Roc Arenas Doradas: FIrst time to Cuba

The hotel grounds were beautiful , the hotel rooms Were good, the key card suck big time . We had to get them re done practically everyday , had the kids go through the patio doors sometimes cause we were sick off getting the keys fixed. The food we Didn’t like but we stuck to the basics and got through it. The bartenders are amazing and the grounds people were very nice and friendly Every morning . Maid service too was great. Our bathroom did start to leak in the ceiling the day before we [... read more] left cause there was a Bad patch job but none the less we didn’t stay Much in our room Except to sleep. Would we return yes but we would go into town to eat and o my snack on little stuff at the hotel

Melia Peninsula Varadero: Great resort

This hotel was very clean. The food was above fine. The staff were all very kind and friendly. I would recommend this hotel to my friends. We had a week in January and our trip was fun and relaxing.

Iberostar Origin Bella Vista Varadero: Decent hotel

I’ve been to 6 different resorts in Cuba and Iberostar Bella Vista has been one of the best. It is a newer hotel and well maintained. Rooms were clean, everything worked and the beds comfortable. The staff is great and always seemed willing to go the extra step to accommodate visitors. The food, as usual, lacked herbs and spices (this is Cuba after all). The buffet and ala cart restaurants were good and provided a variety of condiments (mustard, ketchup, hot sauce, etc). I did find the [... read more] food at the 24 hour snack bar disappointing. It needs a major menu overhaul. There is a very good beach, three large pools and an exciting wading pool for children. Note: This is a high-rise building so be prepared for elevator waits or stair climbing.

Iberostar Origin Laguna Azul: Excellent vacation

The staff provides excellent service, fast and courteous. When we arrived we had a 1st floor room that smelled musty, they changed us to a 3rd floor and we were very happy, it had nothing to do with cleanness it was the ground, the food was very tasty and great variety I have never seen my husband eat so much and enjoy, we recommend Iberostar Laguna Azul. thanks

Melia Las Antillas: Nice time!!!

The hotel itself is one of the oldest, but it’s kept in good running condition. Love the stuff people are so nice and helpful!!! The food in the buffet could have been a lot warmer but it was plentiful. Beach is beautiful!!! One thing I can say Cuba got the most amazing beaches!!!! Overall had a very nice time!!!!

Iberostar Selection Varadero: Great resort

This resort is clean, beautiful grounds. Great for all ages. The food was fantastic, but I think the beach grill could have had a little more choice other than burgers and hotdogs. The buffet had a great selection of different food every day. The service was amazing, everywhere in the resort. Loved every minute . We were a group of 10 and we were all very happy with this beautiful resort.

Hotel Bella Costa: Awesome Vacation

The Bella Costa was probably one of the best resorts I've stayed at for a number of reasons. First - when staying in Cuba you have to know that there are a number of standards that may differ from what you expect. With that being said, the food at the Bella Costa was good. You won't go hungry and the fresh orange juice at breakfast was amazing! It's a smaller resort which I actually tend to enjoy. The room we stayed in in the Villas was amazing; clean, working A/C, 2 bathrooms, large bed, wi [... read more]th a large balcony overlooking the ocean. The beach is gorgeous (though we only had a few days of sun to enjoy it - can't change the weather!) and the water is crystal clear. What really makes this hotel experience though is the staff. They care about their guests and really do truly seem to want to make the experiences amazing. Everyone is friendly and eager to help. Bartenders are good and - lets just say the drinks are not watered down like some places I've stayed! If you're on the fence, don't be. Negative reviews happen because people like to complain, and are used to the comforts of home. Even with limited services, poverty and everything that comes with it - Cuba is a wonderful country. The people are great in and out of the resort and the Bella Costa is one of the gems of Varadero.

Melia Varadero: Beautiful resort

I suppose some 20 years ago it would have been a five star resort. It is well maintained, but the furniture is getting old and squeaky, the wind blows around the window frame, etc. On the plus side, beds are comfortable and the rooms are clean. The buffet restaurant has a good variety of foods. I would recommend the International a la carte restaurant. Try the swimming with the dolphins in the ocean experience. You can snorkel right off the beach, it’s very nice. We will come back!

