A luxury hotel stay experience should be a seamless one, but unfortunately my recent stay at Lux Grand Baie was anything but. The overall experience was marked by daily issues which reveal what I believe to be systemic issues affecting the operation of the property which did not live up to expectations on most levels. Before progressing further, I'd like to preface this review with several relevant data points. Five years ago, my wife and I traveled to Lux Le Morne, one of Lux Grand Baie’s sister properties in Mauritius, and had one of the best beach vacations in our lives. It was pure bliss. We travel regularly, having traveled multiple times to Maldives, Mauritius, Seychelles, Thailand and beyond over the last decade. We live in Dubai and regularly staycation at the UAE’s leading hotels. This trip was to be our babymoon, so it was meant to be special - instead, it was forgettable. This was not our first ride at the Five Star Resort Rodeo…But it will be the last at Lux Grand Baie. First, let's start with some positives. The lobby is breathtaking. Clean lines, subtle architecture with local elements (see how those chandeliers look like fish nets), and a wonderful view out to the Indian ocean. It's a wonderful first impression and a great way to start your day every day. The welcome drink was so good, I asked for another. Seems like we got off to the right start. Multiple pools - the infinity pool is adults only, quiet, and a hidden gem during the day. The tapas served poolside were delectable and the overall food experience was very good. The room wasn't ready right away, no worries there. Let's go take a couple scuba dives through the resort’s dive center. Having done my research in advance, I knew I would be charged the same price for diving with equipment rental or without equipment rental (which is a first for me - it's usually cheaper if you dive using your own equipment.) The price for diving with your own equipment at the resort was 50% higher than doing so with a dive shop down the road…So after the first day, down the road I went, more out of principle outweighing convenience. A minor annoyance, but one that would be the first of many… Room check-in time has arrived…and why am I being led over a bridge, over a main road? Across the street from the main resort? What is happening here? Ah, you see I booked the residences, which are located there, on the street, with a great view of the entrance to the resort and the passing traffic. And not the ocean. Awesome. Nothing screams beach vacation like the view from the parking lot on the one side and the main street on the other. The sounds of honking cars and revving engines late into the night were almost as soothing as the ocean breeze through the beach palms. This was my mistake for not conducting proper due diligence, but the location of the residences is not expressly clear from the website - in fact, I couldn’ find them after returning home. Although there were only two of us, I had opted to pay for this “upgrade” for a 2BR residence because it had a private pool. Looks like I misunderstood the concept of the residences, which are actually long-stay apartments, on the other side of the main road from the resort. Whoops! Well, the pool overlooked the main road and despite my willingness to “downgrade" to a junior suite on the beach, no luck, they were all booked. I offered to pay more for any room on the beach, but was met with an “I am sorry sir…” - a phrase I would hear on a daily basis. I would never have booked the residences for myself and don't recommend others do, unless you want much more space in a far inferior location, and really enjoy a combination of traffic noise and a view of peeling paint on the side of the main resort. Well, the fun didn't stop there on the first day. The Air Conditioning didn't work in the living room, my wife went to sleep in the guest room halfway through the night because of the traffic noise, so we were moved to another residence, on a higher floor. Could we please be moved to a beach room, a lower category room is fine, or charge me more money for a higher category one? Nope, we are sorry. Breakfast was consistently good, with the pecan pancakes being exceptional. I appreciated the fresh juicing station and the protein shake station. But wait, are you guys setting out regular forks and knives to serve cheese, creating a hot mess every time someone wants a slice of manchengo? You can't invest in proper cheese knives for this function? What?! This is a 5 star resort, not a high school cafeteria. To the trained traveler's eye, you start to pick up on lots of little details like this. For example, the resort makes a lot of its commitment to health through its not one - but two - gyms. Let's dissect those for a moment. The gym on the roof is utterly useless, open for a few hours a day and mostly nonfunctional due to the presence of glaring sun, wind, and/or rain most of the time. The indoor gym downstairs is dominated by a massive TechnoGym tower that no one uses. The TechnoGym equipment it is stocked with is excellent and top of the line, but there is not enough of it. The free weight area has the ability to accommodate two (yes, two) athletes at the same time. Another couple of incidents to shed light on the operation style. For our first night, I had booked Ikuzu a week in advance before our arrival and was seated at a table with a pile of dirty rice on the floor next to it. Not a good look. The hostess could have 1) seated us at another table 2) wait for the dirty rice to have been cleaned before seating us 3) seated us anyway, take more than 15 minutes for the rice to be cleaned up, necessitating a conversation with the manager to actually move us to another table. She went with option 3. More apologies, this time met with “We will make you a very special dinner next time.” Well, we came on the last night of our stay - making a reservation six days in advance - and were initially let to the side dining room on the right of the restaurant lobby which was a windowless dark cavern with mirrors on the walls, which looked like a 70’s disco. More protests were made, we were moved into the main dining room for dinner (which was not special). I booked a deep tissue massage with a specific therapist two days in advance, instead they gave me an elderly therapist who gave a reflexology massage (it’s kind of like going to McDonald’s and ordering a Big Mac but getting a chicken burger instead - they’re both burgers). More “I’m sorry sir…”, more service recovery. The wife and I were excited to book the spinning studio, which we did a day in advance, but when we showed up….The projector didn’t work. 25 minutes of scrambling to fix it, leaving 20 minutes of cycling, more apologies, and booking again the next day. The absolute worst thing was the internet speed/connection during the duration of the stay - it was so slow that it was difficult to perform simple tasks, such as stock trading, load webpages, stream, etc. It was like dying a slow death each day and majorly impacted my productivity on a daily basis, which was a source of stress I did not need for a week. It was a perpetual black cloud that hung over me every single day. Let’s finish with some more positives and a reflection. The ice cream bar was great, I appreciated the protein shakes at breakfast, Sarah the therapist was amazing (try the hamam experience and ask for her specifically), the beach is small, but well organized and nice. Daily feedback was given to Edi the Duty Manager, and was received constructively - but - my experience was not good. I would not stay here again, I have not had a vacation of any kind fraught with issues on a daily basis and stopped being surprised the second half of the stay, because clearly the hotel has systemic issues - that could not be fixed. I would have picked up and moved to another property after the third night, but due to an impending cyclone, it did not make sense. The overall feeling I came away with was extreme disappointment and I can unequivocally state I regret coming here. What was supposed to be a special stay was shambolic and stressful.…
This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of Tripadvisor LLC.