Stayed at The Reef in October 2012 for Canadian Thanksgiving/US Columbus Day. We checked in mid-week and practically had the place to ourselves. The front desk and concierge staff were outstanding; very helpful and friendly. We chose a Harbour View (2 bdrm) room which was very large and comfortable. The room overlooked the front of the hotels' grounds. In the distance was the harbour as well as the beach/ocean. We could see how many cruise ships were in the harbour but never felt that the Aquaventure water park was overcrowded even when there were multiple ships in port. We hardly spent any time in our room so we didn't regret not staying in an ocean view room at all.

There's a Starbuck's in the lobby. The pool area was great and the beach was beautiful (which is reserved for Reef/Cove guests only). Lots of chairs available both at the pool and the beach. About half of the chairs have canopies. The only disappointment was that our family couldn't walk along the beach towards Aquaventure as we would have had to walk through the 'adult only' Cove beach. There is also no outside path around the 'adult only' area so you have to walk through The Cove hotel to get to Aquaventure.

We had a great time in Aquaventure. It's lots of fun and only felt crowded once or twice over the holiday weekend. It's a bit of a walk from the hotel to the water park area so we opted to rent a locker to store our valuables. There is only one location for lockers and it is quite a distance from the Reef. We brought bottled water and juice with us to the pool every day in a cooler bag that we brought with us from home.

Highly recommend using FoodStore2Go for groceries. We ordered some snacks, fruit, other breakfast items and a couple cases of water (and some wine). The groceries were already in our room when we arrived at the hotel. This is a great service!

We chose the Reef/Cove Dining Plan which includes breakfast and dinner. We opted for a late breakfast (11-11:30) every morning at Mosaic in the Cove. This is by far the best breakfast buffet that we have ever experienced. I believe the cost was $25/person which I considered to be a bargain. Only had to wait once to be seated and it was only for a few minutes. I personally wouldn't choose the dining plan again even though we had wonderful dinners every night. There are a variety of restaurants but we chose to eat at the more formal ones in order to justify the cost of the dining plan. It just felt like we were always stuffed.

The shuttles pick you up at the hotel entrance and do a circuit of the resort. It's easy to get anywhere and doesn't take a lot of time. The most we waited for a shuttle was 20 minutes. Usually there was one pulling up within 5-10 minutes.

The hotel has a gym but it's only available to the residents. The fitness centre (a short walk) was terrific. It's large and there is lots of equipment.

Bottom line: This isn't an inexpensive vacation but it also wasn't over-the-top outrageous like I'd inferred from other reviews. We brought enough sunscreen with us and since we had bottled water delivered (read that both of these items were overpriced at the resort), we didn't feel in any way taken advantage of and are looking forward to our next Atlantis vacation. We would definitely stay at The Reef again.

