Mr Shrewsbury

Review of Paradisus Princesa del Mar | V...

Nice hotel but there are many little issues that w...

Nice hotel but there are many little issues that were irritating. Upon check in our room was ready but still had garbage in the bathroom from previous guests and the bar fridge, which is supposed to be stocked, was empty. It took 2 days to get the fridge stocked and we had to call everyday to get bottled water and coffee.
The room was nice and big with a bedroom and living room seperate and large balcony with sea view, sort of, the trees block out 90% of the view. The jacuzzi tube was nice and big but water pressure was low and the hot water was warm at best, the wife had to boil water and add it to the tub to warm it up. Bed was a King and super comfortable.
Maintenance around the hotel is lacking, many of the lights on the paths were broken and just hanging or not working at all.
Buffet was a let down, food was bland and half the time you had no idea what anything was as they don't label the food. They kept running out of food plates. They were very slow to replenish food when it got low or out and more than enough times the desert area was completely empty with nobody around to fill it. Because staff expect you to tip them all the time you get OK service if you don't tip right away and you get better service if you tip before you start to eat which is no good. Buffet hours were less than ideal especially if you were catching a tour in the morning. Most tours would leave before the buffet was open.
The tools are just wading type pools not really designed for swimming Deck chairs are problem, everybody gets there early in the morning puts their towels on the chairs and then doesn't sit in them so you if you get in there a little bit later you have no chairs available and the staff do nothing to monitor who is just leaving the chairs and going off and doing other things all day.
Internet is only available in the lobby or close to the lobby and is 1 peso per hour, sometimes it was hard to get on.
For the most part staff were very friendly but you can see very quickly that they have a job and that's all they do is their job they can walk past something broken but that's not their job to report it.
one of the biggest drawbacks at this hotel is it's one of the last ones on the peninsula and if you're doing any excursions or taking the bus into Varadero you take forever, you have to pick up everybody at each hotel so it can take you almost an hour before you start your trip.
This is my wife and my first trip to to Cuba and learned what not to do the next time. Would we stay at the same Hotel again? probably if there was a deal on.