We stayed at Jolly Beach for 2 weeks all inclusive in Aprill 2005. The weather was fantastic very hot need plenty of suncream!

People very friendly, even the beach venders leave you alone pleasently if you say no thank you.

The beach at Jolly Beach is FANTASTIC! It is exactly how you see it in the pictures - turquoise sea white powdery sands.........

Now the hotel, good points...........
- Staff very friendly
- Rooms ok size with kingsize bed (very comfy!)
- Pool - BIG!
- Food excellent
- Entertainment was good and every night however they appeared to have one week of different entertainment and repeated it for the second week!
- Excellent value money for all inclusive
-beach AWESOME!
-maids left fresh single flowers on our bed side table each day

Bad points..........
- Rooms are a little dated
- the fantasy pool could get loud throughout the day when the mid-day entertainment was on


I would recommend this hotel if it still is as it was then.
There was a wedding whilst we were there on the beach and it looked fantastic!

Antigua: The Jolly Beach Resort
Date: 1/12/06 to 15/12/06
Reviewer: Ming of Helensburgh, Scotland
We were about to make our 10th. visit to the Jolly Beach Resort when we took off from Gatwick Airport on First Choice Airways seated in the Star Premium Class. The leg room was very good although the width of the seat was not much better than the British Airways domestic flight which we flew down on the day before from Glasgow. The in flight service in the forward cabin could only be described as excellent. Having travelled on BA and Virgin in the upper class on previous visits First Choice took top place for service. It was non stop attendance from the very friendly crew. At one point they were handing out a selection of magazines to read including the latest Hello publication. Well worth the extra expense at £179 return each!
The flight took 8 hours and we landed ,fortunately ,before other large aircraft which made the usual scramble through immigration and customs more tolerable. We boarded the mini coach in good time and started out for the Hotel. After a while it became obvious that the pot holes in the road from the last visit had got larger and increased in number. A very bumby journey!
At the hotel we were processed quickly to our Standard room in the requested Granada Block (it is much quieter there). The view from the balcony was breath taking with the wonderful beach and palm trees in full view (at no extra charge!). This is why people return so often to the Jolly Beach. It certainly is not for the accommodation as that still remains basic, however, you do get clean sheets and towels every day. Agreed some staff can be a bit off hand but they are out numbered by the rest including Sylvia and Velly in the Hemisphere Restaurant and Ann Mari/Sendy in the activites department. The best restaurants are Lidyas (fish) and the Utsav (Indian) both with friendly staff. It must be mentioned that there was a lot of building activity going on and areas of the hotel grounds were blocked off. It was a minor inconvenience! We had non stop sunshine every day and lay under the shades from 8a.m. till 6pm. The friendly traders always took no for an answer and most of them left you alone after the first day.
The one negative point was experienced for the return journey when at the check in desk I asked for our two cases to be checked through to Glasgow. Apparently this was beyond the capabilities of the staff and the equipment which ,of course, required us to collect our bags on arrival and push them on a trolly to the BA Domestic check in desk. After that, onward to the security queues which were a complete shambles and took half an hour to get through. If you fly BA or Virgin your bags are carried all the way back to your destination which saves all this hassle. So waken up First Choice! By the time we got back to our home we were exhausted. Will we go back again? We say no when we get back then half way through the year we look at our holiday films and think maybe.................

Stayed at the Jolly Beach from 15 Dec 06 to 5 Jan 07. Booked with Virgin - flew BMI out of Manchester. Flight okay - only flew economy - no better/no worse than any other.

We are 36 and 46 years old and have travelled to North, South & East Dominican Republic (8 times) staying in 3*, 4* and 5* accomodation, Bahamas Paradise Island (Riu) 4*, Barbados 3+*, Cozumel 4+*, Playcar Mexcio (Riu) 4*.

Have been away for Christmas and New Year in DR for the last 4 years so thought we'd spend a little bit more money for the time of year and head to Antigua.

Had read the reviews and thought we knew what to expect of a 3+* accomodation in Antigua - had to be as good as 3* North Coast DR surely !! Certainly cost a lot more money.

