Family Fun

This hotel is great for both couples and families. The rooms are updated and modern. The facilities, such as the pools and kids area are amazing. Everything was kept clean and in working order. Many days you will see the manager on site interacting with guests and staff in a very pleasant manner. The entertainment staff work so hard to make sure that guests are having a wonderful time. The kids club make sure that the little kids are having a great time as well and the parents don't need to [... read more] worry about their little ones. The only thing that I feel falls a bit short is the food. There could be more variety for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Wait times are and can be quite long at the hot stations such as pizza and pasta. There could also be some improvement in the beach area. This area could be cleaned up quite a lot with the number of rocks. Perhaps raking the area every morning would make it beautified. These would be the only areas that I would say needs to be worked on. This is a resort that my family would for sure go back to. Thank you Iberostar Playa Pilar for all your hard work at the resort and making our family vacation a great one!

Team are amazing at the pool,

Annie, Lindy(sorry maybe spelling wrong) and Rambo, excellent staff, an asset to have them. Very clean resort. Need to work on the drinks a little more. Great holiday would go back but like beach. Pool was lovely

Awesome Week!

We just returned from a week at Iberostar Play Pilar (March 16 - 23), and had a fantastic time. We were in a room on the 3rd floor of Building 15 so it was a bit of a hike to the main lobby, buffet and beach, but it was nice and quiet, and had a great view of the water. The room was clean and AC worked very well! The buffet was good - servers were great and very hospitable. Food was pretty decent for Cuba - a few misses but lots of variety and we never had an issue finding anything to eat. [... read more] A la carte restaurants were overall excellent - the Japanese was hands down the best one, and Mediterranean was very good as well. The Gourmet wasn't as good as I was expecting but was still decent. Beach was a bit different than what I'm used to but I enjoyed the boardwalk and there are still lots of beach chairs on the sand to sit and have a good beach experience. The water was beautiful and clear, and snorkelling off the beach (WWII shipwreck there which was cool) was one of the highlights of the trip! We walked to Playa Pilar once from the resort and it was very nice, but we decided to just stick to using the resort beach as it was still very good and close to the all inclusive bar :) A great week and we will definitely be back!

Nice resort!

Hotel very clean and well maintained. Staff are exceptionally friendly and welcoming. Resort is fully operational and cleaned up after recent hurricanes as evidenced by young landscape plantings and new beach shelters, which by the way were plentiful! Beach was great for our needs and water very clear, but a little awkward accessing water from gorgeous elevated boardwalk (not ideal for those with mobility issues) Pool was great! well designed and situated and very clean with daily activities f [... read more]or families.

Amazing experience!

I have nothing negative to say about our visit. The hotel was amazing, the staff were amazing, the food was good, we always found something to eat. One of the days we missed breakfast due to sleeping in which was a fault of our own, but our only options of food were from the snack bar. The only downside was that the snack bar only offered food such as pizza, pasta, or burgers and fries. My only recommendation would be that they offer more "breakfast type food" before lunch for those who may  [... read more]be late getting up, but other than that everything was great. There was lots to do every day, a lot of entertainment at the pool in the afternoon and the entertainment staff was really great at getting people involved. I have to say I went outside my bubble and tried a lot of things I wouldn't normally try if it weren't for them. We will definitely be back to this resort in the future. The staff and the entertainment at this resort were EXCEPTIONAL! I have to say they absolutely made the experience that much better. To anyone who is thinking of staying at Iberostar Playa Pilar you will not regret it :)

Amazing resort. A must to visit

Variety of food. Al-a-carts are excellent, especially the Asian restaurant. Pools are refreshing with the pool bar. The ocean is amazing. The blues in the ocean are breathtaking. Great boardwalk by the beach. All staff goes out of their way to welcome and wait on you. They are very friendly and knowledgeable. Some of the bartenders go the extra mile to make your special drinks. The rooms are clean. The grounds are well kept. The music in the lobby at night is great. There was always clean t [... read more]owels. Our second time there and will return again.

A Great Resort with an Amazing Staff !!

We have visited this resort twice and have loved it both times. The grounds are beautiful and the boardwalk over the coral beach is a great place to sit and enjoy the ocean view. We found the food at the buffet very good both times with lots of variety. Plenty of grill stations to sample and not much of a lineup up at any time. The wonderful staff is the main reason we returned here, they are beyond friendly and work hard to ensure you have a great experience at IPP. We would not hesitate to rec [... read more]ommend this resort to anyone. We would also like to thank Lisa Selig of tripcentral for yet another seamless vacation transaction. Thanks Lisa, cheers until next time.

