Review - Alaia Belize, Autograph Collection

Alaia Belize, Autograph Collection

November 24th, 2021

Enroute:

For this year’s Thanksgiving, we planned a trip with my partner’s family to Belize. Belize had been on my radar for quite a while. Home to the second biggest barrier reef in the world and equatorial sun all year long, I was convinced it would make for a memorable trip. Well, hold that thought for a moment.

While as a destination Belize had fascinated me, there wasn’t any decent hotel options on the island of San Pedro, where most travelers would be visiting. There was the Mahogany Bay, which was a Hilton Curio Collection property. While it looked nice enough on the website, we drove around the property when we got to San Pedro, and boy was I glad we didn’t have to stay there. The whole complex felt like a RV resort. All the villas were right next to each other and commanded no views over any large body of water. I say large body of water because there were several ditches on the resort where the water was black, and so were the crocodiles swimming in them. There were active constructions on the resort as well.

So in all honesty, a huge part of why we chose Belize was because a brand new Marriott Autograph Collection hotel named Alaia had opened this year. The hotel seemed to have higher aspirations, as it featured a rooftop pool and was active on social media with professionally produced marketing content. The actual experience, though, was not quite as sans souci and effortlessly glamorous as the promo videos of people sipping piña coladas in the pool.

Things didn’t go smoothly right off the bat. We had booked a three-bedroom suite from the 25th to 30th. Some of our family’s flights from Dallas and Newark were canceled, so we had to rebook for a day earlier, from the 24th to 29th. I used my travel agent for this booking who reached out to the hotel to make changes. Much to our surprise, the hotel was inflexible to an extreme. We were told that the night of the 24th wasn’t available. Okay, that wasn’t a big deal. I suggested I’d book three separate rooms for the night of 24th and move into our suite on 25th. According to the hotel, the three-bedroom suite had a 5-night minimum stay requirement. At this point I was like:

It wasn’t like we weren’t staying 5 nights??? We couldn’t stay in the suite for 5 nights because it wasn’t available??? While I admit we were the party making changes but c’mon man??? We were gonna book another 3 rooms for the first night??? How this logic wasn’t accepted by Alaia’s reservations team was beyond most functioning minds. My travel agent involved Marriott corporate and was able to secure us the suite for all 5 nights but god damn, it’s like you’re asking these people to take you to the DMV and wait for you outside.

The interaction left a bad taste, but we were hopeful as the resort did look pretty.

Check-in:

We all arrived in Belize City around the same time at noon and boarded the turboprop plane from Belize City to San Pedro. The hotel offered complimentary airport transfers so I emailed them ahead of time. The drive was on-time and helped us with our luggage. The pick-up was painless. Within 15mins we were dropped off at the hotel entrance.

Check-in immediately became a huge ordeal. I had a few Marriott gift cards. I was first told by a front desk agent that the gift cards could only be used for incidentals, and not room rates, which was factually untrue. I reminded her to check with her supervisor. She came back and confirmed that we could use the gift cards for room rate, but didn’t really apologize for being so stoic about something she was wrong about.

She went on to check us in, but demanded that we must pay the room charge upfront, which meant I had to pull up all the gift card information on the spot. Being a new hotel, she obviously wasn’t familiar with the process so we were just standing there for her to figure out what she needed to do. Probably after 15mins I told her she would need to give us the keys right now because we had two more senior people in our group. It’s worth noting that at this point she already swiped our credit card for whatever the remaining amount or incidentals were, so it’s didn’t seem necessary for 6 of us to waste our vacation time while she learned her job.

Once we got our keys, this porter came out of nowhere and offered us a “tour” of the hotel. We would’ve declined given everything we already had to deal with, but he didn’t give us a chance to say no and started with his spiel. The lobby wasn’t large, so it wasn’t all that conducive to leading a group of people walking around. I was the last in the group so couldn’t hear anything he was saying. All I knew was he took us to the lobby bar, talked for a bit, and offered rum punch in a dentist rinse cup but only had 5 cups for our group of 6. This hotel was more chaotic than the women dating Pete Davidson.

