Mauna Kea Beach Hotel, Autograph Collection

We loved this property: large rooms with comfortable bed, conveniently placed amenities, superb valet service, friendly staff, excellent bath products, and an amazing beach and snorkeling spots.

The location is fantastic. The teams, especially at the restaurants, are really nice. Live music every night is a wonderful to touch.

The fact that people are “reserving” spots on the long chairs,at the beach, by leaving their towels even before breakfast. In addition, it is hard to see during the day which spots are available, as everybody leave their towels. (no one enforce the “bring back your towels”, and no one remove them until the very end of the day.) The system to get a table at the restaurant, while you are a patron at the hotel, does not allow you to make reservation one day to the next. We were only able to have a couple of reservations. All the other days, we arrived early to be able to have some of the walk-ins spots. You are pretty much like any vacationers on the island: you go to open table and hopefully you can make a reservation. (we also tried to reserve table through the concierge desk: it was even less helpful that using open table!). We have never been to a place where you cannot make a reservation at one of the restaurants at the hotel we stay.

What a dreamy hotel on one of the most gorgeous beaches in the world.

best beach in hawaii

The hotel has a 200-yard long white sand beach with calm water, well preserved reef across the whole bay less than 100-yard from the beach, also along the coastline. Super clear water and tons of fish. There’s a platform out by the outside reef for people to rest if they want. There are kayaks, standup paddle boards, surf boards free of charge. In addition, there’s manta ray viewing and snorkeling with mantas right at the hotel. The mantas glided inches from my body and then did back flips. I got to see every gill under there belly and all the signature spots. It was truly life changing! The restaurant at the hotel is great. They have live music every night. Perfect sunset right at the hotel. There’s only one pool, but who needs one with the beautiful calm ocean!

The hotel staff was exceptional which made the trip great!

The beach is beautiful! It’s worth every penny but as far as the room and service they could improve. They didn’t change the pillow cases and they smelled like sweat. A few staff members were slow and unfriendly. They could use better body wash, shampoo and conditioner for the price of the room.

I can not wait to go back highly recommended!!

It is a beautiful property! Most of our service was excellent, but several times we had less than friendly help. Also, the Manta Dining was closed for a private event on Thursday leaving our dining chooses limited!

Fabulous hotel. The property is beautiful and immaculate. Gorgeous landscaping and nice staff. Beautiful views from everywhere you look and very clean. Ocean front room was extremely private and comfortable. Food was good but not mind blowing. The resort had an east coast country club kind of vibe, which isn’t really my thing but it’s so lovely I didn’t care. Beach was fantastic!