Melia Marina Varadero: Very nice resort

The hotel was very clean and staff were very friendly and helpful. Great beach food was very good a little repetitive.Great pools and grounds to go walking.Entertainment needs to be improved big time. Great little shops and restaurants close by.The restaurants in the hotel are very nice but the portions are very small if you like to eat go to the buffet first. Over all we had a very nice time and I would recommend this resort.

Iberostar Origin Playa Alameda: Mediocre Resort

I want to start by saying that Wendy was a great travel agent. The things I loved about the resort were the staff, the music, the small size and the beach. The food was mediocre at best which I expected but the rooms need some well deserved maintenance. I know we can blame it on the hurricane but honestly the beds and couches need to be replaced. Our room was very musty and the A/C was either full blast or off making it extremely hard to dry anything.

Palma Real: Our Vacation

The staff were great. The food over all distasteful, and the majority of the food was cold. How can you eat cold soupy mashed potatoes? Two nights there was hot roasted ham. "Delicious"! Over all there breads were grand, deserts were delightful, and even had ice cream. Our room was alright, really basic and no frills. The maids did do a decent job cleaning. My biggest disappointment is from one province. "Quebec"!!!! Why can't the resorts make persons who are so disrespectful rude lack of mano [... read more]rs and extremely foul mouthed and do not give a dam about know one except for there ignorant behaviour! They scream, yell, swear, spit, do not pick up after them selves. It is a shame to say they were/are Canadians. Such an embarrassment to even be around so most of us would say Manitoba, Wpg., B.C., etc. Ocean grand.

Starfish Jibacoa: Great resort for the money. Fabulous staff. They make the place.

Very picturesque setting with the mountains behind and the ocean in front. Even though there is more sand than before Hurricane Irma, the Villas Jibacoa is a really good resort for the money. The staff are truly fabulous. They are what makes me want to go back again. The food is as good as any 3 star resort we have been to before. The bungalows are much better than hotel rooms.

Club Kawama: Get what you pay for

If you need a place to stay for cheap, go here but don’t expect much. The food in buffet was not very good and couldn’t stand eating the same few things past the third day. Rooms are very basic. Heard many people having problems with shower. The pillows are barely an inch thick so bring your own, we had to fold ours in half to avoid neck problems. You have to ask to turn on aircon and you woke up shaking cold or when it’s off, drenched in sweat. Not much happening around hotel expect for o [... read more]ne nightly show. We were roomed at the end of hotel lot and had to walk ten minutes back up to main area for food, drink etc. As nothing was open by us. The wifi was out for 3/4 days of our 7 day trip so have remaining of my wifi card to maid when we left, and the lights kept shutting off on our last day. Nobody shows you around or tells you where to go for the “restaurant” reservations on site. Don’t have much good things to say about this resort other than pretty nice employees.

Iberostar Origin Playa Alameda: Iberostar Playa Alameda!

Have been to this hotel before about 3years ago. I have to say the staff this time around were amazing! From the front desk, to the dinning rooms, and the maids, bartenders, even the gardeners,they couldn't do enough for us, they were very accommodating to us. They were fabulous! The hotel is a smaller one which we like, the food was okay, not as good as last time,but you don't starve that's for sure. The rooms are big with a walk in closet, and safe. The fridge was filled everyday with 2 be [... read more]ers, 2 pop, and 2 bottles of water. Coffee machine was very slow but your holiday so no rush! The beds are very comfortable, and the pillows were okay. Overall the hotel was good, it is an older hotel and they are trying to update it a bit. The Internet is 1 dollar for an hour, and can only be used in the hotel lobby. They have the bus that goes into Varadero right outside the hotel, it takes about 35-40 mins to get into town depending on how many stops it makes. Would I go back yes especially because of the staff! The beach at the IPA is amazing, lots of chairs, and umbrellas, they also have staff that come on the beach for bar service.