Never in all our years of travel have we encountered such a disgrace when it comes to customer service. Our trip began at the front desk when my husband attempted to upgrade to a bigger room. While being extremely lovely the front desk personnel couldn't tell us about any possible upgrades or price. He had to call a manager who in then said that thy would call us back but we would be checked into our current room. Well we are still waiting for that phone call regarding an upgrade. The next morning we had booked a cabana and while we initially attempted to book a cabana in the cove for a much higher price we were told we could not as those were reserved for cove only. We explained we would be more then happy to pay the premium but were told that was not an option. Our entire stay all of those premium cabanas remained empty while we were more then happy to pay. We settled on a cabana by the water park which was lovely and clean and the manager was lovely when I asked to move cabanas as ours was not in the sun she explained she couldn't do it as we were already booked under that particular cabana. We explained that none of the other Cabanas were reserved as we saw the reservation list and she explained that she just didn't have the ability to do so but she would move us for the next few days of our booking. Yes we had pre booked our cabana for 4 days. We tried to book the 500 dollar a day cabana but were told no and instead paid 150 a day at the water park. We continued on our journey of service excellence the next afternoon when we were heading to a rehearsal dinner at the beach of the cove. After two different security guards gave us wrong directions we thought we were finally on our way despite being 25 minutes late at this point. We followed the security guards direction and traveled toward the beach. Unfortunately we were met with another security guard at the adult only pool entrance and told we could not walk through with our 2 children at 430 in the afternoon. I attempted to explain the situation and explain that we would be more then happy to be escorted through the area with security as it was the only way to the beach at this point without starting back. The security guard wouldn't hear a word we said and that's when I asked to speak to a manager. The manager Rupesh was a horribly rude horrible demeaning individual who told me that he would not answer me as I was "raising my voice". My husband dry calmly attempted to explain the situation to him and asked him to escort us the right way to the beach and Rupesh answered with "just turn around and go back". At that point I had lost my patience and turned around to walk through the trees and onto to beach to circumvent the "adult only area" The manager followed us around the area to make sure that we didn't cross the treshold of his "adult" area only. This evening as we sit in Nobi having dinner we are watching numerous families with small children parade through the " adult only" gaming floor and this is 859 pm not 430 in the afternoon as we has attempted to do. While in the rehearsal dinner my young 5 year old daughter needed to use the facilities. We quickly ran to the first ones we saw and were told we could not use any of the outdoor facilities as the entire area was closed after 5 pm and we must head back to a hotel to use the laboratory which was a quarter of the mile away. I begged and pleaded to no avail and therefore had to leave the party and go back to a hotel which took over 20 minutes and we decided since we were already by our room we would just head there. We were so upset and disappointed that no one would acknowledge or respect our frustration. When we went to speak to the concierge at the reef she listened and yet still told us that we could not have gone through that area with kids and that the outdoor areas close at 5 but she did say that she would have a manager call us immediately. Well as I type this sitting At NOBU which was the best service we've had here to date we are still awaiting that manager phone call and its been over 3 hours. Atlantis you should be ashamed. Customer service and thinking outside the box is obviously not a necessity in your resort and the consumer is not a priority. This will be our last time traveling here. Last month we spent the weekend in the w hotel in Miami and were treated like royalty. The month before that in the ritz Carlton in key biscaine and a wish was never denied. The list goes on and on ..., it is truly unfortunate and disappointing since the potential here to meet and exceed hues expectations is tremendous. However at every turn Atlantis seems to fail epicly.

We visited The Reef in February last year during a non-school vacation week. We had been prepared that it could be very crowded but we were very lucky and had the place practically to ourselves! This is a beautiful resort that is almost a city unto itself. The Reef and the Cove are the two newer hotels and it shows! I felt the decor in the Reef was far superior to that of the other hotels on the property.

THE ROOM: Our studio room in the Reef was ample space for us and our 2 children as we left the room at 8 am, came back to change for dinner and then back to sleep - we were never in it! When we were, everything was brand new, clean and comfortable. Beds were great and bathroom was beautifully appointed. Great views of ocean and harbor where my kids got a kick out of watching cruise ships come and go. One note -- there were not ample towel hooks in the bathroom and there was no outdoor lighting on the terrace which made it impossible to enjoy at night when the kids were sleeping.

REEF LOCATION: We liked this particular hotel because it was newer and while it was a bit of a walk to the water park, we enjoyed the walk. The Reef is a quiet hotel away from the rest of the resort, which we have heard can get quite crowded with day and cruise trippers. The Reef shares a private pool with The Cove and during our stay there were never more than 3 or 4 other families at the pool. With such low occupancy, one would think pool service would have been amazing. It was not - had to search out staff to help with chair set up, often there was no one to take food or drink orders so you had to go to the bar area to order yourself. There is no excuse for this lack of service ever but especially when the resort is empty.

WATER PARK: was great for kids. We had no waiting in line which was amazing. There were a few rides that my smaller child could not do due to height requirements but the lazy river was a hit as was the water playground. One day we hopped a shuttle to the other side of the resort - we had been told the Beach Tower had its own lazy river and my kids wanted to try it out. It took us almost 45 minutes to get there and after we'd been dropped off and made our way through the Beach Tower lobby to the outside, we noticed it was empty. It turned out The Beach Tower and one other hotel were closed down due to low occupancy so all attractions and restaurants here were closed. It would have been nice if concierge at the Reef or the shuttle operated had communicated this to us knowing where we were going. We wasted almost 1 1/2 of our day going back and forth for nothing. Pools are great throughout the resort (although we never experienced decent pool service at any of them) and the beaches are beautiful - although the water temperature in February was quite cold which was disappointing.

