Overview – 2 star resort (out of 5) This was our first trip to Grand Lido Braco. I had been to Couples in Ocho Rios once and Hedo II in Negril 20+ times. My wife had been to Boscobel Bay with her children. We both have been to Sandals on St Lucia and many other Caribbean Islands. I just note this to show that we have had many experiences in the Caribbean and that we are aware that Jamaica is an underdeveloped country. We arrived on Christmas Day and departed on New Years Day.
We picked Braco for their C/O area as well as the luxury Super Clubs said the Grand Lido’s provided. While we were very pleased with the C/O facilities, we were not at all happy with the lack of luxury, service and food that the Braco provided us with.
The quantity of choices, Quality of food, and dinning room service was lower quality than we have received at Sandals, Hedo II and other resorts that we have visited in Jamaica and other Islands.
When we picked Braco, we thought we would get top of the line service and food. We were greatly disappointed in this. We arrived on Xmas day and there was no special dinner that night (like I have had at Hedo). In fact the dinning room was over crowded and they kept on asking people to not hang around as people were waiting for tables. The second nite we were there, while waiting for desert and drinks, we got up to dance, when we returned we found someone resetting our table and getting ready to sit someone else there. We complained and no apology was forthcoming.
For the week we were there, we never had any one come over and refill our water glass, ask us how dinner was, ask if we wanted more drinks (we had to grab people when we wanted more drinks), no salt and pepper shakers on the table, Choices for appetizers, soups, deserts were very limited. This might sound like trivial problems, but when you are paying $800 a nite for “Lido service” you tend to expect much more.
Food in the French restaurant was not much better then the buffet food. I had watered down soup and 4 lamb chops for my rack of lamb dinner. Service was okay, but it still took 2 hours for my wife to get 2 drinks.
Airport 2 ½ stars
Arrival I had not been in Jamaica since 2003 and the airport arrival is much improved. There are now standard gates, so you don’t have to depart on the tarmac. The arrival lounge has many more agents and is better controlled, with two lines feeding to all the agents. You no longer have to try and guess which the shortest line is. When you enter the lounge you are told which line to go to, and the lines moved pretty quickly. The lounge was full when we got there, but it only took us around 20 minutes to get thru immigration.
The downstairs baggage area, is still a disaster, it was so crowded it took us 5 minutes just to make our way down the stairs. You then had to fight you way thru an overcrowded area to first figure out which line your baggage is coming out of and then once you get your bags, to fight your way to a line to leave Customs.
Once out, we headed to the SuperClubs lounge. It was nice but they had run out of water, and we had to go and buy some drinks. This was a sign of how SuperClubs seems to have forgotten the little things, or is trying to save some $$. We waited around 25 minutes till our bus was ready, and then sat on bus another 15 minutes waiting for more people. The bag handler who took our bags to the bus was insistent about a tip, and followed people onto the bus until he got paid.
The bus ride wasn’t too bad, though the bus seats had less leg room then a school bus. About ½ of the road has been completed and it only took us a little under an hour to get to the resort. There the bus driver reminded us he wasn’t an employee and solicited a tip.
Departure The brochure says the bus drivers aren’t to be tipped, bus drivers tell you otherwise. Ours made one stop on way to airport for some unknown reason, he ran out talked to people, came back in. Takes a little bit of time to get thru the airport check in, and immigration checks so be prepared. However the departure lounge is now a thing of beauty. The main lounge hasn’t changed much, but there are now lots of restaurants bars, stores on the new gate area. You can actually relax and eat a meal, and they board people by section, instead of a mass rush outside.
Check In/ Check out– 2 stars Arrived at resort, someone asked us what we wanted, brought us a cold towel, and the check in only took a couple of minutes and we were given our keys to our room and safe. The bellhop taking us to our room (B Block on the C/O side) didn’t know where our room was, whether it was on A Block, on first floor or 2nd floor. I will give him the benefit of doubt that he was new there. Took us to our room and dropped our bags right inside the door, didn’t bother showing us the room, where AC was etc which most bellhops do. While there we could never figure out how to turn off the fan, and what several switches were suppose to control.
When we checked out, there was only $16 that we charged to our room from one of the stores. It still took me 20 minutes to check out.. No idea why that long, she had to go to back room couple of times. While the check in was smooth, the check out for some unknown reason took forever.