Muthu Playa Varadero: Old

Very old place. Only the price was right . Need repairs/ painting. Very unusual lobby, not enough places to sit especially when the weather is cold and windy. Not enough towels,beach towels, umbrellas. In the main restaurant there were always line up because cooks were very slow . Food was bad specially meat. Was scary to see the way staff did't change utensils after people left and they prepare for the next. They just left unused one(in their view unused) on the table for the next.

Iberostar Origin Playa Alameda: Some what dissappointed

The distance to the hotel from the airport was decent. It was approximately half an hour from the airport - so it wasn't too long a drive. The initial impression of the resort was nice, it was presented nicely. The front grounds were nicely manicured. The front desk staff were also very welcoming and quick to accommodate and get you checked in. Upon arrival to our rooms we were very disappointed. The furniture,the bedding, the drapery. Everything was very dilapidated and falling apart and wel [... read more]l-used. The patio door didn't open properly, it required a lot of effort. The bathroom was sufficient it was fairly updated. Our biggest disappointment with the room was that the air conditioner didn't work properly and the room smelled very strong of mildew and mold. I have asthma and don't do well with molds and mildew. The smell was constant. Midway of our week-long stay I actually had to get our bedding changed. We had just had a room clean that morning. It was raining fairly steady that day. So we spent most of the day in our room. Upon waking from a nap I had several bites. I had the staff put fresh bedding on the bed and that seemed to resolve the problem. No more bites. Inside the resort grounds it was adequate. It wasn't a very grand hotel. Just sufficient. Although the gardens and landscaping were maintained a lot was disregarded. By that I mean things like straws, plastic cups and just little debris was left to just lay around and lots of cigarette butts etc. I never really saw staff cleaning up after guests. There was also only one pool area, so if the number of chaise lounges provided were taken (30 aprox.) then you were out of luck. Dining hall was fairly clean and organized well. The staff both wait/chefs were very pleasant and welcoming. Food was plenty with a decent variety of stations. Although I wished they'd had more variety of fruit and vegetables. It was same everyday.... papaya, pineapple, watermelon. Veggies were, cabbage, pumpkin, eggplant. Never any variation. So the menu got old quickly. The hotel was rated a four star. I would not have given it more than a 2.5/5. This was our 3rd time to Cuba. A first time to stay with the Iberostar brand. I would not recommend this hotel or chain. Don't get us wrong, we love Cuba and it's citizens. Just not the time we spent at the resort itself.

Paradisus Princesa Del Mar: Beautiful resort with ocean front room. Great! Weather, not so great!!

