We stayed 2 nights in July at the Ocean Club/Four Seasons Paradise Island, following a week in Turks & Caicos. Overall, it was a good, but unremarkable experience. While the service wasn’t necessarily bad, it didn’t compare favorably to experiences I’ve had at other Four Seasons locations, and my expectation was to leave with a more positive impression of the resort and its staff. The grounds are beautiful, and the resort manages to feel secluded and private despite the fact that it is so close to the Atlantis compound. The beach is really expansive, and when the weather is good, the ocean is great. I would like to return to the resort again, and I recommend giving this resort a chance (but think of it as a Four Seasons on training wheels maybe?). More details below.
Our room rate included transportation to & from the airport and when we arrived, a gentleman waiting to pick up another group called our driver and walked us out to where we could meet him. The driver rolled up in a Bentley, which was sort of a treat if you are into cars. There was some serious puzzle work to get us into the car along with our bags though (Our transportation back to the airport on our departure day was an SUV). It was an approximate 35-min drive from the airport to the resort (same upon departure). We arrived on the day after the Bahamian Independence Day & were told by the driver that most people were taking that day off too, hence all of the traffic. The driver was super friendly and told us a lot of interesting things about some of the different hotels, some history of the area, and gave us some off-property dining recommendations to try some local cuisine.
Upon arrival, our room was ready – we arrived close to 5:30PM. During the check-in process we were offered a complimentary drink at the bar in the lobby building and we were led to our room. The room was pretty nice, with a deck looking out at the ocean. We couldn’t see the actual beach in front of us because there is a drop off down to the beach. Between the building where our room (2049) was and the ocean was an expansive, well-groomed lawn area with palm trees and hammocks. The room had a king size bed and it was supposed to have a roll-away bed for our daughter. The bed wasn’t there, but we called housekeeping and they said they would bring one over. Once we started to get settled, we noticed there was a card and chocolates and a cake on the table awaiting us – but as it turned out, it was addressed to someone else. We called the front desk and apparently our stuff was reversed with the room next door to ours. This was corrected while we walked the grounds – when we came back to the room there was champagne, a butler card addressed to us, and the roll away bed was made up in the room.
The grounds are really lovely. Despite Paradise Island being a relatively small piece of land, the Ocean Club feels secluded and fairly private. There is a beach front pool, which is an infinity pool overlooking the beach/ocean. It is situated between the building that houses the Dune restaurant and a smaller building that has bathroom facilities as well as a food counter that serves lunch. You can eat at the tables outside or at the chairs by the pool. There are steps leading down to the beach; they are between Dune and the infinity pool. Walking away from the beach front pool, in the direction of the other side of the island, you will come to a large spa building, and beyond that is the Versailles pool (adult only) and bar/restaurant. The adult pool looked nice and the gardens that stretch to the bay side of the island are really gorgeous. It is an approximate 1 mile walk from the infinity pool to the end of the gardens and back. Close to the spa building are some tennis courts and a family pool. The family pool looks like it needs some love. We never saw anyone there during our short stay and the lifeguard on duty looked like he needed some entertainment to keep him awake. The beach front infinity pool appears to be the most desirable pool location for adults and families with kids. It is in a great location with a really super view. The pool is long and narrow; and while it is pretty, it is fairly small and there is not a lot of seating around the pool. Also, there is no privacy. I don’t expect a lot of privacy, but 5 people in the pool feels like 20 people in the pool. And while we were there, another guest decided he would use the pool as a lap pool and he literally swam laps for over 30 minutes in the middle of the pool, which was really sort of awkward.
The vibe at the resort is interesting. On the one hand, it is lively (at Dune’s bar, people seemed to be enjoying the live singer and having a good time at night). On the other hand, it is stuffy and dull. It seemed like the resort is caught in this weird middle ground of being family-friendly but catering mostly to adults and couples? There were kids at the beach infinity pool, but like I said before, the pool is almost too small to play in. Our own daughter, who is ten, wasn’t sure if she was allowed to get into the pool (that was largely attributable to the guy swimming his laps in the pool).
The beach is very nice, and there is beach service. It’s a pretty wide beach and the water is clear. The view from the water of the resort is nice – the beach and water sit down lower than the sand dunes or embankment and they are covered in shrubs. Our chairs were set up pretty quickly, and we were given a bucket of ice with 3 waters in it. We also ordered a couple drinks, which took quite a while. Despite giving our room number and name, when we wanted to leave the beach, we had to wait awhile for someone to get us a bill to sign. I am not sure if the service is better when the weather is better – both of the days we were there, it rained, thundered, and there was a lot of lightning for the better part of the day. We didn’t get out to the beach until the afternoon, and they still had the red/yellow caution flag up so perhaps there is limited service when that flag is flying.
We ate dinner at Dune one night, and it started off nicely in that our server greeted us and served us drinks and took our order. While taking our order, he gave us some personal history and chatted us up and we had a good feeling about dinner. He served us our appetizers, but then disappeared. No one came back to ask us how our appetizers were, or to offer drink refills. After a very long wait, our entrees were dropped (almost literally) off by some other server who was clearly annoyed. We didn’t see another person again until well after we had finished our meals. In fact, we used the old my daughter and I left the table and went back to the room so someone would bring my husband the bill trick, and that eventually worked. We didn’t order dessert or any other drinks because we had been sitting there so long that it became unpleasant. And, it’s hard to say if the food was good or not because the service experience was so lackluster. On the other hand, breakfast at Dune was good – the service was prompt and friendly and the food was pretty good.
The service overall seems really inconsistent and maybe the resort needs time to work out some kinks and get into the groove of delivering the type of signature service Four Seasons is known for.