Starfish Beach Resort
Trelawney
January 12 through 17, 2005
Greg, Terry & Nicole
Greg and I have been to Jamaica six times without Nicole. Our normal resort is Hedonism II in Negril, Jamaica during the first week of May. We took a break last year and visited Hidden Beach Resort near Cancun.
This year, after checking the school calendar, and seeing that Nicole had two inservice days the Friday before the Martin Luther King Holiday, we thought that it would be a good time to take her to visit Jamaica. We had been promising her since our 2nd or 3rd trip that sometime we would take her there. We considered the Bahamas just because the flights were shorter and a bit cheaper, but the choices for all-inclusive resorts are limited.
We did some internet research and found Starfish Resort, which is an affiliate of Superclubs, the parent company of Hedonism II. The price for Starfish was fairly good, and after reading some reviews on various travel sites, it sounded like a good place for Nicoles inaugural visit to Jamaica.
We departed on Wednesday morning from Baltimore Washington International. The past few times we have flown to Jamaica, we have upgraded to first class at the ticket counter. It normally costs about $130 per person round trip. The man at the ticket counter said he could not do it round trip, but could do it one way and we would have to change it when we returned, so we traveled first class to Jamaica.
The flight was uneventful and fairly pleasant. We landed to cloudy skies and occasional rain. The pilot said it was cool 80 degrees. Since we left Baltimore in 30 degree weather, we found that to be a funny statement.cool at 80 degrees.
The airport has been upgraded a bit since we were there two years ago. The line for immigration was still long and slow. We waited for about 45 minutes to an hour in that line. The luggage was ready and waiting when we got downstairs and customs was a breeze. We went out to the hotel transport area and the new Superclubs lounge is very, very nice. It was air conditioned and had nice little tables to fill out paperwork while you waited for the bus. No longer just standing against the wall waiting for your bus or taxi.
They whisked us all out to a van and we were on the way. Once again, I was reminded why when we stay at Hedonism, we use Timair, and as far as I am concerned, we always will. I dont care how upgraded the roads are the drivers are maniacs. At one point, there was a car driving at full highway speed in reverse. Even our van driver shook his head. We stopped at a little bar for a few cold beers, and then we were off again.
The brochures say it is 20 minutes from the airport to Starfish. In actuality, it is about an hours ride. We arrived at the resort in one piece and headed to the front desk.
We had heard that check in is a bit disorganized. It wasnt at all. It was much like checking in at Hedonism, and, since we arrived at around 2 PM, our room wasnt ready. They invited us to go have lunch and relax and our room should be ready in about an hour. I suggest that if you are traveling with a child, keep a bathing suit in your carry on for yourself and the child as our daughter immediately wanted to go swimming. We figured it wouldnt take long for the room, so we told her to just wait a bit. We ate our lunch, then walked around the resort, finding the pools, waterslides, fitness center, spa, gift shop, etc.
One thing they do at the front desk here, and that they did at Hidden Beach, was take a credit card imprint. This allows you to charge things to your room, like spa services, telephone services, sports activities, etc. It was nice to not have to worry about the deposit for the phone or carrying cash for massages.
The resort is beautiful, although the hotel does seem a bit out of place in the landscape. It is a two wing, 7 story building, painted bright yellow and white. There are two pools, two waterslides, a miniature golf course, an artificial skating ring, and a grotto with three hot tubs. There is a full service spa and a nice fitness center.
After about an hour and a half, we decided to go check on the room. At this point, Greg and I were getting tired. He wanted to lie down and take a nap. I wanted to unpack and then get Nicole to the pool so I could relax. We checked at the desk, and were told our room was still not readyprobably about another 20 minutes. We sat down in the lobby to wait and grabbed drinks from the lobby bar. I wish I had heeded the advice from some of the trip reports to bring along large insulated mugs. The drink cups are way too small, even for soda and you spend a lot of time going back and forth. In fact, there are times you cant find cups next to the soda machines and have to get them from the bar.
Finally, I went to the desk about our room. While I was standing there, a gentleman came up to see if his room was ready. He had a very small child (about 2). The desk clerk told him his room was ready and gives him the keys. The clerk then said that the only problem was that there was only one bed in the room right now, but that housekeeping would be bringing a bed to the room very soon. The guest said My parents are already in a room, and it already has the extra bed. How about if we just switch rooms and then housekeeping doesnt need to worry about the other bed. The look of panic on the clerks face was hysterical. He shook his head and said No, we cannot change the rooms in the system. The guy said, So dontwell just switch around. The clerk got all worried and told the guy that people could charge stuff to the wrong room. The man just shook his head and says Its my dad, its not a problem. Finally, the guest gave up and just walks away. We never did find out if they got the extra bed or just changed rooms.
We then got the keys to our room. We had heard that the rooms werent the greatest, but most of the comments sounded much like those Ive heard about Hedos rooms. Just a bit run down and plain. We got to our room and the key wont work. I traipse back down to the front desk and they reprogram the key cards. The resort doesnt have a regular key lock. Its the hotel sliding keys like we have here. We got into the room and it is beautiful. A brand new CD player, a refrigerator, a small bar cabinet with four bottles of booze, television, beautiful wooden furniture, a sliding door onto a balcony overlooking the poolsand one bed. The other problem that is apparent immediately is that there is no room for a second bed.
