Jeff (Yoda) - October, 2013
October 8-14, 2013
Had a few objectives this trip to Hedo which were to actually rest some (hahahaha), catch up with some great friends, hash out the details for the big March Amigo trip and to see how things were progressing since Marshmallow took possession of the resort. First off the resort was pretty low occupancy, very low, so much so it was noticeable over the same time last October. The low occupancy is understandable I guess as the resort was in really bad shape 12 months ago and I know for a fact people just didn't want to come back and spend their hard earned money or vacation time on a run-down resort...even with the news of the new owners and their 10 million dollar investment. A year ago the rooms/resort were in a great state of disrepair, food was so bad that I complained (and I have always thought the food was good there) and finally the lack of booze in quantity and choices was comical. Traveling with a great group of people and the fun times to be had there puts blinders on you a little, but the reality was that Hedo as a physical property just sucked one year ago. Glad to report that things have really turned around since then...a lot! From a wide-angle perspective Hedo still looks like Hedo, but if you zoom in you can see changes for the better everywhere you look. It is not completely there yet...but good things are happening at Hedo my friends!!
Getting There
This part has nothing to do with Hedo so if you want to skip ahead...please do. We had a great flight down on USAir from Charlotte to Mobay. We flew on buddy passes and were able to score first class upgrades at the gate. I am now completely ruined and detested our return flight home with the other “common” people...lol. The plane had 90+ open seats so we boarded quickly and pushed off early. With our early departure came a early arrival and sitting in 4A & 4C got us off the plane fast. There was no-zero-zilch line at immigration and bags were waiting for us as we approached the no lines at customs. Here is where our record breaking time through MBJ airport arrival came to a screeching halt. Did you know that you cannot wear BDU Camo into Jamaica? Neither did I and when the customs agent told me that I would have to change clothes before I was allowed into the country I thought she was joking. But the joke never came and I had to hightail it back to the restroom by immigration to change into different shorts. On the way back I saw another fellow with BDU pants coming my direction carrying a new pair of shorts too...I guess we both did not get the memo. So with new shorts on and our record breaking time disqualified we finally stepped into the beautiful, hot, humid-as-hell, wonderful Jamaican sunshine. Ya mon...it was good to be home!! Not sure why I cared how fast it took to get outside (man thing) as we had to wait awhile for our friends to arrive so we spent the time at the Groovy Grouper drinking Red Stripes and eating Patties….life is good!! One note, the Red Stripes were a $1.50 cheaper this trip than they were in March, not sure if that is a seasonal thing but was happy to not be spending $5.50 per stubby! Our friends soon arrived and so did our transportation Rocky Tours. Quick hugs all around and the four of us were loaded up into Rocky’s 20 seater heading west to Negrillo and Hedo! Ride was a little over an hour and filled with more stubbies and laughs than I can count. Before we knew it we were in the lobby of the zoo greeted by Amigos that were already there and the smiling faces of the staff.
Rooms
H-Block, room 2142: On the surface our room was the same as always, grey and white painted everything and the damn ugly bedspread that looks like it was in style...never! But that was where the old room stopped and the renovated retro room starts. We found that from March, the rooms have been updated quite nicely. First off and the best improvement was the new mattress, pillows and linens. I found that they were extremely comfortable and not the load of bricks that we used to have to sleep on. Wife….not as impressed as I was but still thought an improvement. She said maybe they were just not “worked in” enough...so I obliged her and we “worked in” our new mattress as much as we could both stand over the next six days! But I really thought they were comfy and probably led to me oversleeping most the days that I was there….who needs breakfast anyway!!! The most obvious improvements are the 42” LED TV’s and the mini-fridge that are now standard in all the retro-rooms. Cannot comment on the TV as we used it as much as the old 26” tube….which was never. I did stock our fridge with a few items...it was nice to grab a cold drink in the middle of the night or when I first un-crusted my eyes in the morning. Funny story about the fridge’s...over in GVP I spotted an entire room stacked wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling with umpteen boxes of the mini-fridges. I came back the next day as I wanted a picture to share and talked the maid into opening the door for me. Got my camera out, maid opened the door only to find no fridges...just a sleeping couple!!! In 24 hours they had completely removed and installed all those fridges, flipped the room and moved somebody in. They are definitely hustling around the resort. Speaking of flipping rooms, we had no neighbors the first two days that we were there. Rooms on both sides were stripped of their beds and all other furniture pushed to the center and covered. Same White and Battleship Grey paint was being applied and TV’s installed. This tells me two things...stay used to the white/grey motif and not all rooms are going to be made into premium ones anytime soon. By the end of our trip both those rooms were occupied with guests. We had no hot water issues, in fact we may have had too much hot water!!! General talk around the pool was most people said the same thing and heard very few complaints of people not having hot water. Now...lets see in March what will happen when the resort is 90-95% occupied and not in the sub 40’s. A/C worked great...over all we were happy with our room, it was extremely clean and suited our needs. We were able to sleep, shower and shag and in reality that is all I require of a room at any hotel I travel to. There are a number of rooms (36) being completely gutted and redone and are referred to as premium rooms. By now you all have heard of and seen pictures of the two rooms over on the Ocean View Prude side that were completed last summer. Delano gave us a tour of the rooms, no surprises there as I had seen exactly what they looked like from all the pics posted around the internet. Even though these rooms are 95% completed, for now they are leaving them unoccupied for people to walk through and tour. They are really nice, for those that have hangups with the current rooms you will be happy with these new upgrades. The bathrooms are awesome and probably 3X the size of the current layout. I have read some concern of the open toilet, and yes there is no door but you cannot see someone “sitting on the throne” from another vantage point of the room..so no worries there. The shower is amazing and so is the countertop and sink area. Plenty of room for all the female type hardware and accessories with room left for the male’s toothbrush and shaver...lol. One thing that i didn’t expect is the loss of bedroom space because of the increased bathroom sq. ft. If you are planning on having a room party...use the bathroom area too! ;) The decks/balconies outside the rear of the rooms are a nice touch and you do reclaim some of the sq. ft. lost inside, just not in the form of air conditioned space. We are hearing that these new room will be approx 30% increase over the retro rooms...so if you have the means and want a little more luxury go for it. I would compare these rooms to the jacuzzi ones at Temptation, if fact I would say that they are nicer. The other 34 rooms should be ready for occupancy around the first of November. These 34 rooms will all be Oceanfront Nude and located top and bottom from the Lion statue down to Delroys Bar.