Room. – 2 1/2 stars We had the mini suites on the Nude side. King Size bed, Ugly Leather uncomfortable green couch, sink in the room and bathroom with a shower. Room was clean but dark, only a couple of lights by the bed. You couldn’t use the mirror in the room because of lack of lighting. Think of a Holiday Inn Express and you get an idea what inside of room looked like. We had a balcony with nice view of the beach and the pool (we were on second floor). While the view was nice, I think if we return, I would request a ground floor room, so you can walk right out to either the beach or the pool. You would still have a patio to sit in, but could avoid the stairs. The bathroom was nice with a great 6 head shower in it. We had great pressure and hot water during the morning, but several evenings around 5-6 we had no hot water. The bathroom also could have used some lighting in the shower. The closet was a decent size, though the safe was in a bad spot that made it difficult to get into. There was no place in the closet to put your suitcases, since the doors were too small and we had to store our suitcases by the bed.
Talked to people who stayed on other side of the resort, and there were plenty of complaints about the rooms. Not clean, some rooms had stuff falling from ceiling, someone else told us, she had to go to front desk to get a chair in her room, so she could put on makeup. Bathrooms on this side were dated and small.
Bedding – 1 star The bed was a King Size bed, firm mattress and comfortable. The pillows were old lumpy pillows that had passed their prime. They do offer better pillows but you have to pay for them??? You need to pay for good pillows. Our biggest problem was the sheets. They didn’t fit the bed. If you are 5-10 or taller and stretch out on the bed, you will find your feet on the bare mattress instead of the sheets because the sheets do not reach the bottom of the bed. If you toss a little in your sleep, the sheets will come up off the side and you will be on bare mattress again. You don’t expect this at a luxury resort.
Food Services – 1 star As mentioned above, we found the food services, quality and quantity very lacking and disappointing.
Victoria Station - 1 star Breakfast We had breakfast here everyday as well as several dinners and a lunch. The service ranged from non existent to fair. If I was going to a Breezes or a Hedo I would have complained about the service, for Braco to call themselves a luxurious hotel with this type of service is a laugh. We would sit at breakfast for 10+ minutes before anyone would ask us what we wanted to drink, we would then wait another 10+ minutes before the juice would come, and sometimes longer for the hot water for my wife’s tea. If you wanted a second glass of juice or a fill up on your water, you were out of luck. During the week we were there, nobody every came by to refill our water glass or ask if we wanted more juice. There was only salt and pepper shakers on 10% of the tables, and half of those were empty. On some tables, it looked like they got the pepper shakers from the Italian restaurant. The big ones you see in pizza places. The food was standard breakfast food, one line for eggs, and if you got there at the wrong time, it backed up there. There was no availability to open up a second egg line. The quality varied, sometimes the waffles tasted like they had been left overnite, on a different day, they were a little fresher. If they ran out of a food (such as scrambled eggs) on the line, they did not seem to replace it quickly. Nobody was checking the line on a regular basis to see what was running low. They depended on a guest complaining that the food was gone, then they would go get some more.
Lunch Had lunch there once, the service was poor like the breakfast and the selections were not plentiful. Food was blanded down, not a lot of choices, one soup instead of two that most resorts have.
Dinner Had dinner there a few nites, The best dinner was Wednesday nite when the beach party was cancelled and they threw extra tables in the dinning hall. Service was better then most nites and there were more choices then normal. We got there on Xmas and when we went to dinner, it was explained to us, that we could go get our soup and appetizer or the waiter would get it for us, and then we would order meal and desert. My wife is not a big fan of buffet, so she asked the waitress to get her soup and appetizer, the waitress looked like she was going to kill my wife and we ended up helping ourselves. The appetizers were the best and most plentiful of the week we were there, but there was nothing like a special Xmas Dinner. There was only one soup available and 3 deserts to choose from. We got there before 7:30 and then watched as a line grew for tables and people had to wait for 20 + minutes to be seated. I am guessing they closed the specialty restaurants and didn’t bother setting extra tables for all the guests who would normally eat there. A couple of announcements were made asking people to give up their tables. I understand why they made the announcements but if I am paying $800 a nite, I don’t expect to be rushed thru dinner. Service was very slow which might be why the line grew. We waited 30+ minutes for our dinner and then had to wait a long time before waitress came over for our desert. Forget about getting a drink order or a glass of water, it was faster if you went and got it yourself. As the week went on the food got poorer with less choices for appetizers. Second nite we went to dance and our table was almost given away. We were not even given an apology for what they did. Menu’s were also in scarce demand, you had to wait for them or share one menu.