My partner was so over it so we just walked off and headed to the room.

Unpack:

Fortunately the room was a (relatively) nice reprieve from all the exhausting human interactions.

Upon entry, there was the first bedroom to the right, which we shall dub as bedroom 1. This one had a balcony, but it faced the street, and it wasn’t nice to sit out on. I believe there’s only a couple of these 3-bedroom units at the resort, and they’re both on the 2nd floor, so you could very well be seen from the street.

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Entryway

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Bedroom 1

Outside the first bedroom was a half bath.

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Half Bath

Opposite from the half bath was the second and primary bedroom, as it bolstered the only ocean view of all sleeping quarters.

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Bedroom 2

Bedroom 2 also had a balcony, but the balcony was connected to the main hallway to all the other rooms on this floor. So anybody could theoretically come and sit on this balcony. The balcony door would also automatically lock itself, so if you went out without a room key you’d have to go down to the front desk and ask for another one.

Next were the dining/living area and kitchen, which were nice enough.

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Living Room

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Dining Room

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Kitchen

Kitchen had all the basic cookware and drink/dinnerware. It was not equipped with a dishwasher, however, so you can either spend your entire vacation washing dishes, or spend your entire vacation living with the guilt that the housekeepers had to do all the dishes.

I thought the room was decent. The finishes weren’t high-end, and the details left a lot to be desired. For example, the kitchen lighting had exposed wire.

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Kitchen Wire

The toiletries were in reusable bottles and on par with what’s offered at a Courtyard. The room condition will no doubt deteriorate exponentially in no time. Additionally, I don’t think this room had been in much use since the hotel opened, as there were many surfaces that were rather dusty from construction. One area that stood out about the room was the sundeck, spanning the entire length from the living room to the kitchen. The deck was separated into a covered area with more traditional seating, and an exposed area with a dining table and two pool chairs.

Alaia Belize Three-bedroom Suite Terrace

It was raining on our arrival, but luckily weather had improved for the remainder of our trip and never rained again. From the sundeck you could see the hotel pool and the ocean.

Unwind:

Every other day we used the hotel’s gym, located within the same complex as the spa. It was petite but never crowded. The equipment selection was on the small side as well, but at least they were all brand new.

We also used the spa. While the treatments were fine, the spa itself was as no-frill as Spirit Airlines’ airfare. There was no steam room, no sauna, and the lockers were inside the bathroom. There was no proper reception area, so we had to sit in the massage chairs while we filled out the forms. I get that Belize as a destination hasn’t had much experience with higher end hospitality but it’s not like I’m asking a for a Himalayan salt room or a hammam? I feel like you could do better than a European Wax Center when you open a hotel in 2021?

We walked around the hotel after spa. The hotel grounds were pretty nice. There were two pools at this resort, one main pool with a walk-up bar, and a rooftop infinity pool.

The service at the main pool was the only acceptable service offered at this hotel. Shoutout to Vivian and Rita who were friendly, attentive and most importantly, competent, which I cannot say about everybody else who worked at this hotel. The guests at the pool, on the other hand, were some of the rougher crowd you’ll encounter. Let’s just say there were many personal speakers and Yeti mugs. We mostly stayed away from the walk-up bar for obvious reasons.

Credit when it’s due, the rooftop was gorgeous with plenty of seating, a nice vantage point for watching sunsets, and had a unique rooftop pool with glass bottoms. With that said, the service was failing miserably like everywhere else at the hotel, which I’ll elaborate shortly.

Refuel:

On our first night we ordered room service desserts, given the downpour outside. This turned out to be a massive disappointment.

First of all, it took over 1 hour and 45 mins for the four cakes to arrive. We had to call three times asking about the status of the delivery, and each person who answered was as clueless as could be. Then they would give these arbitrary estimates based on no real information. During the second call we were told 5 more minutes. The third call this number inflated to 20.

