Sandals Halycion Beach Reviews

This was our 3rd visit to a Sandals resort and we were very disappointed to be honest. We had to move rooms 3 times due to broken air con, a loo that did not work and lastly just really shabby and not worth what we paid!! I felt that there was very little Sandals love at this place, the staff were ok, a few went out of their way became friends but the others seemed lacking something. Overall place was clean and tidy and very pretty but the rooms in general needed upgrading and we had upgraded so I dread to think what the lower graded rooms were like. Othere people we talked to said that their rooms did not have fridges etc which I thought was pretty silly really considering the amount of bottled water we got thru! The beach was not good, very dark and not very clean, the sea was alway murky and not very inviting at all. The beach vendors and locals were lovely thou, especially Chris and Charlie. The food was ok but we got bored with the set menus and would have liked more buffet style evenings, the bars were good and the drinks always nice. Felt very safe here but just disappointed at how much we had paid!!!

We got married in Jan this year in the Halycon and unfortunately were disappointed with some aspects of the whole experience.

Firstly if u do get married there u can take ur own music to be played at the wedding, which we were not told about! So we ended up with rubbish music and whats even worse the first dance song we picked was not played and we ended up with Rod stewart LOL at least I won't forget it...Also the photographer is not gr8!!! he doesn't bother helping u to arrange ur dress when ur having pics taken which is a bit arkward if ur alone like we were, he rushes and he took us onto the beach for pics in a rainy, windy, ruff sea day <which i didn't wanna do> and while our backs were towards the sea and he was fumbling around with his camera, the sea swept up and covered my dress with sea water and dirty sand, ruining my satin shoes and I had to end the photo session, SO BE CAREFUL!!!

Rooms: The rooms r nice with a fab bed but we were in the block nearest to the main road that runs behide the rooms and it is very noisy as well as that for our last 3 nights we had a huge lorry about 50 feet maybe less from our room pumpimg out the sewage tanks in the grounds, this went on all through the nite til early morning, I complained and the night manager said there were no rooms to move us too and he didn't know how long it would be there, by this point we just both wanted to go home!!!

Food: food is gr8 in Marios and nice in the pier but only ok in main restaurant and focuses alot on American food, plus i asked for extra fish from the grill and they looked at me like i was a greedy fat pig and as i wandered around with my plate for salad with my fish they were pointing me out and talking about me behind the grill bar, so i marched over and told them off, they soon shut up lol It made me feel so UNCOMFORTABLE i just wished i was at home....I have been to many places and it was such a shame this place turned out to be a bit of a let down.

There is absolutely no way it is 4.5 stars, i would say with everything considered 3-4 stars! First time at sandals and my last time I'm afraid...

Also ppl have mentioned no special touches and this is true, its such a shame, also the rooms could do with fridges and we took our own tea bags, they give u mainly coffee in ur room, nasty coffee at that! and no real milk just coffee mate, u ever tasted that with Tea??? its awful lol

Its not directed at British ppl, only Americans, if ur getting married go somewhere else and if ur renewing vows go and do it at Maldives, its AMAZING there! I promise u!!! The only place i've ever wanted to go back too...

At St lucia, Halycon u have a man made beach with dark water which sweeps up alot of rubbish each day, its also getting smaller where its being washed away!!!

Book somewhere else because St Lucia is fab and worth the visit buy Halycon is not!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

just returned from st lucia sandals halcyon, very disappointed sandals is not ultra all inclusive we have been on better holidays much cheeper. The minibus to the resort was very uncumfortable we were packed in like sardines i was sat over the wheel arch knees under chin for one and a half hours and the suitcases were just piled up loose on the two back seats can you imagine if we had to brake hard!!!!

the island is very beautiful and the people are all very friendly. We had a luxury seaview room which was nice very clean but no fridge i like a cold drink in the night so this was a problem, asked but didnt get a fridge. theres no waiter service for drinks so had to que, plastic glasses at night! no where to sit for pre dinner drinks, food o.k but had much better, plenty of sun beds but some were in poor condition, swimming pool old fashioned so lots of bits and insects flotting in water.

We were so excited about going to a Sandals hotel for our honeymoon our expectations were so high. I think this is where it started.
Everyone is there on their honeymoon or wedding so no freebies and no special favours. No petals on bed or towels made into swans! Silly but there were no little touches, no waiter service round the pool or beach.

Flight - We booked with Hayes and Jarvis and they use BWI. We find out now that apparently they are always delayed departing from Heathrow. This was the worst flight I have ever been on even worse then Aeroflop! We spent the first 12 hours of our honeymoon was spent in Heathrow as the plane was delayed. Then it was a stand in plane which was filthy. The return flight was better and the food was almost good! As we arrived at 3.30am St Lucian time customs were there just for us and our bags were waiting for us on the other side, nice and easy. Pay the extra and go with some else. We didn't see anything of the Hayes and Jarvis rep.

Transfer - No problem here there is an hour and half transfer in a little mini bus with dodgy air-con but it was 4 in the morning! These are just local taxi that the hotels use. There are no big coaches in St Lucia which I found wonderful.

Rooms - Check in was easy and we did get a glass of bubbly at 5:30am which was a bit novel. The rooms are clean, great big bed, and all have a balcony or terrace. But the Bathrooms were a little less inviting - be careful of the showers they were never a constant temperature. We did ask to change room as there is a major road that runs just outside the hotel and if you don't have the rattly air-con on the road is very noisy if you are staying in blocks 700 and 800. Apparently they up graded our room but I couldn't find any differences except it was a little bigger and you didn't have a road running passed your door. I believe that everywhere else was quite. Yes the air-con was noisy, everyone had a mown about that, we just had the ceiling fan on at night so we could sleep in peace. There were tea and coffee making facilities but all I wanted was a cold glass of water in the middle of the night and this was not possible as there were no bottles of water or fridges in the room and I don't care how safe they say the water was I was not drinking it, especially after it had rained the water from the taps ran brown!!

