For my 30th Birthday, my wife planned a trip to Curacao. We chose Curacao b/c of its consistently warm weather, and we were curious about the ABC islands.

First off, I would say that my wife and I are very well travelled. We have been to many Carribean locations and worldwide: Punta Cana Dominican Republic, St Thomas, Grand Cayman, San Juan Puerto Rico, Belize, Honduras, Cancun, Rome, Sicily, Tunisia, Barcelona, Marseille, Genoa. Some locations visited by cruise ship, many by resorts.

The Good:
Everything about the hotel was beautiful; clean and well decorated.

Jaime the daytime front desk manager was very helpful and gave us great suggestions for restaurants.

The pool was nice and the pool bar food was surprisingly good for lunch (especially their fish sandwich). Voila Delicatessen also has a decent lunch, pizzas and hot/cold sanwiches. A bit expensive but what do you expect for a Marriott.

The Bad:

The few nights we stayed @ hotel for dinner were disappointing. The outdoor Breezes Patio does a buffet style themed dinner, and the food and service is terrible...STAY AWAY.

Our friends who joined us had problems with their A/C in their room and had to move rooms mid-week. Inconvenient but the problem was resolved.

The beach was the biggest disappointment. It was full of rocks, and you could hardly walk out into the water without carefully navigating the sharp rocks and coral. There's also a public beach located right next to the hotel and it gets pretty busy during the weekend. No big deal, b/c the hotel reserves an area for guests only and there is a fence that seperates the 2 beaches, but its far from private or secluded. The otherside of the beach is reserved for the dive shp and boats.

The ocean view would be beautiful but there are constantly oil tanker ships in the horizon, almost every one of our daytime beach pictures had one in the background.

Worst of all, the money exchange. Don't even bother exchanging US dollars for local money. You don't benefit from the exchange rate and almost everything was priced in US Dollar. In fact, our taxi cab driver couldn't even provide change to us in his own local currency.

If you are going to Curacao, and want to stay at one of the nicest hotels, this is where you stay.

But there are so many better places to go for the money.

Just wanted to write in because of all the other reviews that got us excited for the trip to Curacao and helped us make a decision to book at the Marriott. So if this is long - winded, sorry.

The Marriott was a great choice for us, the property is beautiful, great pool and swim up bar, and also a good beach. Do bring water shoes though, there is tiny coral a couple feet into the sea, but there are spots you can get into the sea without hurting your feet. We saw some great fish snorkelling just from the hotel beach. Getting under a palapa was no problem either. The Boardroom is great to sit on the swings and order a good drink looking out at the sea. It's fun to be at the Seabreeze by the pool around happy hour.

Definitely check out the iguana feeding at the hotel! The woman that does this is full of information and iguanas come out from everywhere. You can see them bathing on top of the bushes in the morning and the garden wall.

Monday night at Portofino was the Italian Buffet and it was awesome. One of our best meals. Mornings you can get the buffet there and it's a little pricy and a lot of food, so later on in the week we just did a la carte. We did walk over to Hook's Hut past the Hilton. At first you might be a little timid because you have to walk down a lowly lit street, but it's fine. You are well rewarded with great food and atmosphere there! Some people at the Marriott heard that it's not inside in air conditioning. They are correct, but who cares? You're having an awesome meal, with fun music looking out at the Caribbean Sea with moonlight peaking through the palm trees!

One day we rented a car and went to a couple beaches, we loved Playa Lagun. Once again, being off property might intimidate some people, but no one hassled us at all! It was great because there were very few people at these public beaches mid week - not touristy at all. We went to Jaanchie's at Westpunt and braved a side of iguana. Very cliche, but it did taste like chicken, just bonier. I ordered garlic shrimp with rice and beans - it was excellent. My husband ordered the grouper and that was good too.

We took the hotel shuttle to Willemstaad and the architecture really is beautiful with all the colors, but we were very hot since you don't get the ocean breeze and we retreated to Kura Hulanda Museum. Nice small museum and Kura Hulanda Hotel looked like a cool place to stay with nice grounds and cobbled walkways. We were told the shopping in Willemstaad was really good but we must have missed something.

Overall, we loved Curacao and were glad we choose the Marriott after seeing some of the other properties on the island. Hope this review helps some people and you have a great vacation!

We have been to this hotel many times and we were always happy. It felt like home away from home. We have been here 12 times or something like that. Always was our stay to our great satifaction. Not this time. When we arrived we had booked a resortview room/king bed/non-smoking on their website. We are marriott-gold reward members so they have to give us the king/non smoking anyway. What did we get? A room all the way at the very back of the hotel, street view/tree view, double beds, SMOKING! How horrible. Went back to reception, no other rooms available anymore. Roomchange next day. Also asked before arrival for baby-bed and little micro-wave to heat up bottles and food for the baby. It was not there at arrival! They upgraded us the next day to sea-view. That was ok but nothing more than that! The rooms were renovated a few years ago but they need a complete renovation. Old bathrooms, old (re-painted) furniture, no facilities in the room wahtsoever. Fridge was not cooling. A/C made a lot of noise, almost broke. No directory, towels were not stocked, empty coffe-cups and glasses not cleaned/thrown away. In 4 day's we did not have a linen-change! Housekeeping always at 15.00 hrs while the maid saw us leaving the room at 8.30 in the morning, every morning!
No glasses for wine and beer at seabreeze for dinner. Everything in plastic cups. Only pro is the staff (waiting staff at bar and restaurants) Always smiling and interested. Same staff for years already. Next time when we come to Curacao we have to rethink if we will stay here again! They will have to do something to meet up with the new Renaissance and Hyatt that are being build on the island!

I wanted to write a review because of all of the great information that I read before my trip to Curacao. I was very pleased with the Curacao Marriott Beach Resort, I've stayed in many caribbean resorts including the Marriott resorts in St. Kitts and St. Thomas and I have to say that this one is the best! The staff was so friendly and attentive. The rooms were very nicely appointed and very clean. The resort grounds were beatiful and the food in Portofino as well as the Sea Breeze restaurants was delicious. We also enjoyed the beach barbeque. I highly recommend this resort to anything who is looking for a lovely beach vacation on a warm and friendly island.