Moreover, if room service food comes in a takeout container, it’s no longer room service? Similarly, if a tray charge appears on the bill, then I’m expecting to see a tray show up in my room? Do they realize they could’ve deployed a robot if all they had to do was bringing up boxed up food? Heck, I’d rather go downstairs to pick it up myself to save the 2 hours wasted?

Little did I know the room service mishap was only the pilot episode of Law and Order. The horror ensued onto the next morning at breakfast. We booked the suite under Marriott’s Luminous rate, which normally includes free breakfast for two. Since we booked a 3-bedroom suite, my travel agent confirmed with the hotel that breakfast would be included for 6, which was just the standard occupancy for said suite.

The communication among the staff at this hotel was as disjointed as CDC’s self-isolation guidance. The hostess told us our room didn’t have free breakfast. I didn’t really care at that moment, since I was confident I could sort it out upon check-out with someone who’s more informed. I told her that was fine, and that she could charge whatever to our room. She refused to do that and insisted on going to ask the front desk. While she was gone, we managed to get seated by another hostess to avoid congregating at the host stand. When she came back, she told us that we did have free breakfast, but it was only for two. At this point I asked her to get the front desk manager. Roughly 15 minutes later, a guy came by our table to inquire about our issue, who turned out to the f&b manager. Keep in mind this whole time we weren’t allowed to order, even though we made it clear that they could just charge our room.

Another good while passed, the front desk manager Carsten stopped by and apologized for the confusion. Since I had his attention, I aired the grievances about check-in as well. He offered to buy us a round of drinks at the rooftop as service recovery. At this point you guessed it, the rooftop was a sh*t show too, which I’ll get into later.

Now that we could finally order, I want to point out that the hostess spoke incredibly loudly. She was borderline shouting “WHAT IS YOUR LAST NAME?”, “WHAT IS YOUR FIRST NAME?” and “WHAT IS YOUR ROOM NUMBER?”. It was super awkward because other tables turned around and looked at her when she did that, and I felt extremely uncomfortable providing personal information when the entire restaurant’s attention was on us. A different waitress tried to ask for everybody’s name for each order. I asked her why that was necessary, and she said so that she would know who ordered what. I’ve lived on this planet for 24 years and have never been asked to put my name on a parfait. It made ZERO sense. Consequently she gave two of us the wrong food🤷‍♂️.

The breakfast menu can be found here:

Many of you might not know, but Alaia Belize actually held the Guinness record of the World’s Most Penny-pinching Hotel. While a free breakfast could be defined quite liberally, I don’t recall the last time a hotel didn’t offer a free hot breakfast. Here at Alaia you get a meager continental breakfast. The waitress even had the audacity to tell us that each person was only limited to one coffee or juice, and that refill would cost extra. The ludicrousness. This is compounded with the hotel offering one bottle of free water per guest per stay. I’m starting to think George Costanza owns and runs this hotel. Tap water in Belize is not potable.

The food itself was fine, but there were some fuzz-looking things in the parfait so I would not recommend ordering that.

Throughout our stay we spent quite some time by the pool. Everything at the pool was great thanks to the two competent pool attendants. The ceviches were excellent. The pool menu could be found here:

Later in the afternoon we went up to the rooftop for sunset and drinks. We were the first ones there as the bar wasn’t even open yet. A waitress came over to take our drink orders, and I saw her writing every drink down on her notepad. 45 minutes later, when most people that came after us had a drink in hand, the same waitress who took our order came back and acted as if it was the first time she had ever seen our faces. She asked if anybody had come to take our order, and I was like, “yeah, you did.”, to which she responded “ok, what would you like to have?”.

I was once again annihilated into oblivion by all that’s unfolding in front of me.

WHERE IS YOUR NOTEPAD? Did it get lost in the ocean like your ability to perform rudimentary tasks? We repeated our orders to her. 30 minutes later, still no drinks in sight. One of us went up to the bar and was basically like, look, wtf?