Awesome resort

This was our second trip to the Playa Pilar in two years, needless to say we returned because we was impressed on our initial visit. I have nothing bad to say about your resort, the amount of staff that remembered us from our trip a year ago was mind boggling. I apologize if I cant remember names but from the time we stepped off the bus we was greeted by Jossy and Yadier, awesome people skills, they were the first two to remember us. The rooms was great always clean, good variety of food, buffet [... read more] and a la carte`s, didn’t really care for the Mediterranean restaurant, not because the food was bad just it wasn’t the type of food I prefer. Wilbur, the bar tender at the 24 hour snack bar made very good drinks which kind of matched his personality and attitude, always upbeat and friendly. All staff from the grounds keepers to the people that waited on you always had a smile for you, and willing to help out in any way they could. If I had to put a negative twist on this place it would be the lack of a beach front, the boardwalk is great but a beach is nice, in saying that Pilar beach is a short walk if you want to go there. Overall I would definitely recommend this resort to anyone that wanted a fun and relaxing vacation. We will definitely return to this place in the future.

Beautiful resort! Beautiful people!

The surroundings were beautiful, luxurious and clean. Thank to Ballemy for your excellent work at keeping our room clean. Thank you for the towel shaped swans.Thank you Yudis for your very useful Spanish lessons. Thank you Jamines for your professionalism and patience in teaching me how to play tennis.

Good Resort

This resort is relatively new so the decor and layout is very nice. The grounds are well kept with beautiful gardens - overall very nice aesthetic. Staff were very nice too and the entertainment was good. Where the resort could improve was around efficiency in their processes. The check in experience was horrible. There was no line just a crowd at the counter....it felt like when you are ordering a drink at a very busy bar. When we finally got to check in we had to fill out a very long [... read more] form with information I would have thought the resort already had...things like our names and addresses etc... The whole experience took over an hour. Since we were the last family to check in and it was late - after 11pm the bell boys were gone. We had to carry our luggage through the resort in the dark to find our bungalow. Terrible first impression. The other real area of weakness is in their a la carts. They have 2 good options one was Gourmet and the other was a Japanese restaurant. Then they have also set up a "room" that they claim houses 2 other a la carts. It alternates between Mediterranean and a steakhouse those were horrible. Both nights they didn't have most of what was on the menu. What was available was really sub-par. We would have been better served eating at the buffet. We were able to get reservations at Gourmet and it was very good. On balance the surroundings are beautiful but some of the basic services need improvement.

Amazing Resort

Loved everything and every minute of our stay at this resort. Well maintained grounds, clean rooms, friendly staff with great entertainment and a beautiful ocean. Beach is limited but the pier gives you easy access to the water without the sand if you want or there are plenty beach chairs behind the pier in the sand. Pilar Beach is close by and you can walk the beach or take a short ride by bus or taxi. Food was good always something to eat for even the pickiest. Already thinking of booking our  [... read more]next visit!!

Amazing

No complaints. Great service at reception. The staff were great and very helpful. Staff spoke very good English. The hotel grounds were beautiful and well maintained. No complaints about the food as well.

Amazing place

Very nice clean comfortable room with beautiful view Friedly staff Good food with a lot varieties Beach is not the best but playa pilar is 15 min walk what could be great daily exercise Entertainment was not bad Hotel is very good better than more other places we stayed in Cuba We had beautiful weather and that also helped to have relaxing vacation

Nice resort food not so good for our week

When planning our trips we rely mostly on reviews and feedback from friends. Seeing as this is a new resort with a gorgeous layout and reading past reviews we decided to splurge and check out this 5 star resort. This was our 8th trip to Cuba and we’ve heard on occasion to spend the extra money and go elsewhere. We did try Mexico and Dominican and have had positive experience, but we both love the people in Cuba and feel that it’s our second home and we will continue to go there. So with [... read more] that being said I will write my first review because like others we were both disappointed. Check-In- When we arrived at the resort around 4 we were told they were still getting the room ready. After about an hour they had a room in block 15, seeing as we did some homework we knew it would be a bit of a hike so we said we were willing to wait longer for a closer location and we were able to stay in block 5 which was close to all the amenities. We were very happy with their accommodations. As far as replenishing water and beer the first two days we had to ask. I figured if they didn’t want to do what was required then I didn’t feel the need for anyone in my room, our only request was to replenish our toilette paper and we were told on more than one occasion they ran out. Food- We have always enjoyed the food in Cuba, so that has never been a factor for us when booking a trip. This is the first and hopefully the last bad experience with food and lack of selection. I could go on about the set up of the buffet area and about the long jammed up lineups for pizza, pasta, fish, and meat but forget it. We chalked it up to how possibly the hurricane could have contributed to the lack of selection of food (the Japanese E la Carte was the best experience of the trip by far.) We decided to take the bus to the Iberostar Daiquiri to check out the resort. We did have lunch there and we were impressed with the quality and selection of food, so that cancels out the hurricane for the reason for lack of food to finding out they are run by different owners. The Daiquiri does have a nice market, gift shop, and beach but the atmosphere and layout at Playa Pilar Iberostar beats it. Beach-If you love laying on the beach and occasional running into the ocean then you may not like the layout considering they have a board walk over rough coral and you would have to go into the ocean by walking off the board walk. We knew that before we booked so we were ok with the set up. Cigar Lounge- Onei took good care of us at the Cigar Lounge. He made a tasty Spanish coffee and Sangria. He enjoyed discussing the history of Cuba with us which was a Big Plus. These are major points from our trip, overall we did enjoy the layout of the resort, the entertainment, servers, room, pool volleyball, but because of the quality and lack of food selection we will try another resort in the future.