Back to the lobby I go. There was a security guard standing at the desk. I explained that there was only one bed in our room. The security guard and the desk clerk had a conversation, a little of which I understood. Finally, the security guard came over and told me that there is no a way to put a bed in the room we were given, that they will have to move us to another room. He then explained that no other rooms in the hotel look like that one, as that was a prototype room that was recently remodeled. I told him I didnt care, but that I was not sleeping with my child in my bed for a week. So, they moved us one floor down.
This room was showing some signs of age. It was definitely not as pretty as the one we had just left, but it was clean. There were not enough dresser drawers for three people and we had to combine some clothing to get everything unpacked, but that wasnt a problem. The refrigerator had several bottles of soda, and this room also had the bar cabinet. The bar cabinet consisted of four bottles of liquor a bottle of Appleton Rum, a bottle of Vodka, a bottle of Jamaican Brandy and a bottle of Gin. The information on the website says that if they have to replace any bottles, you will be charged for them. However, we were not charged for the sodas that we drank out of the refrigerator.
This resort is excellent for children of almost all ages. There are plenty of activities that children and adults can participate in. Our first night, there was supposed to be a magic show, followed by karaoke. For some reason, the magic show didnt happen, but we watched a little of the karaoke. It was fun. There was a large group there from Minnesota and they were having a blast. All of this took place in the lobby, which was kind of nice as there were plenty of chairs to pull up to see the show.
Here is a brief synopsis of our stay:
Food: We only ate lunch at the buffet on our first and last day, so I dont know how varied the lunch menus are. Most days we ate at the grill by the pool. We ate breakfast every day at the buffet, which had standard breakfast fare. They have two made-to-order omelette grills, which Greg ate a few days. The cereal choices are not exactly kid-friendly. One day they had Frosted Flakes, which made Nicole happy, but other days, she basically ate toast or a muffin for breakfast.
As for dinner, heres where things get a bit strange. You must make reservations for dinner no matter where you eat, including the dining room. They also have certain dinner seatings, so you had to choose between 7 PM and 8:30 for dinner. We were there at 8 a few nights and they seated us with no problem.
There are a few specialty restaurants. One, Casablanca, says you must have a jacket to eat there, and children under 14 were not permitted. Not a problem as we had no intention of taking a dinner jacket. There is the Scotch Bonnet, Giuseppe, and Munasan. We never found the Scotch Bonnet and werent sure exactly what type of food it had, so we never ate there. Giuseppe was the Italian restaurant, and we didnt try it either. Munasan is the Japanese steakhouse type restaurant, and since Nicole loves the local steakhouse like that, we decided to try it one night. All the restaurants have a surcharge. The buffet is included in your All Inclusive Package. The cost for the three of us to eat at Munasan was $40 ($15 for adults/$10 for children). There is no fee to eat at the grill during the day.
Drinks: As I said before, insulated mugs are definitely a benefit. They do not sell them in the gift shop, so you need to bring them with you. Sometimes the drinks were a bit strong, but not always. We didnt drink many mixed drinks, since we were in Mom and Dad Mode. The soda machines were easily available and, like Hedo, they have the non-alcoholic frozen drink machines available with daiquiri and pina colada mix. Bar service could be slow sometimes.
Service: The staff is very pleasant and helpful. There could be some improvement in the dining room as far as keeping water glasses and wine glasses full. In fact, I never got a wine glass refilled unless I specifically asked for another glass. They are quick to take your drink glasses if you leave them for any amount of time. Several times, I lost drinks sitting by the pool or while playing miniature golf.
Activities: There are a wide range of activities available. During the day, the Entertainment Staff does a good job of keeping people involved and incorporating children into every event. Nicole participated in the Miniature Golf tournament, the Best Burn/Best Tan Contest and the Best Bathing Suit Contest. She also joined in the Lazy Beach Games and we played Team Pictionary one day. She really enjoyed the Hermit Crab Races in the Lobby one night. The poolside activities usually ended around 4 PM and nothing else happened until 9 PM. That became a problem as Nicole was very tired by 9 PM and was disappointed that she didnt get to do some of the later activities. It would be nice to have some of them occur at 8 PM rather than 9 and 10:30 PM for younger children who are not quite teenagers, but not toddlers, to participate.
Only one night was the dinner band so loud you couldnt hear the people next to you without shouting. Most nights they played rather softly and it was a nice backdrop. There is a piano bar, but it took us two nights to figure out where it was, so we never got to do any of that. The big problem was on nights they had a band on the Pool Stage, which is directly in the center of the resort, off the dining room. The sound invades every single room. If I had a light sleeping child, I probably would have gotten annoyed, as it would have been difficult to get them to sleep.
