Fairmont El San Juan Villa Experience

Great

The hotel is old and shabby. My ocean villa smelled like the sewer. If you got to the beach in the afternoon,they were out of umbrellas and even chairs. Definitely not even close to what I have come to expect from a Fairmount.

Classic 50s property in a good beach location. Updated extremely well.

Has the potential to be a 5 star. Needs to be better managed. What’s not 5 star about this resort: If you arrive late expect to take your own bags to your villa, or room. The pool ran out of towels by 10 am and told us they didn’t know when they would get more. The pix of the villa are better than in person, even my 10 year old seemed stunned at the carpeting, sticking doors, sticking toilet flusher, and airplane noise. The cabanas can only be reserved on Open table and you cannot choose on the app or when you arrive, even when you see empty ones. We got a LUX cabana fist. - the only 3 are in a high traffic area, ours had a broken lounge chair and the TV had only a few channels. The pool speakers are next to you so expect to hear a lot of noise. We then got a pool/beach cabana. Same thing with choosing one. these have no side protection. We roasted as the sun began to set and gave up on it and sat in regular chairs. Again the speakers were so loud you feel like your at a club. It’s not relaxing. The service was poor everywhere. My wife and I understand how hard it is to get help so we overlooked our frozen drinks that arrived not frozen, food that arrived cold, and room that didn’t have a turndown service, a restock of the used coffee cups, or soap. In a nutshell this property has a lot, but needs better leadership. It’s more like a place for singles who just don’t care but its not a place for families.

We had a great relaxing stay- can’t wait to return, thank you!

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PROS: The pool / beach area is great. CONS: Room areas could use some updating, the service is snooty, and food/drinks are way overpriced. This is a great hotel for folks that want to be sheltered from anything too Puerto Rican.

I understood my unit to be overlooking the beach as it was stated but was instead overlooking the pool. It was noisy and wasn't what I thought it would be. For a Fairmont it should be much more superb, the hot water didn't work first couple of days, there were several power outages and one of the shower heads didn't end up working at all. The lobby was beautiful however for what I paid for my unit I'm not impressed and will not be staying here again nor recommending it.