Food
I am probably a bad one to review food since I am not a very picky eater and find the food at Hedo usually very good. Add to the fact that I usually am on a diet the weeks leading up to a Hedo trip, eating mostly cardboard and celery, is another reason I find the food there to my liking! This was my 5th or 6th trip to H2 and I found the food was the best yet. I get into a food routine while there and tend to eat some of the same things everyday. Breakfast usually consists of a healthy (in size) BLT samwich and they had all the fixings each morning in abundance. Added bonus were some grits and corn beef hash...I couldn't ask for more. The wife likes the omelets and commented that they were excellent this trip. They also now have a fresh fruit smoothie bar and wife was happy with those too. Lunch for me is jerk chicken from the nude grill and sometimes I get a side of jerk chicken to go with it. ;) Wife tries to get some grilled cheese (w/ bacon and tomato) every once in a while which are good...but bring on the jerk chicken!! They have changed the jerk sauce a little bit...a little sweeter and a little hotter, damn that shit is good!! Dinner is where I think they are shining...some good eats for sure! We ate both at Martinos and at Harry San, both excellent and if you have complaints after eating there I have nothing for you except the pupils of my eyes rolling to the back of my head. Buffet had lots of choices, standouts for me were the pasta bar (best fucking pasta ever...lol), Prime Rib and Yorkshire, and of course the lobster on Friday night. Had pizza down at the nude pool a couple of nights. Cannot really comment on taste but if you went by how much of it we ate one night, it must have been pretty good!!
Entertainment/Bars/Pools
The nude pool was super clear and clean which was better than the grit that we experienced last October...but wouldn’t of minded a little clouding up from rum creme as we are used to in March!! There are new lounges, tables and umbrellas everywhere you look. There are these huge stairs now that go into the hot tub, no one will fall in now but just bang their shins on them instead. The EC’s have a new Bose sound system that they set up daily by the pool and either they or a DJ plays tunes. The system consists just of a subwoofer and this skinny tall speaker, but it sounds pretty amazing. Speaking of EC’s the crew is completely new since March with the exception of Winston and a couple of the guys. They are high energy as always and seem to stick to the schedule more than I have ever seen at H2. Games were done by the pool everyday and a couple of them jumped in the pool to play beer pong with us...and really played. The amount and selection of booze at all the bars was outstanding, if they have gotten anything right since the new owners took over, this is it. Pretty much whatever I wanted, when and where, I was accommodated. Last October they were running out of everything...I have pics of the main bar with like only ¼ of the bar stocked, this year there was no room to place another bottle anywhere. I do not remember them having Grey Goose before (my goto drink this trip was “Goose and Juice”!), it was available at every bar. Also the had Appletons Extra (which is a step up from VX) and Jager and the Red Wine was new and improved!!!! I found the crew of new bartenders to be excellent, not just at the nude pool but at the main bar at night. My only complaint is that they all over-pour like crazy and you really have to watch them...damn I must be getting old!!! Night time entertainment was good but might have been skewed for us this week as Mr. Caribbean International was here and their competition dominating the evening entertainment. Got to see Fifty which was awesome and as unbelievable as it is, he did not win the competition...I think everyone was like WTF? Piano bar was the place to be most nights and the new piano player is really good...the disco had nothing but crickets in attendance it seemed. As I said, it was a pretty quiet week and not much was going on after midnight, which is so different than what we are used too in March!
Offsite
We did a couple offsite things as we usually do. Negril is just too awesome to stay within the walls of The Zoo 24/7. 20 Amigos went to Push Cart for dinner one night and it was amazing. We got an awesome sunset and the ambiance is spectacular for a dinner with friends. The food took a long time to come, but once it did it was excellent. Once again did the Pub Crawl with Lenbert...if you have not done this it needs to be added to your list of things to do, so much fun!! 7 bars, 3 hours and more laughs than you can count!!! His bus becomes a rolling disco on the way back to the beach and resorts. Even the non Hedo people were having the times of their lives..lol!!
Going Home
Always sucks to leave...and this trip was no exception. Shorter trip than normal made leaving that much worse. Rocky, as always, was on time and had us rolling back to Mobay. We hit a traffic jam in one of the little towns as there was a protest of some sort over a water pumping station?? The protesters….were protesting in the roadway and had backed up traffic in both directions. We managed to make it to the airport with enough time and as we were flying out on a Monday the place was not crowded at all. No more immigration check, just straight through security. Some new shops in the airport and the new smoking lounge was completed. I didn't go in the smoking lounge as I quit in June, but from the looks of it, it is 2-3 times the size of the old one. Didn't make the first flight but got on the second one...said bye to The Rock once again with a content smile.
We had a great time and it was awesome to see some good friends and meet some new ones too. Looking forward to the March trip and feel real good about where the new owners are taking the resort. I have said it before that Hedo did not decline overnight and it will not be fixed overnight either...but they are definitely heading in the right direction and they are “this close” to it being returned to its former glory and exceeding what it was!! Hedo Amigos 2014 come soon mon!!!