Goodbye My Friends! This will be my last post on BrickGals. I’m moving up to Fort Lauderdale. While I’ll miss you, and this has been fun, I’m sure another brilliant mind will start a blog on Brickell.
As a last attempt to provide you great wisdom, I wanted to share with you a review I recently posted to Tripadvisor on the Resorts World Bimini Superfast & Bimini Bay Resort…
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A couple friends and I decided to finally take the trip to Bimini for a birthday celebration weekend after winning some free cruises on the Resorts World Bimini ship. We’d always wanted to go to the Island but without a large enough boat to travel there on our own it was too much of an inconvenience for a short trip (fly then customs then ferry, etc.). With the new RWBimini ship, that appeared to change.
Before It Went Downhill
Our arrival at Port Miami to depart on the ship was fairly smooth. A young gentleman was helping people with checked baggage ($25). Helping may be the wrong word… he was more like standing with a blank face, shuffling through about 75 pages of what looked like reservation names. Disorganization at its finest. There was a computer in front of him but perhaps that was just there for looks. After 45 min to check-in, in the VIP line, we boarded the ship, passed hoards of people in line for the $5 continental breakfast buffet and found a great seat/table in the Sportsbook Café. We hung out there for just over an hour (departed around 9:30/45).
Once we were on our way, the ship was very pleasant. Clean, new, plenty of space to roam. We eventually found our way one story up to the BlackJack tables where we got our table and started the games. Cocktail servers checked in on us regularly and a couple of our friends even took away over $1K at the table. Since we were staying overnight, we were supposed to wait until the third tender/boat to take us to the resort. We kept playing BlackJack until they announced the third boat was boarding so we didn’t have to wait in line. This was a good call.
Finally we headed to the tender and boarded right away. It was hot as heck on the second deck but they passed out cold mini bottles of water. After about 20 minutes waiting to load the last stragglers, we took off towards the Island. Once we got moving the breeze was heavenly and the island looked gorgeous. It took about 25 minutes to get to the resort. Our tender pulled up to the dock and they made an announcement that the day trippers had to get off the boat first so they could enjoy the most time on the Island. Wait, what? Weren’t they supposed to be on the first two boats? Aren’t we the ones paying $400/night for a room? It seemed very backwards and to top it off we were right by the exit but instead the day trippers who of course were at the very back of the boat had to fight their way to the front through a mass of people. Finally we got off the boat and made it through customs quickly. After asking two people where the resort check-in was, I was directed “through the buildings and to the left.” Oh, ok, thanks for being descriptive. Thank goodness we were the first over-nighters off the boat because otherwise we would have now been stuck in a line at checkin because everyone came in at the same time. Odd they wouldn’t stagger people instead of having everyone checking in come in at the same time.
We asked for an upgrade at check-in and instead of them saying yes or no they jerked us around for about an hour saying they’d clean one and then they weren’t available and then god knows what else. I walked outside to make sure we’d get a golf cart. Thank goodness I did at that very moment because we literally got the last cart ($110). I guess all the day trippers got the carts – once again, odd, the resort is at least 100 acres and I certainly wasn’t going to be walking to our condo at least a three quarters of a mile away from the center of the resort. Finally after they resort decided they would not be giving us an upgrade, we packed our golf cart and took off for our two-bedroom condo. On our way to the room, we passed the casino (looked brand new), a pool, marina, a restaurant, some houses and a buttload of construction. From what I saw on the website, it looks like they’re building a new hotel. We arrived at our two-bedroom condo to be pleasantly surprised. We were on the 3rd floor of the building and could catch views of construction on one side and the ocean on the other. It was spacious and besides the lack of towels and pillows it looked good. We changed into our swimsuits and went to explore the island. Exploration took about 45 min to get to the other side of the island and back so we went to other pool away from the casino on the beach. What I didn’t see on the website was any info on construction at the pool. We handled about 30 minutes of the jackhammering before we needed to call it a day. We had to use pool towel cards to redeem towels at the pool and were told at checkin that if we didn’t bring back our cards that we’d be charged $25 each. Odd. The pool towels we did get were lackluster but then the attendant was nowhere to be found when we were leaving so we had to hang on to our towels and make a special trip the next day to return them to get our cards back.
After the short time at the pool, the group headed back to our condo for some quick naps and then to get ready for dinner. We needed more pillows and coffee so we called the front desk. I guess everyone is only supposed to have one pillow because that’s how the beds are all set. I don’t think I’ve ever even been to a hotel were the bed has one pillow. The front desk said they’d bring more.
We had made a reservation at the “nicest” restaurant at the Resort – Sabor, but everything about this restaurant was a joke. After waiting 20 minutes to be seated, the host took us to four two-tops pushed together and set with 2 placements (for the five of us), 1 water glass, 3 silverware setups and a bad attitude. Right next to us was a table set pristine for the group of 6 that walked in after us and originally had a reservation for 4. Apparently the restaurant ran out of table setups so we had to wait a bit. We ordered some wine, apps and entrees and snacked on the white bread while we waited. Most of the appetizers were good, especially the shrimp and conch fritters. However I don’t know if even an amateur can mess those up. After another 40 minutes we received our entrees – or should I say 4 of the 5 of us did. That risotto, that was going to come out another 25 minutes later. And when it did come out, it was definitely more of a rice soup. My short ribs was gross, and the vegetables and fingerings were lame. Everyone got the same sides because apparently they were out of everything else on the menu. $475 later we walked outta there. Blows.
After dinner some of us went to watch the fight at the beach bar, others went to the casino. It was a fine night and then we all retired back to the condo. No coffee or pillows had arrived so we made do with what we had. At 6:45 am the next morning, the fire alarm battery started dying so we got the beep every 5 min. We called the front desk to send someone. No one came.
It was stormy in the morning, so when the monsoon stopped for a few minutes we hightailed it out of the condo to the casino restaurant for a buffet breakfast. There’s no room service so that was the only option. The buffet was ok but definitely not $25 worth. We had to ask to have several items refilled, multiple times. After breakfast we headed back to the room to wait out our time at the resort (meanwhile trying to avoid the little ants who infiltrated our room) before the tender arrived to take us back to the Superfast.
At 2 pm we headed back to the main area of the resort to turn in our golf cart and check out. $1263 was the damage. They made sure to get that $58 resort fee in there, right by the island taxes so you’d brush over it. I’m not sure what exactly the resort fee went to because all the amenities we checked out were no bueno. And there was def no wifi or internet service in the condos. We tried to express our dissatisfaction to the General Manager but when he came out of the office and looked like he should be a deckhand at a rundown jimmys marina we should have just let it go. Nothing was getting through to this man like nothing got through to his staff. Get us outta here.
After waiting in a line to go through Customs to get back on the tender, we then had to wait on the tender for another 45 min until it filled up. The tender took us back to the Superfast and we relaxed and waited for it to depart. Dinner/Lunch buffet ($10) was OK and they also had complimentary burgers, hot dogs and some other items on the top deck.
It took only a couple hours for the boat to arrive back at Port of Miami and then the waiting began. 45 minutes for the boat to clear customs and then literally 3 hours for us to all get through customs/immigration. Line after line after line. Alas we finally got out of the port of Miami around 10:30.
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It was a trip I’m glad we took. I have little to say negative about the Superfast but the Resort is another animal. To charge luxury prices for a Motel experience is beyond me. Service blew left and right at the resort and I will never go back there again. It makes better sense to rent a condo or place to stay on another part of the island and just grab the golf cart at the resort. Don’t waste your money to stay there for the convenience. That is all.
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