Dissapointed

Cuba is a nice country, with beautiful beaches. However, this resort made the experience almost terrible. Beach/water - the water is amazing but watch out for stones and corral. Water shoes highly recommended. The beach is fairly small but they have enough chairs and shade. Too bad they are not cleaning it; there are lots of cigarette buts and other garbage on the beach. The guys that are supposed to rake and clean are busy collecting tips for setting up the chairs and pretending they clean  [... read more]the sand off the chairs. Service - they are very disorganized and non coordinated and I think this has to do with the bad management and supervision because some of the workers there seem to be hard working and courteous. They constantly run out of something or another at the bars, restaurants and beach snack bar. The towels place opens at 9:30 and sometimes closes when they run out of towels. The internet is SLOW and only available in the main lobby. The Cigars bar has its own rules; I found a drink that I liked but I could only have it if I buy a $5 cigar that I didn't want or need. The next day that drink was gone... and the list goes on. Food - terrible. I expected that as I have been to Cuba before and I know they don't have certain things. But if you make fries why burn them? And I know they had plenty of eggs, milk and flour so why do you make breakfast pastries hard as a rock and crappy? In some days or for certain meals they had good things (tasty and appealing) but in very small quantities. It was gone in no time and no next batch, so it was lack of food but just bad coordination. There is no excuse for the hundreds of flies and cockroaches seen in the buffet restaurant. There is no bottled water other than the one they leave in the room, the water in the restaurant sometimes smells and tastes bad. Rooms - are nice, at least buildings 7-8. You get 1.5 l bottled water daily in the fridge. Housekeeping is OK.

Excellent Resort.

Considering this is a relatively new resort the operation of the resort functions above average. The various staffs especially the animation team perform to a high standard and are to be congratulated. In fact the staff in all areas work hard to make the tourist happy more so then most resorts. The ground are a work in progress and will be beautiful when more mature. The food is good but even the new resorts can not keep the food more then warm in their trays in the buffet. The a-la-carts are wo [... read more]rth attending and the small beach unique at low tide. The walk to the main beach at Playa Pilar is well worth the effort. Our room 1525 was spacious especially the bathroom and the towel art appreciated. This resort has been carefully laid out and the pool area impressive. We enjoyed our stay and recommend this resort.

Ugh

I was looking forward to returning to Cuba. The people here have been our favorite compared to other Island resorts etc. Not this time. Alot of the staff seemed not interested in providing good service. Either by attitude or insufficient training, I'm not sure. It is a newer resort, perhaps Iberostar had problems getting experienced help. The food was typical Cuba. Mostly had to stick to pasta , rice and bread. Always self served, the cooks managing the hot plates were painfully slow everyday  [... read more]with every meal. The rooms were ok although my safe was not working 1st night and the tv remote for 3 nights. Ants were a issue, I killed about 8 a day, but they don't generally bother me, nor did they bite. There is no real water, beach area. The Sand is dirty and never raked the week we were there at e end of January. Over all, it was the least favorite resort we have been to, unfortunately. Poor service and food over all (completely forget the snack bar at any hour, worst service I have ever put up with anywhere) Too bad, we were looking forward to this vacation. We are already looking to return to Cancun or Jamaica next January.

Not a 5 star

After having to change rooms due to a bad knee had a nice room looking a little tired...some of the staff were wonderful but others just worked if you tipped...the food was the worst...cheap alcohol & each bar had different drinks definately not consistent....this resort should not be rated as a5 star....I think the pics were deceiving....to end this vacation never going back to Cuba

Never go back again

Food was terrible. Lot of problems in the room ( no hot water, water doesn’t evacuate from the shower, wind whistle through the window can’t sleep) Hotel is not well clean Beach is not clean either There is no really entertainment specially during bad weather’s day However the bay is nice. The staff are super nice too and smile.

Wonderful Experience!

Iberostar Playa Pilar is a terrific resort that shines with its service!! The food and beverage options are wonderful and the staff is exceptionally friendly and accomodating. The seaside area is incredible with plenty of lounge chairs and awesome bar service. The view...breathtaking!