What I look for in a vacation

Ray Hanania, Punta Cana 2009

What I look for in a vacation and what you can expect from this blog.

First and foremost, there are three types of vacations you will read about on this blog. The first is the travel tourist vacation where you I can explore new places, cultures and places. This would include places like New York City's Times Square, Chicago, where I live, Los Angeles, and other great vacation destinations. It might even include a road trip. 

This can be mixed with the others I write about too.

The second vacation is the exotic travel vacation, such as to Paris, Dublin, Beirut, Dubai or Jerusalem, my father's hometown.

The third vacation is the beach vacation. This one is important and must have a great beach. There are not a lot of great beaches that the average person can afford. You will be influenced into believing you are at a great beach, in many cases because you may not have really been to a great beach. But I can tell you from experience, the best beaches are, first, in the Bahamas. Clear bright white sand and clear blue and teal waters. 

The Bahamas used to be a great destination until Atlantis destroyed Paradise Island, which once was a beautiful beach strip with great beaches and lost of room to enjoy. Now, it's a cash cow for the owners, a casino without one-armed bandits. The place is over-built and the focus is on the water parks, aquariums of sharks, pools and things that you can get at any resort inland in America. You don't need to spend $10,000 to enjoy a water park with some nice beaches.

Aruba and the Cayman Islands are great destinations. Pricey, but, you get what you pay for, for sure. Aruba has more culture, the Dutch. The Cayman's offers some nice beach explorations.

In the more affordable division is Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic. It has great vacation resorts, although the resorts are built like bowling alleys, something I'll help you understand. The villas and rooms closer to the beach cost way more than those further away. You have to travel on the resort using a golf cart or a cart train.

Jamaica is a great destination, but most of the beaches suck. The water and beaches are a bit dirty and rocky. Go there mainly for the off-beach culture because Jamaica has a wonderful culture. You'll want to leave your resort to visit some of the great places like Dunn's River Falls, or Rick's Cafe. But, it is costly to travel there and it is not always safe with the country still submerged in socialist remnants of a past political instability.

My first posted review here is about a resort along Jamaica's northwest coast. Nice place, somewhat costly, but the beaches really were so limited.

Mexico is a coin toss. The prices don't reflect the growing fear caused by drug gangs that have taken over the country. There is still an unwritten rule that the drug gangs won't harm tourists, but that isn't always guaranteed. You have to be careful. It used to be fun to travel to Cancun and leave the resort to visit the shopping malls. But these days, they are not safe.

Europe offers great places for both types of vacations, beaches and exploration and I will write about many of the ones I have taken, including traveling through France without hotel reservations, renting a car and flying up the Cote d Azul from Perpignan through St. Tropez and Monte Carlo to Menton in Italy.

And then drive to Paris where you walk the historic streets and districts, taking a side trip to London through the Chunnel on a Gourmet Dinner Car. Phenomenal.

When you look for a vacation, the first thing to check out is the beach. View the photos and then view a map showing you the resort. Even use GoogleEarth to get a better feel for the real layout of the beach because most resorts with small beaches use trick photography or photos of other beaches to mislead you into believing you are getting more than you will get.

The second thing is to real research the resort because they won't tell you that the resorts are often divided into sections based on distance from the beach and price. Some in Punta Cana are really three different resorts each sold separately but basically the same resort. The cheaper rooms are the furthest away, although they will make you think they are near the beach. The most expensive will be near the beach, but you may not realize that the resort you are traveling to, doesn't offer those rooms when you book. You may have to pay to upgrade when you arrive, if there is room.

Finally, always search for a map of the resort in order to get a better feel for where your room or villa will be located. Different roos are located in different areas of the resort and cost more or cost less. You need to see these.

Finally, I do rely on TripAdvisor to read through tourist postings, comments and photographs. Don't go by the photos posted by the resorts because they are angled to mislead. 

I'm not saying that a resort with some handicaps isn't worth visiting, but I am staying you should know the good, the bad and the ugly before you book and know what you are getting. 

Many resorts post fake comments posted by members of their staff and pay agencies to write up reviews. They pay travel agents to visit their resorts and win many of them over to post excessively positive comments to off-set the negative. But if you read 1 negative for every 10 comments, you can be sure that the negative experience is going to be a 50-50 shot that you should expect.

All inclusives are great, when available. Not all resorts offer all-inclusives. It's popular in Punta Cana, but not always everywhere else.

I'll review the food for you, too.

Anyway, take a journal with you and spend a few minutes to jot down your experiences to share with your family. Draw pictures and take pictures. In traveling through France, I took a sketch book and colored pencils and ink and drew -- as bad as I am at art -- some wonderful memories of places I visited. It took about 30 minutes to sit and sketch out scenes that were memorable. I'll post some of those pages for you to enjoy and share and find your own inspiration.

Put them altogether and you will always have something precious for yourself and your family to share with others. Vacations are a prize regardless of the experience and I hope you always enjoy yours.

-- Ray Hanania

The Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton, Jamaica -- watch out

The Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton & Jamaica -- watch out

Reviewed June 18, 2012

The Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton and Jamaica has two listings on Trip Advisor. You can click here to get to the 2nd listing. It is two hotels in one -- like many of the other resorts you find in Punta Cana, except this one has very small beaches.

Here is my review posted on the other listing that you SHOULD read BEFORE you decide on this hotel. I found it to be far below what I expected. But a good traveler makes the best of even a terrible resort and the Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton and Jamaica Resort is a TERRIBLE resort.

