rose - with no name (e.g. merlot, it was just red wine), the wine quality was poor. Many alcoholic drinks were not available - e.g. vermouth. All the juices were powdered and of a very poor quality. There were very limited options for non-alcoholic drinks - just tonic or powdered juice. Having at least lemonade would have been nice. 3. Food quality and variety. There was mostly processed meat - sausages, ham etc. and very rarely pork, beef or chicken. Not every day and only for one meal per day there was grilled fish or meat, however, guests were required to stand in the line for 15-20 minutes. Eggs were not available for half of our stay for breakfast. Vegetables were very limited - salad bar (cabbage, tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers) or steamed pumpkin, eggplants, green peppers, tomatoes tasting all very plain. Rice and beans were always there. Pasta was always available, however, it was always overcooked. Cheese variety was good. The food presentation was not appealing. There were no potatoes, except French fries in a snack bar 3 days out of 11. A-la carte restaurants were a bit better, except Cuban restaurant which served the same buffet food on nicer plates. 4. The big pool didn't work, the hot tubs didn't work. We received an email about the main pool being repaired 2 days before our trip but no word about the hot tubs. The working pools had damaged tiles and were unpleasant to walk in, especially for the baby. 5. Room cleaning did not happen every day, despite the fact we put a sign on our door. One day we had to go out to throw away the garbage ourselves (there were diapers). The cleaning lady works 9 to 5 and on some days she was not able to find 15 minutes to clean the room, unless you begged her. We always went to the beach 8am to 12pm and put the sign on the door but most of the days when we were comin back the room wasn't cleaned. Our baby was going for a nap 12pm to 2pm and we put the "do not disturb" sign on the door. On some days the cleaning lady would barge in during that time, despite the sign. We were refusing the cleaning during our baby naptime and she would assume we wouldn't need it that day, due to the language barrier. I feel like I paid twice more than I supposed to. I feel robbed, tired and disappointed. When I was leaving this hotel I was thinking maybe all Cuba is like this and that I would never come back to this country. But after talking to other tourists, I realized this was the hotel problem. Tripcentral - please don't send people there. If you are considering going this hotel - please don't go, it doesn't worth your money, time and mental health.

Mexico is great this time of year!

The food was not good (some meat had jagged pieces of bone hidden inside), I cut my foot when I stepped on a piece of broken glass next to the pool, which was only half open (the swim-up bar half was closed for maintenance. On top that, one of the employees at the currency exchange lied to my friend about the exchange rate, costing her over $200 dollars Canadian more she she was told. Many places on the resort seemed to open only when they felt like opening and not the advertised times and the e [... read more]mployee in charge of taking reservations for dinner was annoyed by having to book reservations and mixed up every reservation we made. Do yourself a favour and go somewhere else

Nice Family Resort

Well, this is a nice family resort: 5 pools. Unfortunately the part of the main pool with a bar was closed during our stay. But We were able to use other pools. Due to strong wind and waves the beach was deformed to unveil the rocks and some metal structures, as such it was not safety to go to the sea. We had to step aside from the resort to swim. The room service was good: water each day, towels are not changed for the stay, cleaning was excellent. The food: as we are seafood lovers we found  [... read more]it super good, as we had calamari, fish, octopus, mussels, scallops... Options for veggies and fruits. Entertainment team did their best and it was always funny and great. In general: even though this resort needs some repair done, It's a nice one.

Good times and people.

Was a fun time. missing items like eggs and meat. It’s an island. Cockroach in room. The atmosphere was nice. The staff were amazing. The pool with the bar was closed due to fixing it. Overall not bad

Disappointed

The hotel has a nice layout but has shortfall in upkeep and basic stocking of rooms. The door wouldn't lock and maintenence was informed but was still not working properly. The food was horrendous barely palatable and I'm not a picky person. The beach is amazing so only points for location. The staff are friendly but minimalistic in response . Currently there is a food shortage so the omelets station was cooking up the stuff to go in the omelets but no eggs were added and plating it for lined u [... read more]p clientele. I got food poisoning quite badly during stay here and heard another whole family on the airplane coming home had food poisoning as well. Wouldn't stay here again and has actually left a bad mark to not want to come to cuba again in the future . Will stick to Mexico instead.

Save your money book elsewhere

We started with one room that smelt so bad like must and mold we had them move us to another room. Also the safe in the first room had no batteries in it. Second room there is mold all over the bathroom tub and sink. But we stayed in there rather than having to move once again. Our second night here we went to the front desk because we had a couple minor issues with the room and we were told maintenance would be up in 20 minutes. Well 3 days later and we still have not seen a maintenance guy. [... read more] Breakfast at the buffet we have seen eggs only twice but you have to line up for them for 20 minutes or more. They have shrivelled up pancakes but no syrup for them. There is next to no selection for breakfast at all. The servers bring you coffee or juice but don’t come back to see if you are ok or need a top up. Lunch has been ok not a lot of selection but we did find something. Dinners have been a mess next to nothing in selection and the food is cold even when they bring it freshly from the back. Also want to point out absolutely nothing is labeled with what it is so you have no idea what you are taking whether or not you will like it. We did the Italian alacarte the one night. We ordered chicken. The chicken was extremely dry and rubbery to the point we had a hard time cutting it with the knives. The cheese soup tasted like kraft dinner sauce and the chocolate cake tasted like the box it come in. The Japanese restaurant was amazing we did enjoy that. And the show that goes with it was on point. WiFi has been horrible on one minute off the next. No WiFi at the pool or beach either. Booted off and can’t get back on for some time. It was even very weak when on the balcony. Housekeeping the room was cleaned daily but not once all week were the towels changed just folded and put back on the shower rail. Our shower was only a wand which we had to tuck into a pole to have a shower. Otherwise hold the wand the whole time. The weather this week wasn’t as friendly as Cuba weather should be so we spent a lot of time in the lobby. We waited hours and had to flag the server down to even get anything in there. The bar was always lined up so that also took a lot of time just trying to get a drink. The entertainment team is awesome they keep the crowd going and the evening shows have been great. Also not once has the elevator in building 16 worked. Overall this wasn’t a great experience and we will not be returning here. Definitely not a 4.5 star. I would give it maybe a 2.5 to a 3. I do understand that there are shortages in Cuba but service isn’t great either and in my opinion that makes or breaks a resort. Unfortunately this one is a break for me.

Iberostar Laguna Azul

The food was surprisingly good. Excellent service. No shortage on liquor there, Lots of beer, wine ,rum, vodka, and tequila. Lots of entertainment and music in the evening. We would return again as a repeat customer.