The miniature golf course has nine little greens with two holes in each oneone on one end and one on the other. We figured out that if you wanted to have a regulation miniature golf game, you went through the course all shooting at one hole, then reversed and shot at the other hole. We only did that once, but played several games of 9 holes (Nicole is a mini golf fanatic). There are no score cards, so you either keep score in your head or grab paper and pencil from your room or the front desk. There are a variety of clubs and balls at the course.
Most people played hockey on the synthetic ice rink in their stocking feet. I never saw anyone using skates.
There is a basketball and tennis courts, but we didnt use any of them. One night, a group of young British men played a game of soccer on the basketball court, which we watched from our balcony.
Pools/Hot Tubs: The main pool, off the dining area, has a swim up bar, along with what appears to be a huge star shaped hot tub. There are also two pool tables in the pool and a water slide. The problem was that the sun rarely hit the water in the pool and the water was rather cool the entire time we were there. Nicole tried the waterslide at that pool one afternoon, but found it boring. The star in the center of the pool turned out not to be a hot tub, but just a cool Jacuzzi. It would be better if that was turned into a hot tub and I believe more people would use it. There was never anyone at the swim up bar as it was completely shielded from the sun.
The other pool had a more childlike slide, several wading pools, areas with chairs immersed in water and a few pool tables. Nicole loved these pools and spent the entire vacation on the water slide or in the pools. This is also where all the activities are held, on the Sports Stage. The problem, though, is that they have built cement bleachers for people to watch the action on the stage. This means that from many areas of the pool, you cannot see the things going on the stage unless you go over to sit on the bleachers. They are not comfortable and they get rather warm, so that was kind of a pain.
There was no restriction ever regarding video taping, even during the Circus Show on Friday night. I never heard them state that due to Jamaican Entertainment laws we couldnt tape, so we taped quite a few activities.
The hot tubs were just regular Jacuzzis that had been placed in a small garden area, surrounded by trees with little path ways cut through them. I only got in them once with Nicole, but she and a friend she made got in them a few times. They were definitely hot and were nice on the cooler afternoons. We thought about getting in them after dinner one night, but never remembered suits so we could.
Beach: We only sat on the beach one morning and one afternoon. There is a nude beach at the far end of the resort, but the sign stated No Photography and No Children so it was pretty useless for us, as we had a child with us. I had actually considered taking her to the nude beach to see how she handled being in that environment. Unless you are on the beach, you will not see anyone unclothed. Two women walked down to the water with no tops on while we were there, but it wasnt intrusive and no one seemed offended.
There is a small island that you can wade to (theyve built a manmade sandbar for you to get in and out of it). We walked out there once, but you have to get there early to get a seat, so we ended up back on the other beach.
To be honest, the weather did not cooperate for beach sitting. The day we arrived was windy and there were a few rain showers. By 4 or 5, the wind had gotten chilly and it wasnt comfortable to sit even by the pool. The next day, it was less windy during the day, but the wind picked up again in the afternoon. Truly, there were only two out of the five days where it could be considered hot. The rest of the days were fairly comfortable. The other problem was that it was far to rough to snorkel off the beach, and you had to take the boat ride out to the reef to snorkel. There was a surcharge for that as well.
Towels: I would suggest bringing some of your own beach towels. When we checked in, we were given towel tickets. You take them to the Watersports Shop and they give you beach towels. I use the term beach towels loosely as they were rather thin and threadbare. Each morning, you could trade the towels for clean ones. When you checked out, you had to turn the towels in and they gave you towel tickets and you turned them in at the front desk, or you were charged $20 per towel. Now, I have no idea how they know what room turned in towels and what room didnt as they never asked for a room number. One day, I had walked to the bathroom, Greg had gone back to the room and Nicole was swimming. When I returned to the chair, my towels were gone. I immediately went to the front desk and reported it and he handed me three new towel tickets. So technically, we got six towel tickets, but we werent charged for towels. On top of that, we had completely checked out when we brought the tickets back, and the desk clerk did not ask me for my room number when I turned in the tickets.
Kids Club: Nicole and I walked through here one day, but it seemed to be more of a babysitting area than any sort of club. They do arts and crafts, but usually only toddlers and infants were in the club. Older kids just did stuff at the pools or participated in the activities. There is a charge for using the Kids Club as well.
Vendors: Everyday, behind the beach grill, there were tables set up with local vendors, much like on the beach at Hedo. These had to be the most polite, most easy going vendors Ive ever seen. They never called you over to the tables, they didnt harass you if you were looking. The prices were extremely reasonable. In addition, the prizes for all the games came from the vendor tables for the kidsbracelets, necklaces, etc. That was really cool.
Overall, this was a very nice resort. Nicole definitely enjoyed it. The only negatives, obviously, are that this resort could not really be considered all inclusive. I think if they raised the price of the resort by $38 (which is the cost for upgrading to the Platinum Plan which eliminates all surcharges) per day, and included everything, it would make things much better.
We may return to Starfish someday, although we want to take Nicole to see other areas of the country and world. I would recommend it to anyone with childreneven teenagers seemed to enjoy the resort.