Japanese Restaurant 3 stars Standard food, nothing better, nothing worse then your typical hibachi place back home. Most of the cooks put on a show with fire, having guest do some cooking, flipping food etc, but ours had no patter, no showmanship. Poor bar service again, and they ran out of half the deserts.
Italian Restaurant Didn’t go to, stopped there one nite for some desert only
French Restaurant 2 ½ stars Service was good, though my wife kept on reminding me it took 2 hours to get her 2 drinks. They didn’t have enough menus, so we had to share them (4 people at table 2 menu) again, just one of the little things you expect at a luxury resort. Food was mediocre. My soup was watery and lacked flavor, I got the rack of lamb and got a ¼ of a rack (based on what I get back home). When you ordered you had to order everything including desert up front. Have never heard of this before, normally you eat your dinner, and then a desert menu comes around. It took us 2 ¼ hours or so to eat, when we left we saw 20 people waiting in the non air-conditioned room with 4 seats in it. It looked like they overbooked, or booked the second seating too soon after the first seating. You would think they would have a nice waiting room with a bar, like a real restaurant, but nope you would be wrong.
Jamaican Restaurant – 3 stars We had lunch there a couple of times. It was decent, but few choices, no deserts and while the food was Jamaican, it lacked a lot of the spices and flavor of good Jamaican food. The Jerk had sauce on it, instead of being made the proper Jamaican way (slow cook the flavor in) it tasted like they grilled the chicken and threw some sauce on top.
New Years Eve They put on a great spread food wise outside. All kinds of choices of shrimp, real jerked chicken, lobster, lots of deserts etc etc. They did do this up right. Lots of service, no problems getting water, drinks etc. The wait staff did not seem to be enjoying themselves and gave very sullen as opposed to pleasant service. We also saw a boss man chew out a waiter for wearing a New Years Eve Hat and being to friendly?
Room Service 2 star Only had room service once and it came fairly quickly. My wife had the safe key, I had no money and the waiter seemed upset that I didn’t tip him. We would have ordered Room Service for breakfast but there was no “egg Option” you could order breads and cold cereal, but you weren’t allowed to order eggs. Why you couldn’t get a hot breakfast at a luxury resort was beyond my limited understanding
SPA – 4 stars When we booked we got a lot of spa credit, and my wife took advantage of that to get a massage, body wrap and facial as well as the free manicure and pedicure. She enjoyed all the procedures immensely and had no complaints about them at all
Clothing Beach/Pool side Spent no time here, it looked like there weren’t enough seats around the pool, as it was half the size as the Au Natural side. Heard problems about lack of seats, lack of towels etc.
Au Natural side
Beach 4 stars We would only spend an hour a day on the beach but we found it beautiful, water warm, the sand well kept up , plenty of chairs, cushions and floats. No complaints problems whatsoever
Pool Area 4 stars We spent most of our time here. There were always plenty of chairs, cushions etc. The day we arrived we couldn’t find towels, but after that there were always plenty of clean towels around. People were super friendly, bar service was fine (though they could use a bartender in the pool area.. you had to wait till she saw you before you got service if you were in the water). My wife did water aerobics every morning and enjoyed it, said the instructor did a good job. At lunch they would play trivia or some other games. It would be nice if they had an area in the pool where there weren’t speakers so you didn’t have to listen, but that is just a minor complaint. The activity coordinators tried to run things, and did a decent job but they did have a problem with pronunciation of some of the trivia questions and answers.
We ate lunch at the pool several days. The food was hot and well prepared, but seemed to be the same day after day. Lamb Chops were good, but not every day.. I can get tastier and hotter Jerk Chicken back at home, then I did there.
Bar Service people did a good job getting us drinks during lunch. They also toured couple times a day getting drinks from people around the pool (though I think they could do it more often) and around 5:00 they would bring drinks over to people at the bar.
Conclusion Would we go back? I don’t know. The minus’s the food service, quality and quantity, the pluses, great C/O area and the beautiful Jamaican weather. We did not get quality for our dollar and if the resort was priced like a breezes or a Hedo, I would not hesitate to go back. However when you are paying top dollar, you expect top dollar service.
Any questions, please contact me at UconnHenry@cox.net