We are the type of people who believe you make you're own holiday - you take what you're given and make the best from it. We have stayed in 3 and 5 star accomodation All Inc. and have had great holidays in both - we couldn't do that at the Jolly Beach.

In summary, this hotel, in our opinion, had one fundamental problem, it didn't cater for all of it's guests needs, only for those with young children, of which there were not that many !!

The daytime was fine - beach was just perfect - even the hawkers on the beach were good fun !! Plenty of trips to choose from to get out and about and see the rest of the island.

The evening's in the hotel where a wash-out and after trying very hard - there was nothing we could do to change that !! ...... and if you think the management of the resort are bothered - we spoke to them (don't usually feel the need to do this) - think again - they are not interested in whether the guests are enjoying themselves. If you go to bed early because of boredom - fine by them. I guess it costs the hotel a lot less money in staffing and drinks.

We spoke to many of the staff at the hotel and they know there are fundamental issues at this hotel but the management won't listen to them either. It's a shame becuase this hotel could be a four star instead of a three star if they just spent a little more money in the right areas and listened to what the guests would like.

Would go back to Antigua in a shot, beautiful island and great people - but unfortunely not to the Jolly Beach unless they have a change of ownership. Whilst it remains under the present ownership, which we were told by a member of staff, is a financial institution - in our opinion it will just get worse.

All in all - we paid a lot of money to come visit this hotel and feel we could have spent a lot less and got better value for money in the DR, or spent the same amount of money and got better value for money in Mexico, Barbados or Bahamas.

We have booked 3 weeks at the Riu Ocho Rios in Jamaica next Christmas and New Year - won't let our experience at Jolly Beach put us off !!
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Airport - 1 hour 50 mins in very crowded airport terminal to clear imigration - taking approx 10 mins per family (don't know why because they only actually asked one question (when are your leaving) and look at pre completed forms before stamping docuemntation). No Air Conditioning , one toilet and no facilities to buy cold drinks during this time - kids were fainting !!

Luggage: all over the floor and mixed with other flights making it very difficult to find when you finally got through immigration.

Customs: spent a further 15 minutes queueing here.

Finally got outside - airport grounds are beautiful. Virgin Rep got a taxi to Jolly Beach - Taxi Driver was great - never stopped talking the whole way there - really informative and really friendly -started to feel a whole lot better.

Check-in at the hotel went smoothly and reception staff where very friendly - as transfers are by taxi no big queues when you get to the hotel.

Rooms - We booked a standard room and it was a expected adequate for our needs - great size bed, everything worked - found a place to store eveything eventually (wouldn't want to guess what the Supersaver rooms are like !!). Nice view from the balcony. Could see the sea whilst lieing in bed. Bit on the small side - just meant you needed to be tidy.

Bathroom - Very small sink area and shower cubicle was tiny, however the water pressure and hot water was great for the whole of our stay. Plug in sink didn't work - rang Maintenance - came and replaced within the hour. Light stopped working - again rang maintenance and it was working when we came back to the room - Great service

House-keeping - Room was tied and clean towels left every day but one (in 21 day stay), sheets where change regularly. Good service.

Restaurants - Hemispheres Buffet - good breakfasts, easier to help yourself to drinks rather than wait for service (which we prefer anyway).

Lunch menu reasonably varied.

Evening meal - not enough choice and very hard to put a meal together most nights. Very disappointing. Overall the quality of the food was good though.

The queueing to get in is untrue - there are empty tables and guests queueing for up to 15 minutes to be seated at them because they don't have enough staff to get them cleared - the staff they do have, although very friendly, don't have alot about them when it comes to speed and efficiency.

Indian Restaurant - Excellent Service (especially from Maureen). Small Menu but enough choice. Food was excellent.

Lydia's - Excellant ambience - great location. Brilliant bar (just what was needed in the hotel elsewhere. Small menu and extortionate rates for T Bone Steak (which is really all I bokked the restaurant for). This was supposed to be supplemented but they still charged 30US. (The steakhouse on the harbour at Jolly Beach only charged 70EC for a full T Bone Seak Meal !!).

Only went once for that reason, prefered to go to the Harbour and pay less there.

Italian - didn't bother - figured we'd probably get turned away 'cos we had the wrong style of dress, shirt or shoes on, even when dressed up !!