The drinks shortly came to live. We ordered some snacks which were not comped. Unfortunately by then even Carbone’s spicy rigatoni would probably taste like the regurgitation of a cow that’s exclusively fed durian shells. Mind you the cocktails were $14 and sushi rolls were ~$20. So they were charging second tier American city prices but providing civil war plus genocide plus pandemic plus mass famine level service.

The rooftop menu can be found here:

On Thanksgiving Day we had dinner at the hotel restaurant because everywhere else was fully booked. The food was good, and service was rather uneventful as well, which was all we could hope for. Had we been at a place where we felt we were well taken care of and we could have a good time, we would’ve ordered bottles of wine and extra food, but the reality was we were just trying to get in and out quickly so not many things could go wrong. If every guest feels the same way we did, it’ll eventually jeopardize the hotel’s bottom line.

We started with a guac and lobster fries. The guac had a piece of avocado skin in it. It was hands down the most trivial and inconsequential mistake this hotel had made in the grand scheme of things.

The main courses were also fine. The presentation of the coconut rice was on brand with the hotel’s MO, tumultuous and on the brink of an apocalypse.

Note this was the initial state in which the rice was served. The dessert was alright.

On our last day we had a quick lunch at the hotel before heading to the airport. I’m not sure why we did but there we were🤷‍♂️. Lunch was actually quite good with no hiccups, or I was immune to it and didn’t even notice.

Depart:

I’m just gonna say it. Alaia Belize is the WORST hotel I’ve ever stayed at in terms of service. Not that I’m the most traveled person to make a final judgement. I mean what do I know? I’ve only traveled to 37 countries and flown over 3 quarters of a million miles🤷‍♂️. I have NEVER witnessed such gross incompetence and sheer ill-preparedness. Every interaction we had at Alaia was so triggering (it is giving me a panic attack as I’m writing this review) that not enough valium can calm me down. Horse tranquilizers maybe.

Virtually every single staff defaulted to “no” as a resolution to every issue. There were no customer service, no hospitality, no above and beyond. Even the housekeeper when we called for luggage racks, she showed up empty-handed and questioned whether we had looked inside the closets or behind the doors. I invited her to come inside and have a look herself. Guess how many luggage racks she found? ZERO.

Prior to check-out, I had a 30-minute conversation with the front office manager Carsten. I acknowledged that Belize was still in the infant stage of hospitality, and there was much, much more for the local human capital to catch up on. What I did not empathize with was the ownership/management made a business decision to open a hotel in the circumstances known to them, for them to not properly train and ready many aspects of the operation was dilutive to even the most minimal expectations. He explained that Belize was on some kind of banking blacklist for card issuers, therefore Belizean businesses were forbidden from pre-authorizing credit cards. He attributed this as the reason why we weren’t allowed to go to our room until full payment had been taken. Yet, on the first morning at breakfast, we weren’t allowed to order until the whole free breakfast saga had been sorted out, even though we told the waitress she could just charge everything to our room. How many people stay/dine and dash on a daily basis for them to be so leery?

While I chose to pay in full for everything we had consumed, it did not remotely reflect how much I in earnest deemed them worth. Although Carsten seemed like a reasonable enough guy, it felt to me that he either was constrained by how much he’s empowered to rectify service defects, or neglected to grasp the gravity to which how spectacularly his team had failed. He offered us 25,000 Marriott points, which is half of what a basic room at the hotel would cost when redeeming points. Not that I’d return even if it’s free.

At the end of the day, we had a pleasant family vacation in Belize. We were able to dive, drive around town in a golf cart, eat at many good restaurants, be by the ocean and spend quality time with family. Pertaining to the hotel, however, of my many reviews, this is the first one which I strongly encourage you to avoid at all costs.

Review - Alaia Belize, Autograph Collection

Alaia Belize, Autograph Collection

November 24th, 2021

Review - Waldorf Astoria Atlanta Buckhead

Review - The Ritz-Carlton South Beach

Satay Away