We stayed twice during our trip to Martinique at Hotel la Pagerie and have many good things to say about our stay, yet a few things that were concerning. First, the good things...
Upon arrival, the people at the front desk were incredibly nice, despite my shaky French. They were very busy when we arrived, yet managed to get us a room for one night. Without ever looking at information about the hotel in advance, we were not sure what to expect. Our room was very nice, especially for the price that we were paying (off-season rates). The room looked extremely clean and was well-decorated. The furniture was especially beautiful - it looked as if some of the wooden furniture was handmade. We enjoyed the shopping in the area as well as the proximity to many nice restaurants. We ended up staying for three nights during our first stay because we enjoyed it so much. During our second stay, we arrived to a room that did not have working air conditioning - however the staff worked quickly and politely (despite my lack of French vocabulary to communicate the technical issues we were having) and placed us in a different room right away.
The few downsides to the hotel were the parking and the rudeness of one staff member. Parking is, at times, extremely difficult to find on the streets that border the hotel. One night we could find no parking except for a spot that was reserved for taxis only. It appeared that many other cars (that were certainly not taxis) were parked in those spots, so we parked there and walked to the hotel. Upon arriving, I asked one of the staff members about whether or not we should try to move the car before morning. Coming from the United States, it had begun to appear that when it came to driving and parking there were not many laws (or if there were, they were not enforced). So, I did not know if leaving a car in a spot for taxis would truly be a problem. At first we spoke French and I asked if I should move our car. He asked where it was parked, so we walked to the entrance and I pointed towards where we parked. He said it would be better if I moved the car closer to the hotel. I nodded and said yes, OK. He looked at me and said "You don't understand?" I said that I do understand. He looked at me and then got frustrated and stated emphatically "No, you don't understand." So then, in English, I repeated back what he had advised in French to try to confirm that, yes, I understand. That was the first unfriendly encounter with him that we had. The night before our second stay at the hotel, we were trying to find a restaurant that was open (many of them seemed to be closed on Tuesday), so finally we decided to try the hotel restaurant for the first time as well as book our second stay. The woman at the front counter was extremely nice and recognized us from our first (recent) stay. She called the restaurant and asked if they could accommodate us, which they said they could. Once we got to the restaurant, the same man I had spoken with concerning our car was there. He did not seem very happy to see us. We noticed that very few people were at the restaurant and began to wonder if they were closing soon (it was 8:45 pm). Throughout our stay on the island at that point, no restaurant seemed to be serving dinner until at least 7, if not 8 pm - so we would not have guessed that the restaurant would be almost closing. The same (very unhappy) man took our order right away - we got three drinks including water, two appetizers, two entrees, and we ordered dessert all at the same time. He never brought us our water, did not ask how I wanted my steak cooked, did not bring a steak knife (leaving only a butter knife), hurriedly asked if I was done with my dinner when I was not quite halfway through, and brought a liquid with mushy bananas that at one point was ice cream for my boyfriend for dessert. Thankfully he charged much less for our dinners than it seemed like a normal dinner there was supposed to cost, however we both were left questioning what we did to make the man so angry. In spite of it all, we had been so hungry by the time we got there and appreciated them serving us even though it looked as though they had intended to close at 9 that I asked the man for some paper and a pen and wrote a note thanking them for serving us even though it was late. So in terms of service, we had a mix of excellent service from everyone else to absolutely rude and horrible service from one of their staff members.
I would come back to this hotel again, however I would not eat at the restaurant except at breakfast time. I would recommend this hotel for those looking for proximity to restaurants, very clean and reasonably priced accommodations, and (mostly) very friendly people.
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC.
August 24, 2012
Dear Madame, Dear Sir,
First of all, I want to thank you for this nice comment about hotel La Pagerie, It really help us to improve the service.
I really apologize for the lack of professionalism at the restaurant. It's really a shame and be sure that It won't happen anymore.
Let us know when you come back in Martinique, we will be very happy to welcome you again.
Best regards,
Laetitia BIRON
Front Office Manager
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This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of TripAdvisor LLC.