FOOD: we bought the meal plan for my husband and I and our children were free. Food here is pricey and the meal plan was well worth it in my opinion. We ate every breakfast at Mosaic in the Cove because we couldnt imagine it any better elsewhere. It was a very pretty, bright and uplifting place to eat. Huge choice -- made to order omelettes, pastries, cereals, fruits, oatmeal, pancakes, french toast etc. Lunches were tougher with children. There are only a few poolside bars serving food and the offerings are limited. No chicken nuggets. No pizza. Our children had difficulty finding something to eat which is not pleasant to deal with. Dinners were mixed. We ate at Carmines twice - being from NY - and it was just as good. The portions are huge so we brought back to the room and our kids had leftovers for lunches two days which worked out well. Mesa Grill was very good and we went there twice as well. Bahamian Club was mediocre at best and Casa' D'Angelo was fine. Service at all were fine.

KIDS' CLUB: Our children wanted to check out the kids' club and begged us to go after seeing it. We have never left our children in a kids' club situation before and were apprehensive about doing it; however, the staff reassured us and told us exactly what they would be doing. They were to play in the indoor camp for a bit, go to a cooking class, get a behind the scenes tour of the sea lions habitat and then go swimming. Seemed like a nice schedule for 4-5 hours so we made an appointment for the next day. When we dropped our children off, we brought several bottles of water because our children do not like juice. The staff said they had water and it was not necessary. When we arrived to pick up our children we were shocked by what had transpired: they had stayed inside the ENTIRE time (we did not go to the Bahamas from NY in February to have our kids inside for an entire afternoon). They did not have a cooking class, did not going swimming and did not see the sea lions. Furthermore, they had not been given any water to drink in 4 + hours and one child had a pretty nasty gash on his hand and no one was quite sure how it happened. We were terribly disturbed by this experience and voiced our complaints to the director of the kids' club. Later that day, we received an apology with presents for the kids in our room with an offer for a complimentary visit back to the kids' club. We obviously passed.

THE SPA: While our kids were at the kids club we had the concierge at the Reef book us a couples massage in the spa. When we arrived the receptionist quoted us a totally different price than what the Reef concierge quoted us (of course in the spa's favor). We spent more than half an hour going back and forth with the reef concierge on the phone and the spa trying to work it out. The spa staff was very rude about it and in the end, they made a compromise but did not honor the price that the concierge from the reef quoted us. It was a very poor display of customer service. The massage was fine but the whole experience was tainted.

Be sure to visit the Atlantis Racetrack - the kids had a blast playing with the remote control cars. We also enjoyed the rock-climbing wall and we swam with the dolphins which was definitely a highlight of our trip.

Overall, we had a great trip to the Reef in Atlantis and would return again in future however wont be using the kid' club or the spa.

An expensive and almost painful place to go if you have small kids. You think you know how much it is going to cost before you go. You have no idea unless you have been there. Think buying two virgin pina coladas on the beach for $25, apple juice $10, a bottle of water $7. We had the dinner plan so we avoided the high bills for dinner to some extent, but our bill just for drinks (most non-alcoholic) for a week was well above $1000 for our stay. For the meals we had to wait in a line for breakfast, 45 minutes every morning, then you had to wait for your bill, then wait for the waiter to return with your card (on the meal plan, we thought we could eat and leave, this was not the case). Parents with young kids would understand that a 2 hour routine for breakfast is less than ideal, especially when kids are excited to go to the beach. My husband booked all restaurants months in advance for supper, but getting to restaurants around the resort was tough with a few kids in tow and a reservation on the clock. The place is huge, and if kids are too big for strollers, yet so small that they mind walking 30 minutes or more, you may be in trouble. I feel we spent most of this vacation dragging kids around, calling for room repairs (doors were constantly not working), and waiting for our bills. There are so many other places which have better service, nicer amenities and a offer a better family/relaxing experience. I would not recommend this place to any of my friends with small children.