Hedonism II Trip Report - Lyle (Dec., 2019)
30 Dec 2019
I visited Hedo 09 – 28 December 2019, partly because of the great sale prices offered by Hedo during that time period and partly because I was sick of the weather in St. Louis.
I flew American Airlines from St. Louis to Montego Bay via Charlotte and everything went pretty much as planned. I had completed the online immigration and customs declaration, which seemed to expedite parts of the arrival process. Frankly, I don’t think Jamaican Immigration and Customs have fully completed integration of the online system with the paper system, and that seems to confuse some people. Overall, however, I think the online system is beneficial and helps expedite the process. Immigration was rather smooth and so was Customs once we got our bags.
I hired Rocky’s Taxi & Tour Service for ground transportation and their representative was waiting outside the arrival hall exactly as promised. The trip from the airport to Hedo was smooth and the driver was very professional.
Check-in at Hedo was very smooth and my room was ready upon arrival.
The hotel was very busy for December and I was impressed with the high occupancy rate. Per the Hotel Manager, this is the busiest December they have ever had in the history of the hotel. If I remember correctly, I think she told me the had a few days that were at 102%, a few days at 90%, and the rest of the month they were at 100% occupancy. That’s great for their business and, in some respects, what’s good for the hotel is generally good for us as customers because it helps keep it a thriving resort for us to enjoy and may be helps keep the rates more reasonable.
Overall, the property appeared to me to be in good condition and working well. The crowd of guests generally all seemed to be fun and sociable. There seemed to be some of the newbies / low-timers that hadn’t quite figured stuff out yet and were kind of a pain to have around, but that’s just a part of the process; they’ll learn and grow into things or move on. If some of them would actually read and follow the advice on various forums, just relax and be themselves instead of trying to impress everyone, they’d be much better off and more fun to be around. Just my opinion, others may feel differently.
I thought the food and entertainment was good during the visit and that part of the operation was generally working well. I ate at the buffet most of the time, but also used both beach grills, Pastafari and The Flame. All were good and I didn’t have any complaints with any of them.
The ECs were quite active, but it appears to me there’s been some turnover and there are a number of new young ECs that are still learning and in training. Because of that, they’re not quite as engaged as the more experienced ECs, but again, they’re young and they’re learning.
My room was generally in good condition, but did have a few minor problems. I had a problem with the room safe a couple times and the Front Desk made sure it was corrected very promptly. I had several problems with the door lock to my room and again, the Front Desk made sure they responded very quickly to correct the problem. The AC in my room didn’t seem to be working right and it took a few visits by maintenance and an AC technician to get it corrected. Finally, the phone in my room wasn’t working. I asked the Front Desk to have Security to come provide a 06:00 AM wakeup call on my departure day, and they never showed up by 6:30 AM when I left the room to go check out. That should NOT happen for any reason. We need to be able to rely upon a wakeup call if we request one, just like at any other hotel.
I made several trips to the Boat Bar to listen to music in the afternoons and always enjoy that. This time of year, they usually have music on Wed and Friday afternoons. They were closed on Christmas day and had a special show the day after on the 26th. WOW. One of the singers that performed was Pinky Dread and he reached WAY deep into the history of Bob Marley music and did some really old stuff that was absolutely excellent!
I made several trips down to Boardwalk for lunch from Fireman’s Lobster Pit and thoroughly enjoyed every meal. While the service at Boardwalk can be a bit slow sometimes, the food prepared by the lobster pit crew is worth the wait.
Aside from the wakeup call problem mentioned previously, checkout and departure were smooth. Rocky’s was ready to pick me up on time as promised and the trip to the airport was smooth and as expected.
I checked in for an 11:43 AM flight on American Airlines and the ticket counter rep didn’t say anything about a delay. When I went to find the gate, that’s when things got more interesting. I received several messages from American informing me of delays before any info was available at the airport. The airport finally reported the flight had been delayed to 2:00 PM with an arrival in Charlotte at 5:00 PM. Since I had a 6:09 PM connecting flight, I was concerned with the connection, considering I needed to clear Immigration, Customs, TSA, and travel across the airport to a different terminal on the other side of the airport. American personnel could NOT have been less helpful. They insisted they consider 1 hour to be an acceptable connection time. I explained I’ve made this trip many times and 1 hour is insufficient. They dug in their heels and refused to consider other options. We boarded for a 2:00 PM departure, then sat on the aircraft at the gate until after 3:00 PM while the crew worked on a maintenance problem with the aircraft (I’m happy to have them take the time to fix anything wrong with the aircraft, but that delayed us sufficiently to absolutely break my connection in Charlotte).
I used Global Entry for Immigration and Customs in Charlotte and it was extremely smooth, simple, and effective. I claimed my bag and took it to re-check to find out what was happening with my connecting flight. American had booked me on their next flight out which was scheduled for departure at 10:40 PM. I wasn’t thrilled with a long layover on a long travel day, but was happy with how effectively they took care of rebooking the flight and transfer of my luggage. SO, despite the initial delay and the crappy customer service by American at Montego Bay, the rest of it was all OK.
Another trip in the history books………… overall, it was a good trip and I thoroughly enjoyed it all. Some great times with old friends and also the new folks I met on the trip.
Irie Vibes,