We have just returned from a two week stay at Blue Waters. All aspects of our holiday were absolutely excellent. The food, friendly service and general ambience of the hotel were all faultless.
The one minor quibble we have is that there is some building work being carried out at the northern end of the property which caused us to ask to be moved to another room. This was done promptly by the hotel and in a very courteous manner.
Our major concern is that from next year, the development will add some 30% to the number of rooms using the hotel's facilities. This is likely to have an impact on the general ambience.

Please ignore the last two negative reviews. We stayed at Blue Waters in April (went for the World Cup Cricket) and had an absolutely fantastic stay. We are well travelled and have stayed in many 4/5 star establishments in the Caribbean including Barbados and Tobago. We found Barbados basically catered for travel snobs who feel there should be 'manicured gardens' and perfectly smooth tarmac roads wherever they travel - why do these people even bother going abroad! Tobago like Antigua has the true Caribbean spirit. Rant over - Blue Waters, in our opinion, offered fantastic food, extremely friendly staff who in our case could not do enough to make sure our stay was perfect, even down to the amount of food packed for a day at the cricket! Our room was an oceanfront deluxe in the 100 block - couldn't beat it for views. It was extremely clean and well maintained with a perfectly adequate bathroom with separate shower - what do these other people do in the bathroom that makes this unacceptable! There were absolutely no problems with mosquitoes when we were there as the area is regularly sprayed. All in all, would highly recommend this hotel and would happily return.

The previous reviewer (ref. 'All Inclusive or be Excluded ?') has well and truly hit the nail on the head in my opinion.

I was very disappointed further to my recent stay at Blue Waters and I personally feel this hotel does not represent value for money, not when one considers equally rated establishments across the wider Caribbean - particular those in Barbados whom charge similar rates.

One of my biggest disappointments with Blue Waters, as identified by the previous reviewer, is the hit and miss attitude of it's staff towards customer service/friendliness. Coincidentally I had exactly the same experience regarding the breakfast incident described by the previous reviewer with the notable exception that I was confronted and curtly refused entry on having wandered into the breakfast area after 7.30 am !

On this point I am aware and respectful of Antigua's various customs particularly the one that places emphasis on the visitor to initiate (friendly) dialogue. Believe me I tried. And yet in spite of my constant cheery manner more often than not I was greeted with nonchalance and down right rudeness. I say 'more often that not' because not all staff were found to be so. However, in my experience as a general rule the staff at Blue Waters were rather surly and this put a dampener on my stay.

My other big disappointment concerned the quality of the hotel's cuisine. I'm no Gordon Ramsay, I'm certainly no food snob but I do enjoy good fine dining. The food available from the hotel's two restaurants was found to be extremely disappointing and as a consequence I opted for the B&B rate (from MAP) shortly after arrival. For any would be traveller to Antigua with experience of the high standard of cuisine that Barbados, for example, has to offer you'll have difficulty in finding this in Antigua. The nearby Cove Restaurant was the nearest thing I found to the type of fine dining I was hoping for.

On the upside the hotel is well located on the north of the island which seems to benefit from the better weather. Blue Waters is set in attractive gardens and has three well appointed pool areas. The room was generally fine but more thought and attention particularly to the bathroom area would have taken the standard from averagely pleasant to very nice.

To finish up and in summary you would be within your rights to expect more for your money.

Hmm, having looked at the other reviews I wonder if there is a difference in the treatment that you receive, dependant upon whether you go all inclusive or not. We travelled on a breakfast only basis. We had an 18 month old with us and I was pregnant, so we didn't think we would have done justice to what was on offer by going all inclusive! Our room was quite a distance from the main reception area of the hotel, uphill all the way and a few steps to negotiate; fine without baby or bump, but they knew we had a child and we would have appreciated a room closer to the main section.

The staff were very hit and miss and did seem to warm to you as the week went on. However, I was rudely told to get out of the restaurant area at breakfast (at 7.28am, breakfast is served from 7.30am and I was only getting a bowl of cereal for the little guy!), we were often not offered coffee or tea at breakfast and quite regularly there were things missing from the table, milk, sugar or teaspoons for example. Quite often we didn't even get acknowledgement from staff when we made simple requests, such as a glass of water.

Having said that, at other times the staff could be great and were very friendly to our son. The guest services people were very helpful with any questions we had and the woman in the gym was very friendly.

I felt that the hotel was operationally focussed rather than customer focussed. They decided to prune trees mid morning which meant that leaves etc. fell onto the beach and indeed our beach beds whilst we were there. This could have been done early morning when everyone was at breakfast. You had to go and get new beach towels from the watersports area at the other end of the beach. Very often they were out of towels. Other hotels have a place on the beach to pick up towels from - this would have been handier. Bird guano was all over the footpaths, I would have thought that a hotel of this calibre would have washed down the paths each morning.

The setting itself is spectacular and the rooms are a really good size. The beaches are really clean and the hotel is very peaceful, with very friendly guests!

So all in all, would I recommend it? I think I would if you go all inclusive as I do think that this is the reason why we were treated differently. I would have given it a higher score had the service been better. It's a lovely environment to relax in, but if you have kids or are expecting try and get a room close to the reception area!