This is an absolutely beautiful resort. As Marriott's go, you get all that you expect but in Costa Rica the service and staff are always a cut above. For me everything was perfect. For those of you who are not familiar with Marriott's or this property here is what I might find detracting. One is that even though the hotel is beachfront, it is not a swimmable or lounge-able beach. It's right up against the marina, the sand is a dark brown color and the water is a grayish color. The overall scenery is still very beautiful. The other is that I still can't see myself paying $24 per person for breakfast. I'm a Gold member so I don't pay it anyway but it's just the idea. You all probably know that the meals at the restaurants here are even more overpriced. So the point is this. Skip the Hotel fare and go just outside the main gate to Herradura beach for your meals. You can actually walk there. I'd say it's about a 20 min walk. You can dine on extraordinary, well portioned local and international dishes, mingle with both expats and locals, watch the sunset and spend a quarter of what you would have spent at the hotel. Now, for all those other things there is a American style shopping center with a very nice supermarket at the main intersection. They sell everything that you can get in the states. Get your wine there. $7 for a really good bottle of Chilean Chardonnay. At the hotel its $14 a glass. Hey, I vacation two to three times a year. I'm way beyond the "I need to be pampered" mode and I just don't like giving my money away unnecessarily.

Hotel is nice, pools are good, beach is nice (volcanic black sand and pebbles like most of the area) and people are pleasant. However, in my opinion you might as well be in any beach resort in Florida as there is pretty much nothing about this place that says Costa Rica. Costa Rica is beautiful and amazing and I have visited 5 times now. We didn't have any intention of staying in a Marriott as we would much prefer a beach home from VRBO but we won a charity auction. In my opinion, this place is everything that is wrong with the mega resorts that come in to a beautiful place when it starts getting popular and ruin it... however that is is a rant for a different forum.

My chief complaint here is the cost of everything. The beach club has signs everywhere that said Thanksgiving dinner for $24.95. I called to book and confirmed the price but after dinner was charged $45 a head and 1/2 price for the kids. A cheap bottle of wine that cost $10 at the local 'mini super' was $50 here. A bottle of sparkling water was $16. The buffet was really average at best. I was then told that the beach club is separate from the hotel and they don't know about the $24.95 deal, which is not what the person I booked with said.

The hotel is in the Los Suenos resort with what looks like a beautiful golf course but on enquiring about a round, I found out it was $160 + $60 to rent clubs. Seems like you should get some sort of a deal on that but no chance. Not even the Wifi is free.

Down the road in the resort, is the marina with some other restaurants. I didn't realize this is all separate from the Marriott, however again these places are outrageous. A small provisioning store called Jimmy T's, where we bought some chips, paper towels and 1/2 and 1/2 for coffee that somehow cost us $35.

The area is really sanitized. No bugs, which is nice I guess but also in a whole week, we didn't see any monkeys, Sloths, Macaws or other Costa Rican wildlife that is abundant everywhere else.

There are some really nice little locally owned bars down on the beach outside of the resort, that are really good. I had some of the best ceviche I have every had and a whole afternoon of amazing food and drink for 4 of us cost $50. That is more like the real Costa Rica.

So overall this place and everything within Los Suenos is a complete riff off and there are much nicer areas in Costa Rica to visit. If money is no object and you are happy with just a luxury hotel stay then this place is fine. However, if you want to see and experience Costa Rica, do yourself a favor and avoid these big resorts and stay in Manual Antonio (70 km down the road) and rent a nice beach house on VRBO or stay in a small boutique hotel.

Just got back from celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary and had a great time. Had a great ocean view room. The staff is absolutely amazing and ready to please! The Sibo Spa had some great deals and felt wonderful after my treatment! The food was great and room service was fast and hot.

We stayed in a 1 bedroom suite which was nicely appointed, looked torward the ocean and is located on the 4th floor. I would consider this hotel a 4.5. Everyone that works here is friendly and the breakfast was good. The hotel is practically empty in November. Location is about 1.5 hours from the airport. We rented a car to get here but we also were out in La Fortuna for a few days. The weather was good and we enjoyed our time here. I would come back, definently!