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My initial trip had to be rescheduled because of hurricane Berly that came around July 4th weekend. It took some haggling and The sands would only accommodate a 2 week window to use the credit. Which was very disappointing. I had to pay double on a flight to meet their deadline. Upon getting to the hotel, the staff at the front desk were polite and apologize for the short time frame to use the credit. The rooms were nice, we had a duplex style room. The food was subpar, only ate there twice during my stay. I wouldn’t say it’s truly an all inclusive experience. There was a rude encounter with one of the head staff at the dining area ( actually 2 rude experiences). This incident was reported to upper management and rectified with an apology and a complimentary brunch at NIOR. Beyond this, some training needs to happen to let the staff know it’s not ok to treat people differently because of how “they look” This woman had some level of bias to her tone and approach when dealing with black guests vs non black guests. Let me just say she was more polite to people who did not look like her. #Sad Shout out to Kemar at guest services. He was attentive and approached each guest with respect. He accommodated any request that was asked. I gave it a 4 stars because of the location, and the few friendly staff we encountered.

Note: We originally booked a different hotel where we went on honeymoon (a beautiful 4 star hotel on the beach) however it was damaged during hurricane Beryl and therefore closed - so our travel agent moved us to a "like for like" hotel.. Hotel: Basic facility with basic furniture, A/C , grounds etc. There is one pool and one bar - both quite small and you realise the size on busy days! Our A/C and toilet both broke on more than one occasion. Food and Drink: We had all inclusive. This was misleading. All inclusive meals are very limited, especially if you have food intolerances or specific diets. The selection/options for each meal is very limited, and the food quality was mostly very poor. Portion sizes were tiny and sometimes just unacceptable. Drinks options are very limited to cheap brands and speciality drinks are not included. Dining Area Hygiene: This is a big issue. There were birds everywhere scavenging for food. They jumped from table to table, plate to plate whether anyone was there or not. The dining area which is beach-side, also has hanging lights - often the birds would rest on the hanging lights and poop - landing on people, their plates, the floor etc etc. Not entirely the hotels fault but they didnt really do anything about it. Other hotels in Barbados have resident cats and they dont have any bird dropping issues like this place. Beach: Public beach, small and has a big problem with seaweed during hurricane season. We had 3 days with sand, and then woke up one morning and the whole beach was covered and unusable. It took the hotel a week to have the seaweed removed, but by then all of the customers were fairly deflated. Also, for our first 2 days stay there was a ban on entering the water as a sewage pipe burst during the hurricane and the water was contaminated. Eventually, the beach was re-opened. Gym: This is a converted hotel room with 6 pieces of equipment, a few of which either dont work or are broken. If you enjoy fitness then avoid this hotel, there is a reason they dont have pictures of their fitness facility on their website. Its terrible. Staff: We met some lovely staff members on our trip. Many however are young and inexperienced and for most of our stay there was an obvious lack of leadership in the hotel, restaurant and bar and this was reflected in a mostly poor and sometimes rude attitude by staff towards customers. I dont think there was any malicious intent to this behaviour - just inexperience and a lack of visible leadership to keep people on their toes. To reiterate, we did meet some lovely and hard working staff, but their amazing attitude and efforts were overshadowed by others.

this was a good hotel made great by the staff. Restaurant and front of house staff were superb, bar staff pretty good although service could be a little slow. food was hugely better than expected after some of the reviews we had read before we went, we never had any bad food at all in the week we were there and some of it was really very good indeed. If I could change anything is if they would enforce the rules about booking sun loungers. our room was great and it was just one of the basic ones, we also took advantage of the day up at the Mango bay which was a good experience, and getting the bus up there was another superb experience.

Just got back from 9 nights at the Sands. Nice small hotel with friendly and attentive staff. Food was varied in the main restaurant with a mixture of buffet style and service at your table. Portion sizes were small but tasty and good for our waistlines. Visited the Noir restaurant once and found it to be mediocre and not worth a second visit. Beach was good and the nightly singers were excellent. Location is great and close to St Lawrence Gap and Six the excellent sports bar. Easy bus ride to Oistins, a must on Fridays, and Bridgetown. Been to the Caribbean more than 20 times across many islands and have to say this was the worst example of either watered down or low grade alcoholic drinks, the spirits specifically. Beer and wine were good (explains why so many people were only drinking beer or wine), but everything else was unacceptably poor. Shocking and should be addressed. Also worth saying that for periods of every day of our stay the bar ran out of water or beer. Rooms were a good size but the bathrooms need to be updated. Overall, a 3/5 strikes the right balance and represents our experience.

Superb All Inclusive holiday. We stayed for 7 nights and enjoyed a lovely Ocean view room, excellent food and drink and great service. Love the fact that they clean the room everyday and even have a turn down service on an evening. Live entertainment every night and they were great. Found the staff very friendly and always keen to help. The hotel is only some 500m from St Lawrence Gap with all its restaurants and bars and there are some great beach walks to enjoy. We will definitely be back.

Nice clean relatively small hotel.. Doesnt have the facilities of the large hotels we've stayed in! Good pleasant staff-always polite and helpful.. Rooms are comfortable and have all facilities necessary..! Only one basic restaurant,but you are allowed one visit to the luxury end Noir..!