We enjoyed one week at the Paradisus Princesa Del Mar this January 20-28. We requested, via our agent at Trip Central, a top floor room, with a King Bed and a room situated in a quieter area of the resort. We got all three requests. Our room was perfect located in building 4 on the top floor and was overlooking the ocean. We were literally only steps to the Beach. Our maid Yesiney who looked after us everyday was fantastic. The room was spacious and it had a king bed with a sitting area just [... read more] inside the balcony. There was a fridge with drinks and two beer (the maximum we were told) and we worked around the beer issue and it was corrected by the third day! All of the workers at the Resort were friendly and most spoke some, or a little English. The resort is very large, but building 4 seemed to be in close proximity to everything. My wife enjoyed the aerobics and yoga classes held in buildings beside the main pool each day. The main buffet restaurant is lacking in space. There were only 6 stations and they were all cramped together. The Buffet served basically the same food day in and day out. That was our only concern with this being classified as a 5* Resort which in way s it was but the Buffet was at a 3.5* level at best. But, this is Cuba remember so take the good with the bad. The weather while we were there was not good unfortunately and those before us had even worse weather and those following us were expecting the same poor weather we had. This consisted of very high winds, rain, and average to lower temps. We only made it to the beach 3 out of 7 days due to inclimate weather. On the nice days the beach was great but watch out for the Portuguese Man O war (jelly fish) as we observed probably 1000 lying in the sand the first day we arrived. On the nice days you would see 5-10 floating in the water which was not a problem, but on the bad days they were everywhere so people could not swim when the weather was bad for fear of being stung. The resort did have the beach cleaned and dragged every morning. The beach was beautiful and there were ample beach chairs for everyone so saving spots was not necessary. However, the beach bar was closed the first time we went over to it, apparently they ran out of cups! It re-opened within an hour. This resort was extremely quiet, not noisy like a lot of other resorts. Even by the main pool the Island music was kept to an acceptable level and wasn't pounding.As an adult only resort I found the clientele older and more reserved. There wasn't huge amount of late night partying going on. The weather may have had something to do with that also! Finally, we have one large complaint and this is in regards to a one day Havana Tour we booked for our stay in Cuba. We attempted to book this tour via Trip Central with our agent and through our provider Sunwing. For u/k reasons our agent could not access this trip on Sunwing's site. So, we went ahead and booked on line through Amigo Tours. When we started our trip we realized we paid more than double what other people on the tour paid. In fact we paid $146 as compared to most who paid only $70 each. We brought this to the attention of the tour guide who said she had seen the discrepancy in the price we paid and was going to tell her supervisor who in turn would call our Sunwing rep. We waited a full day before we talked to the two Sunwing reps at our Resort about this problem. They both said they knew nothing about this issue and no one from the tour company had called them. As was expected! They told us they were going to look into what they could do about it on their end and we never heard another thing from anyone with Sunwing after that. Typical. We decided we are going to call our CC company and report this as an internet Fraud and try to recoup at least half the money we were over charged through them. I suggest anyone traveling to Cuba only book with their provider once you are at the Resort.

Melia Marina Varadero: Very nice resort

It is a very nice resort, the room was big with balcony, good services, four restaurants and buffet, place very secure, the personnel is professional but a bit far from downtown varadero and airport and There was bed bugs.

Blau Varadero: A Nice, Clean, Chill Resort with a Great Beach...

