My wife, daughter (20 months old) and I stayed the week of June 28-July 5. Overall our experience was very good. We felt the service(concierge/check-in, housekeeping, entertainment staff and most of the waitstaff) was excellent. The room(#128 in the Santa Cruz block) was 4star for the bedroom, 2-3star for the bathroom which needed updating. The food ranged from very good (steaks at the Last Chance Saloon, and the entertainment at Kimonos teppanyaki grill) to average (the buffet dinner at the Mill).

The beach was beautiful and the grounds were well kept.

Our daughter loved the Sesame street character breakfast so much that we had to attend again later in the week. There is a lot to do for tweens to teens (Xbox camp, waterslides, scuba, snorkelling, waterskiing etc).

Don't go expecting luxurious accomodations and fawning staff, but it wasn't a nightmare either.

Our family of four just returned from Beaches Negril. I'll preface this by saying that I am an extremely picky traveler. Things that bother me don't bother most people. I spoke with several families during our trip that loved Beaches Negril and said it was "perfect". This review is for the people like me who are bothered by dirty dishes being left poolside without being picked up or the same wet towel sitting on the bathroom ledge for two days. I wouldn't go as far as saying the property was dirty because our room was very clean, but the pool areas bothered me. There is a swim up bar, but there were constantly dirty glasses and wet napkins on it. Lots of stuff floating in the pool by mid day. There was a walk up soda fountain that smelled really bad and I think was in need of a good cleaning. The beach is lovely, but also was littered with empty glasses by mid day. I rarely saw staff walking around during the day to tidy this up.

The food was marginal and the drinks were the same. My husband and I enjoy relaxing in a lounge or bar are during rainy afternoons or in the evening while on vacation and that doesn't really exist at this property. The two pool bars have no seating or bar stools on the land side (swim up bar with stools from the pool and walk up only with no seating on the land side). The main hotel bar is only open in the evening and doesn't have any bar seats either. There are three small tables near the "bar" which is really just a wrap around counter with some plumbing for a sink, a kegorator for the Red Stripe and a piece of lattice in the middle . It's really odd. There are two very old pool tables. They don't even have a proper hotel checkin counter. It's two tables pushed together!

The overall condition of the property is a bit dated. It surprises me that the owners wouldn't do some simple remodeling. For instance the main lobby room has some couches and leather chairs all badly in need of new upholstery. The chairs were black in places. I wouldn't even sit on them.

The staff was very nice. The entertainment at night was funny, but not in a good way! A magician, a few marginal singers, a guest talent show. I would rather have a steel drum band or something.

We had a good time. I just expected more.

My husband, my 7 year old son, and I stayed at Beaches, Negril from June 15-June 20. We had an absolutely amazing time, and would recommend the experience to anyone looking for a wonderful, family Carribean vacation.

After an easy flight from DFW to MoBay, we cleared customs in a few minutes and arrived at the Sandals/Beaches welcome area. We grabbed a couple of beef patties from Margaritaville, a Red Stripe from the welcome area, and waited (briefly) for our ride from MoBay to Negril.

The ride from MoBay to Negril was about 1 1/2 hours. The driver was informative, sharing the history of the island and identifying points of interest along the way. The kid was asleep after about 20 minutes, but my husband and I really enjoyed the time to look out the window of the van and to take in the scenery that is so different from suburban Dallas, Texas.

Upon arrival at Beaches, we were shown to the Concierge Lounge to check in. We had initially booked a Luxury Oceanview Room, but about two weeks prior to our visit we upgraded (at a discount offered by the resort) to a Honeymoon Grande Luxe Beachfront Concierge Room. Upgrading to the Concierege Room gave us a lot of benefit for the price. The Concierge pre-booked all of our watersports activities, made our dinner reservations, when necessary, and assisted in all off-site excursions. All of the concierges were beyond nice and helpful, and we are so glad that we took the opportunity to upgrade.

When we arrived at the room, I was pleasantly surprised at the accommodations. The room was spacious and very clean with a fridge stocked with water, soft drinks and Red Stripe. The bathroom and vanity area were also very clean. We had a few issues with the room, and they are very minor, considering that we were really only in the room to shower, change clothes, and to sleep. First, the pull out sofa bed in our room had a bent frame that our kid found uncomfortable to sleep on. He was perfectly content to sleep on the sofa itself, so that issue was easily resolved. Our only other issues were that the water pressure was low and the ac and ceiling fan were loud. Again, given that we really spent no time in the room other than to change and sleep, these are pretty minor issues.

After we got unpacked, we proceeded to enjoy the resort immensely until the moment we left. For food we ate at The Mill buffet, Kimono's, Last Chance Saloon, Cafe Carnival, and Blazing Paradise Beach Grill. First, we really enjoyed the buffet for both breakfast and dinner. I personally loved the chance to enjoy some more authentic Jamaican breakfast fare such as salt fish and callaloo. If you want eggs, bacon and pancakes those are there too (no worries). Dinner was good at the buffet too. There was always a good mix of American fare and more traditional Jamaican fare. Our favorite night at the buffet was Jamaican night where the bulk of the buffet was Jamaican food such as curried goat, jerk chicken, and stew fish. All of the other restaurants were good too. Our son fell in love with the beef patties at Cafe Carnival and ate at least two a day.