Pools and beach - To start off there are no where near enough sun umbrellas, 2 I believe in the whole hotel! The hotel was peaceful and there was no problems getting sun beds around either pools or on the beach. It was about a 50 50 split English and North American, which was nice. Although there is always one loud American women where ever you go that spoils the peace and quite. For all you English girls that have no problem sun bathing topless be warned it's not a done thing in America and they don't like it and they will tell you!! They would have a shock if they came to Europe. I think this was only round the pools and they didn't mind on the beach but don't walk around topless on the beach as if the police see you they will ask you to put your top on - now that was embarrassing! The floats were great and fun to watch people get on. There are 2 pools both with swim up bars. One has music and games, the other was chilled out and quite and the bar staff were happy to tell the louder people to quite down.
Beach - the beach was nice but it was not white sand like it the holiday books. It is a public beach so you have many beach sellers they are friendly enough but after a couple for days just dam annoying. We didn't see any fish during the day but we did see cheeky crabs.

Restaurants - This is where Sandals shines I can not complain at all about the food it was like eating out every night. We could use the other 2 resort facilities and restaurants. Fantastic. Jump on an air-con bus and 15 minutes you were there. This is why I would go back to a Sandals resort the great restaurants, so many to choice from and all great. What ever you do, do not just stay in your own hotel you are missing out on the best bit. Evening entertainment is not the best but that doesn't matter as you are to busy eating and having drinks in the piano bars. Breakfast and lunch there were plenty of choice too. All hot/cold and fresh.

St Lucia - friendly people, safe walk about in the day, not a lot of exciting activities. Just site seeing and they aren't cheap but worth doing to see the island or hire a car the roads are ok and you couldn't get lost that easily. One thing that is worth spending the money on is the helicopter trip - fantastic and I don't like flying but it is amazing to see this beautiful country for the sky's.

It was a great honeymoon just not the high standard that we expected from Sandals with no nice little touches. I think we could have got a much better service from another hotel at the same price. Although the bonus of using the other hotels facilities and restaurants may out way this fact.

An all inclusive holiday in the St Lucia.
Flight with BWIA was disapointing despite trying to prebook seats, 'phoning ahead and being right at the front of the queue, getting seats together took some discussion. Although BWIA where very accomodating in sitting us near the door it did make one wonder just what one had to do. The plane as looking a litle dated with neither of our entertainment stations working, but BWIA are replacing aircraft stock so we have just been unlucky. A short delay both out and back.

St Lucia is exotic with glorious weather even if there was some liquid sunshine. Do try and get out and see the islands. Pidgeon island is worth visiting to sample the wildlife and history even though a little limited the climb to Fort Rodney is worth it for the view. There are some spectacular rain forest trails and plantations to visit, the volcano and sulphur sprints and the capital Castrices. We travelled in by taxi to town and browsed around, the taxi driver was waiting for us at an agreed time, all very easy and civlised. Though there are some poorer areas of the country set away from the tourist oasis and the roads are rough but the people freindly.

Sandals lived up to its name of luxury. The UK brochure was misleading stating all roons had balconies which wasn't the case at our booked hotal the Regent. After some more dicsussion we transfered to the Halycion where we were well looked after. All the Sandals hotels are available so there are a wide choice of quality eatieries to chose from. The Italian and Japenese resturants are good, the pier and barefoot in the sand have exotic, romantic atmospheres, though look out for sandflies when being bare foot. If your feeling very romantic book a gazebo meal !

All's included so we made the most of the water sports, diving is good; some interesting sites good fauna and flora, with a chance of spying turtle watching the world go buy.

Paradise! may be not, the sand's not pearly white nor the sea glossy blue, but luxury no doubt.

A ultra all inclusive resort.
one and a half hours bus ride from the airport south of the island.
First impressions were excellent, very welcoming, mini welcome meeting was held straight away in the piano bar where you get a glass of champaine and a hot towel, realy tho its the last thing you want after a 8 hour flight, you just want the key and to go to bed. They then give you your key and everything you need, a bell boy then takes your luggage to your room.

Theres pleanty to do, water sports and the opputunity to go to the other two sandals resorts on the island with a shuttle bus running very frequently. The three restaurants were good, Bayside(international) Marios(italian) and Pier(carribean cuisine) you have to pre book for Marios and the Pier, 2/3 days in advance, i suggest you do so as i dont realy reccommend Bayside. The rooms were very nice, clean with air conditioning, sky tv, hairdryer, iron and ironing bored(as if you want to know) There are two freshwater pools, Main pool with entertainment daily, or the smaller quiet pool both have swim up bars. Staff are very friendly and helpful.

The beach is nice and clean pure golden sand and azure blue sea, beware of the locals trying to sell things to you, they are friendly and mean no harm, althouh they roam the beach there is security patrolling 24/7. If your like me and start to miss your good english cuisnine i strongly reccommend THE OLDE ENGLISH PUB which is at the other sandals resort The Grande. Themed on a london pub, roast beef, bangers and mash ect....

Many trips to go on, i reccommend the shopping trip to the sister island of Martinique, whale watching at Rodney bay, Drive through the volcano and a sunset cruise Magnificent! All in all its a good place to go, lots to do, great for relaxing and very romantic, Sandals lives up to its name. HAPPY HOLIDAYS