My husband and I, along with another couple, stayed at Blau Varadero from January 20 - 27th. Other than the weather being crummy for all but three days, we did enjoy our stay. I will elaborate: Flights/Airport: We flew Air Transat and it was a good flight. Although we had a delay due to them being short a staff member, we still made it to Varadero around the same time we were expected to, and everything regarding our arrival at both airports was fine. Our flight back to Toronto was fine as  [... read more]well, however at both the Varadero airport and Pearson in Toronto it seemed to take forever to get through everything. Once you get to Cuba, you can exchange your Canadian funds for CUC's (Convertible Cuban Pesos) and you can exchange it back to Canadian before you leave. If you have any left over you may want to even if you plan on going back to Cuba in the future as they said they aren't sure if they will still be using the same currency or if it will be discontinued and it is useless anywhere else. You no longer have to pay the departure tax at the airport as it is included in the cost of your travel plan. Shuttle/Arrival to Resort: We were the last to be dropped off at our resort so it took a little longer than we thought to arrive at Blau, but the shuttle was comfortable and it gave us a chance to see what some of the other resorts looked like. Upon arrival we were checked in promptly and up to our rooms in no time. Resort: The resort is a pyramid-shaped hotel that has all of the accommodations together in one building, and the resort property is very compact in that you don't really have to walk too far as everything is all quite close together and not very far spread out. For people with mobility issues there is an elevator to take you from floor to floor. Pretty much everything is all in the one building or very close to it. The hotel is also built so that when you drive up to the lobby you are ground level but then at the back to be ground level you have to go down a couple floors. Rooms: The rooms were spacious and clean. Nothing fancy, but we don't spend a lot of time in them anyway. We were on the 4th floor just above the piano bar, which, if you go to bed early, you will hear quite clearly. Our bed was comfy and we slept well, but our friends who were down the hall a few rooms did not as they said their bed was very uncomfortable, almost as if they were missing the foam on top of the mattress springs. That was pretty much the only issue with the rooms. They are your typical all-inclusive room with a balcony, bed, bathroom, room safe, etc. The t.v. had a couple of English channels like CTV, CNN, etc., so we could watch something before we went to sleep. Restaurants: The main buffet restaurant is in the main building and serves breakfast and dinner daily and you don't need reservations. There are two a la carte restaurants right behind the resort. You need reservations for these and we were given vouchers upon check in. One is used during the day for the lunch buffet and is attached to the pool bar. It is then transformed at night as an a la carte serving tex-mex. The other is an international restaurant and both of them are right beside each other so they aren't hard to find. There is also a 24 hour snack bar right by the beach. We didn't eat at it, but we ate at the others and the food was good and we were able to find something to eat each day, even with one of us being vegetarian and the other being gluten-free. Bars: There is a main bar on the bottom level, a piano bar up one level, a pool bar, a chill-out bar, and a beach bar, all serving typical all-inclusive drinks and you can also get cappuccinos. Entertainment/Activities: You can get a schedule that outlines the daily activities that go on. There are things like Yoga, Tai Chi, Aqua Zumba, Beach Volleyball, Bocce Ball, etc. They also post each day what the nightly entertainment will be. We did a couple of daytime activities, but because we are early risers we did not stay up to watch any of the entertainment as it doesn't start until 9:30 pm. If we could wish for one thing it would be to have maybe an earlier show for the people who eat dinner at 6:30 pm and don't want to wait around until 9:30 pm to watch it, but we could be in the minority for that so I am not sure if it would be feasible or not. There is always live music playing throughout the day and evening somewhere on the resort, and they had statue people one night and these other characters another. There always seems to be something going on, yet it never seems loud or overly crazy. Beach: The beach is beautiful and it is very long and quite wide. You can walk a good distance to get to either end before you hit a rocky corner, so for beach walkers, it is situated in a good location along Varadero Beach. As long as you get up early enough you can get loungers and a palapa to sit under, but if you wait until later morning you will likely be out of luck as it can get quite busy. They have Hobie Cats and paddleboats,and you can go out 20 minutes off shore to snorkel for an hour and then back again for $20 CUC's each. We were going to do this, but unfortunately for one poor lady that we saw, she got stung by a jellyfish as it was quite windy and the tide was bringing them in, so we were hesitant to go after witnessing that. She was in the beach area when this happened but we still didn't want to risk it. Pool: The pool is fairly big and there are lots of loungers around, and although there were a few pergolas they didn't have many with sunshades to sit under. Maybe something that is to come as perhaps they got damaged in the hurricane a few months back. We spent some time here when it was too windy to sit on the beach. Spa: There is a spa where you can get services like massages and facials. We had massages and they were $40 CUC's per person for 50 minutes. There is also a gym, whirlpool and sauna in this area. Shops/Internet: There is a souvenir shop and a cigar/rum shop right in the hotel. There is also a pharmacy. You can buy WiFi cards at the front desk - $1 CUC for one hour to use on your own devices. Service: I have to say that all of the staff were very friendly, attentive, eager to please, and all seemed to enjoy their jobs. Excursions: We didn't do any as the weather was not very cooperative - but you can go on tours like going to Havana. We took the double-decker bus into the town of Varadero just to get a change of scenery. You have to walk out to the main highway to where the bus stop is. Or you can get a cab right from the lobby entrance. Overall: This is a very decent, compact, laid-back all-inclusive resort that is for adults-only and seemed to be primarily couples - many of whom seemed to be retirement age, although there were some younger people as well. If you want to get away with your significant other, or a few friends, or maybe other adult family members and just have a chill week and do a few activities then this is a resort that is good for that. We really don't have any complaints, other than we hit a bad week where we got more bad weather days than good. But as far as the Blau Varadero goes, we were satisfied with everything.

Villa Tortuga: Great Memories

Stayed at Villa Tortuga for my first time in Cuba. Rooms were clean and the staff was accommodating and friendly. Food was edible. The villa grounds were well kept and the drinks were great. I would stay here again for the price I paid.