Daytime Entertainment - There was entertainment, however the kids seemed to have their entertainment and then they joined in the Adults entertainment - making it impossible for adults to have a good game or football, cricket, rugby, baseball, pool volleyball etc.

Need to keep the kids seperate in a Kids Club and let the adults enjoy some of the activities too!!

Pool Bar - didn't use too often as the soft drinks during the day where help yourself, which is a really good idea. Whenever we did use the bar the staff seemed friendly enough and the service was pretty quick.

Pool Grill - The usual grill foods - sometimes well cooked - sometimes very under cooked - you needed to check before you ate. When the hotel was particularly busy expect to get in line at leats 15 minutes.

Pool: Great looking pool but we didn't use it as we are beach people - and with a beach like that why bother with the pool !

Evening Entertainment - Deplorable - never witnessed anything like it (and unfortunately as the only bar in the whole hotel open on an evening was the entertainment area - you just couldn't get away from it - and believe me we tried).

It was the same thing every evening - singers who, outside of Antigua, wouldn't have got away with calling themselves singers (except Junior- who was pretty good but only got up once), local choirs who couldn't sing - but they did do there best and occasionally a show by the entertainment staff - who again did their best, however this was just not good enough.

I know we where there for 21 nights - but we didn't want to stay in the hotel on an evening after 5 nights.

By the beginnning of the second week we where going off the complex to Dog Watch bar on the harbour and spending a couple of hours there each night just to get away from the entertainment and terrible bar area.

We also went in the Casino and Sports Bar just to be able to sit and relax at a bar with background music and adult conversation. Unfortunately this cost money - which after having paid for quite an expensive all inclusive holiday - was a little annoying as we only wanted a quieter - more adult bar to sit at the hotel in an evening with like minded people for good conversation. Having spoken to a lot of the guests many of them felt this way (and on some evenings half of the hotel guests could be found in Dogwatch or the Casino) - most ended up going to bed early every evening.

The staff in an evening at the Hemisphere's Bar were the only good thing about the nights - especially Dwaine and Janice - they were brilliant !!

Chrismas Eve and New Years Eve - No Gala Meal's - couldn't believe it.

The hotel made absolutely no effort to make these evening's any different in the restaurant from any other night other than decorations on the table and hats for the guests on New Year's Eve - the entertainment team spent a lot of time on the decoration's that day - so any credit should be given to them.

As I mentioned we have been away at this time of year for 5 years now and this is the only hotel with no Gala Meal's - even the 3 star's in DR make an extreme effort with the Entertainment and Meals on Christmas and New Year Eve - and in my opinion have always done a really good job of it .

The main objective of the Hotel Management at Jolly Beach on New Years Eve was to sell guests a bottle of mediocre champagne at 70US per bottle (which you could buy for half the price at the supermarket on the harbour) very dissapointing !!

If you blinked you missed the fireworks which the staff and management had been telling us about the up to 3 days prior to the event !

My significant other and I chose JBR for 4 days of R&R from Dec 27 to 30 2006. In addition to the beach, a big reason for staying at JBR was the purported selling point of 5 restaurants. For completeness, it should be advertised as well that "certain conditions apply". Note the following with their restaurants:
1) of the 5, only 1 offers 3 daily meals and that's the main buffet style dining hall;
2) 1 is a beach grill that closes at 5;
3) Of the other 3, which are the main attractions, only 2 are open per night. And only for dinner (Lydia's seafood has a brunch on sundays);
4) Reservations are required for each of these 3 restaurants which are done each day between 9.30 & 12 and 2.30 & 4 by phone or by visiting Utsav restaurant. Only 2 nights can be booked at a time;
5) if adult males don't pack dress pants, a collared shirt and dress shoes, they won't be allowed into the Italian restaurant, Bocciolo's. Even though you may have on dressy dark denim and all else required, you won't get in - this dress code is bogus when you consider that Bocciolo's noisy ambience and seating and serving arrangements are akin to a TGI's. The rigidity of the staff here and their inability to apply discretion soured our visit to JBR and left us feeling that we didn't get value for money. It seemed that the staff are employing all means possible to reduce the clientele they would have to serve thereby reducing the work they would have to do!!