Click here for Travelocity Review

Here is what I wrote if you don't want to check out the other listing:

I spent the past week (June 3-10) at the Lady Hamilton in Jamaica and have to say I was TOTALLY DISAPPOINTED in the experience. Here is the problem and why you will read some good reviews. If you travel the Caribbean extensively your disappointment will come from a comparison to other resorts and beaches. This resort is the worst I have ever traveled to. If you don't travel much, bread crumbs do look like cake. But, even if you have booked your trip here, you can still make the best of it by going to other beaches like the Negril Trip ($30 a person). The only saving grace is the swimming pool. It is very nice, except for the drunks who hang out at the pool bar and leave their booze glasses everywhere.

1-The beaches were OK. The Las Brisas beach was cluttered with rocks and coral making it very difficult to enjoy. Sunset Cove was very small. Half the beach is for swimming and the other half is for water sports.

Standing on the same spot looking to the left (above) and then looking to the right (below).

The Las Brisas beach is cluttered with rocks making it difficult to walk in the water ... there are some

sandy spots with no rocks but they are very small and not easy to find once in the water. Further out, about 25 feet is coral rocks filled with Black Sea Urchins and painful spines. (To the left are the honeymoon villas for the honeymooners and there is a small private beach there, too. And beyond that is the Sunset Cove which is even smaller and is infested with flies and bugs.)

As you look to the right (above) you see a sea wall. Beyond the sea wall is a beachfront of coral coves covered with rocks and coral. That is the beach area that is in front of the Jamaica Resort. The Las Brisas beach is in front of the Lady Hamilton Resort.

2-Food: The resort has no system to sign up for ala carte dinners. You have to "GET THERE" at 5:30 and put your name on a list and then wait. If you get there late, chances are you won't be able to get in. That's great for people not enjoying what little there is to enjoy at the resort, but it's terrible for people who are trying to enjoy the day.

The Negril Buffett was so-so. The food was OK. The selection was limited.

3- Resort layout: The resort is two hotels, the Jamaica and the Lady Hamilton. The Jamaica villas overlook the reefs and you have to walk pretty far to get to the crappy beaches. The Lady Hamilton villas are located near the beaches (The Honeymoon villas are in the middle). The Hotel tries to pack you into the Jamaica ... if you don't mind spending your time in a chair watching the ocean from the top of a reef lookout, it's great, I guess.

4-We had a Lady Hamilton Room, 1 bedroom. Nice layout (bedroom, hall and bath, frontroom, two verandas.)

An overview of the resort showing the two small beaches above. The pool (below) is very nice and there are chairs set in rows on sand where it is enjoyable.

Here's a map of the resorts from tripAdviser

This photo of Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton Resort & Spa is courtesy of TripAdvis

Image from Google Earth of the resort. Top left is Sunset Cove. Middle is the tiny adult beach. Right is the Las Brisas beach. The vilas on the right are the cheaper ones facing coral reef beaches, very rugged and difficult to enjoy. The villas on the left are the Lady Hamilton villas nd cost more. The villas on the in sulfa are the honeymoon villas for couples. Great view, ok beaches.

5-Air Conditioning. You don't want to be in Jamaica's humid climate with good air conditioning. Our air conditioner went out five times during the week. Turns out the Hotel Shuts the air conditioning down in the middle of the night in your room to save money. You have to put a Key Card into the in-room box to keep the electricity on. We did.

6-Front Desk: They suck. They do their best knowing they can't do anything about the resort's problems.

7-No information. We went through Apple. This was the first time that I didn't get any real substantive information about a hotel from the Apple Rep. When I did waste a morning meeting her, she had nothing to do give me except to try to sell me an excursion.

They do not provide much info on activities at all. You have to LUCK OUT to learn about things happening ont he "beach".

8-Best Excursion to get away from the Hotel: Rick's Cafe. It cost $30 per person. You leave at 11 and return at 8 pm after sunset. They take you to Sherreta's on the beach restaurant. I ordered a Crab Meat Sub, there was very little Crab Meat on it. Horrible place. They have lounge chairs but only very few umbrellas on their small beach section (This is a place where the beach is divided into 60 foot wide sections for each shop and restaurant. The Hotel excursion takes you to one of the spots). You will burn to death in the sun. The beach and water are phenomenal. You stay at the beach and fry there for 3 hours. (They will give you towels if you need them). They then take you to several Malls to encourage you to spend money -- junk stores, tourist trap junk. Then they drive you to Rick's Cafe where you can enjoy the cliff diving and the sunset for about 2 hours or so. Rick's Cafe was GREAT.

There is an adult cruise to Rick's Cafe also that cost twice as much. I have an 11 year old son so we couldn't try that.

9-Tipping. It's an entitlement there. They say hi and demand money. This was the problem at the Negril beach where people wouldn't let you alone for one minute, begging for money trying to put a reefer in your hand, wrapping colored wrist bands on your wrist and trying to get $10 from you. And when you politely try to discourage it, they start swearing in the worst language -- I've been to Jamaica 100 times and know all the swear words. You'll learn them fast at the Negril Beach in front of these shops.

10-There were many nice employees there who tried to do their best but had no answers to problems. I feel sorry for them.

Conclusion. Family of four, $6,000. Spend the extra $2,000 and go to Beaches or Sandals on the Negril Beach.

I thought this would be a good alternative to our usual trips to Punta Cana. It sure was different.

-- Ray Hanania

 

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