The other high point of the resort was the access to Water
Sports. Our family used snorkeling, Hobie cats, kayaks, the Banana Boat, and the trikes. We cannot say enough good things about our three snorkeling experiences. Each time we went out, we were taken to a different location, and each location had something unique to offer. Odain, the snorkeling guide, is fantastic. The trips would not be the same without him. My husband and I also really enjoyed taking out the Hobie Cats. If you've never been on one, the Water Sports guys will show you how to use the boat, and they will tell you the best time to take one out. Our son tells everyone that after snorkeling, the Banana Boat was his favorite thing to do.

We did not take advantage of other water sports like water skiing or SCUBA but we saw plenty of people ready to ski and dive every morning. I'll say they are popular activities even though we did not participate.

Aside from the beach and the water sport activities, it was nice to have the water park available. Our son really loved the water slides and the lazy river, and Mom and Dad loved the swim-up-bar at the pool in the water park area. It was a great way to take a break from the beach activities.

The only part of the resort that we cannot speak to is the Kids Camp. We only have one kid, and we're used to having him with us all of the time. We did see kids participating in the Kids Camp activities, and they seemed happy, but we have no specific experience to relate.

Lastly, I want to take the time to mention several individuals that really made our stay at Beaches Negril memorable. First, Odain, our snorkeling guide. He made each snorkeling trip an adventure, and I cannot imagine having the good things to say about this resort without having had Odain as part of our trip. Christine was our waitress at Kimono's. She was a great waitress during our dinner and also was helpful in recommending sites to see on our trip to the West End. Finally, the hosts of the nightly entertainment at the Big Top were great (unfortunately I cannot remember all of their names). Their energy, along with their dance moves, was really infectious. Our son will never forget the night he won a dance competition on the Big Top stage.

Obviously, our family cannot recommend Beaches Negril enough.

There were a few positives, as the kids had fun at the pool
and beach/watersports, and much of the staff was friendly and nice.

I want to share with everyone my overall disappointment with Beaches, especially after being so impressed with our stay at Sandals Whitehouse.

The first issue was that of room and location-although no one wants to "guarantee" any location, this is an example of a lack of caring about customer service. As we made these reservations so many months ago,they said they had no record of my request for oceanfront and the section, (#6) on the map of the property.

What they initially tried to give us was NOT even what was written in the description in their literature (which was a 4 poster king size bed and ajoining suite).
They tried to give us a moldy smelling room on the second floor (could not see the ocean) with 2 double beds, and an ajoining room-they aren't set up for real suites, as they advertise.
On the first and second floors, you cannot see the ocean because of the trees planted block the view-just the 3rd floor one can view the ocean.

We were paying top dollar here for a 1 bedroom beachfront suite concierge level, but I think the Hampton Inn would have accomodated us better.

When I told the concierge that the room was not acceptable, in both content and location, it was a true uphill battle-they claimed nothing else was available until I indicated to their director
that this will be escalated to the top management of Beaches and then, miraculously, something became available, still
not in the location we requested, but 2 ajoining rooms that had 2 king sizebeds and didn't smell (as much).

The location they gave us butted up to another couples resort, by about a 20 foot separation, which blasted music until 11pm every night- not conducive to my kids sleeping.

The air conditioning rattled almost as loud as a jack hammer and the condition of the property overall was mediocore.

The concierge did just the bare minimum-we even ran low on shampoo on the second to last day, and I
called to request more-it never came!

Second- the food was sub standard, and many steps downward from Sandals Whitehouse. The restaurant that was open the most was nothing shy of a grease pit with only one healthy choice-fresh fruit platter-everything else was fried and McDonald's is probably a healthier choice.

We planned to go out to the "adults only" restaurant on Sat.
night,only to learn that it was closed to hotel guests for a wedding. Their management priorites are squewed, to say the least. We did make it there the following night-the food was on the level where ALL the restaurants should have been-fresh, and high quality.

The other restaurant choice (which we went to twice) was the Japanese one-o.k., but had the same menu, so if you went there more than once, the entre would always be the same.

So, we sweat, got bug bites from sand fleas, and ate primarily greasy food for top dollar pricing-a real disappointment, to say the least.

Beaches also FALSELY advertises their food selections-one of the "restaurants" they claim to be a pizza and pasta bar is really a step up from a hot dog stand, it is NOT a restaurant, and I never saw pasta.
Plus, another restaurant goes by 2 names-one for dinner and one for lunch-so, the perception is that these are 2 separate places-again, very deceptive-that was the major greaespit that was open the majority of the time.