Mike - February, 2014
Hedonism II trip report – Feb 15 – 27th, 2014
The plane was late getting into Mobay so didn’t arrive until 5pm on the 15th. When I got to the immigration area, couldn’t believe that there was absolutely no one in line, a first for me, I was told I had just missed the rush. Picked up my bag and out into the lobby fairly quickly. As all know by now the Superclubs lounge is no more , construction taking place with a Club Mobay sign around that area, not sure if that was for advertisement or not.
Used Tropical Tours for my transfers (came as part of my vacation package); waited about 30 min to get the small bus as full as possible and we were on our way. No stops other than dropping off vacationers at other Negril resorts along the way, so got into Hedo about 7:30 pm or so. Everything went smoothly at the front desk and I was off to my room.
Room:
I stayed on the Garden View Prude side, the building that is the closest to the dining room. One could tell as soon you walked in that it had been redone, a nice bright white color, it appeared to have new linen, also had a fridge (which was empty and stayed that way), a new flat screen TV and a good working AC which kept the room cool during the day when I was not there, but I did turn it off completely at night so I could sleep. As others have mentioned, 2 clean beach towels. The only complaint were the pillows, I found them too flat and soft, for myself, hard to get comfortable but did make it work. There were a couple of water problems in our complex during the stay, the first few nights were fine, then there was a rupture in a water line on the roof, so no water at all for the full day. Once they turned it back on, more ruptures, so again no water until the next morning. In both instances they did give a time when the work would be completed and that time was quite accurate. The last water problem occurred a few days later, different set of pipes, but left no hot water. In all cases, inconvenient, but it seemed to me that management made a concerted effort to get everything working as soon as they could.
Food:
I thought the food last Feb (2013) was excellent but that was comparing it to the prev. Feb (2012) which I thought was terrible. This year, I was not impressed.
My first breakfast, I took some hash browns, sausage and bacon then went to sit down. My first bite of each, the food was cold, not ice cold, but definitely not warm. When it happened again the next morning, I decided to stick with the French toast. I heard but did not see it myself that at least one person had the staff reheat their bacon on the grill. I suspect that caused the cooks to do a better job at keeping the food warmer. Although I stuck with my French toast, I did have a few slices of bacon and a sausage on occasion, and it definitely was better.
Lunches at the main dining room were ok the time I ate there, ate either at the nude or prude grill most days, I thought the food at both those grills were very good.
Dinners were hit or miss for me. There were some really good dinners where I went back for seconds, a few times however, I thought dinners were terrible and I ate very little of it. The roast beef when I had it was dry and I did not finish it, pork very fatty, one bite of that almost made me sick, even lobster tail night did not seem to be as good as in prev. years, I had always gone back for seconds if I could, this time I didn’t even try.
The midnight buffet in the dining room even had a pizza oven, couldn’t order what you wanted though, just cheese pizza, but not bad at all.
Overall, I would say the dining room food was ok, I didn’t go hungry just didn’t enjoy it as much this time. At times I thought the best food was at the salad bar or the dessert table.
Beach:
I think the new loungers are great, comfortable, no worries that if you sit up a bit you would need to reset the latches on the back time and again, these ones always stayed in place.
The first week I was there, did not need to worry about getting to the nude side early to save a chair, if you got down around 9am or so, you would always find something either in the shade or in the sun, after 10-11am, a little harder. That changed the second week when the fluffers were in house, all the loungers were taken very early not only on the nude side but also the prude side, getting down to the beach after 9am, difficult to find somewhere to park yourself. I remember one day, Harry had asked some of the water sport guys to see if they had some old style beach chairs around, he thought they still had about a dozen or so, and had asked them to be brought down, but I never did see them. My biggest annoyance in general, not related to any groups, but chairs having towels on them that never saw a butt parked there, not a lot of respect shown to people who actually want to spend time on the beach.
Did spend a few days on the prude beach, not sure why it is still called the prude beach as everyone there was nude, not just during the few days I overlapped with the fluffers, but during the entire stay, same with the prude bar, but you did need to wear clothes at the prude grill, that was enforced.
For anyone interested, Augustus is on the prude side, he didn’t look too happy but at least he is still working.
Entertainment:
Can’t say enough about the EC staff, they really do work long, hard hours and yet always seemed to be smiling and happy to talk to you and they do put on some great shows.
Kumar at the piano bar was excellent, a real treat, a lot of participation from guests, spent most nights there while he was playing.
Didn’t care too much for the disco, music too loud and too much sex on the sides, saw enough of that on the beach.
Repeaters Party:
Was there both Wednesdays, good to see some faces from the past, knew more from my first week than from my second. Harry did speak for a minute or so, priority for 2014 seemed to be a free wifi area around the plaza off the main dining room and maybe an espresso bar serving starbucks coffee. Didn’t plan on doing anymore major room upgrades, he felt people currently liked the rooms the way they were.
Wifi:
This was a big improvement from last year. I was in the same building this year as last, no problem getting a signal in my room and no problem anywhere on the resort this time around.
Credit cards:
Just thought I would mention that I used my Amex card for internet purchases and spa purchases. I know Denny had noted last year the resort were no longer accepting this card for these type of purchases, not sure whether I had missed an update along the way, but they accepted my card without issues.
I think the management are doing their best to keep customers happy, saw a number of younger people this year than in the past and a few first timers, but as everyone knows, it’s the repeaters that make the resort what it is and the groups keep it full. Not sure what can be done with the overbookings though, a number of people were shuffled off to GLN, not sure whether they were very happy. While I was at the desk one afternoon, someone came in from GLN who was supposed to be at Hedo was told by GLN that they had to leave by a certain day as their room was booked, with Hedo also full not sure how that was resolved but the person was not very happy as you can imagine. Might be a good idea to plan a trip around the large groups. One thing I have always liked about Hedo is that it has always been clean, the yards, beach and rooms, that has not changed.