The Crane Resort

⸻ We had a great stay at this beautiful resort. The hotel itself is stunning, with several different pools to enjoy and plenty of spots to take really nice photos. The breakfast was good, and the staff were very accommodating—we meet Anthony, who was a pleasure to work with and gave us suggestions for things to do. We did have a few issues with the bathroom, but they were taken care of. Overall, we had a great experience and would definitely stay here again. If you’re planning to go into town, I recommend renting a car—that’s what we did and it made things much easier.

If I were to visit Barbados again, I would definitely return to The Crane. 5 stars for Donna and Chester! If I could give them 20 stars, I would. Not to single them out but they made this trip 100/10. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! The room was 8/10. Very beautiful.We were told it was a private residence managed by the resort. I booked ocean view, 2BR. The beach was slightly visible but in between several buildings. I didn’t see an ocean front choice when booking or I would’ve selected that. My biggest issue with the room was the showers. The shower heads are rusted and calcified. The benches in the showers needed to be changed or removed. There was black mold in the corners. It was nice to have a private elevator. Very luxurious. However, we came back and our door was wide open. I had video of the room before I left because I wanted to post it to my YouTube and TikTok for a review. In the video, the dryer was off. When we returned, it was on. We slept with chairs behind the doors for the rest of the time because we were so spooked. Nothing was touched or missing. A camera should be installed in the elevator. After reporting the issue and a day later while returning to the room, we got lost in the building because we entered through the side instead of the parking garage. One of the housekeepers asked if we were in (room number) and we found that to be bizarre, that they knew who we were. We never ask for housekeeping services during our trips. Again, NOTHING was touched in our room. Nothing was missing, nothing was moved. I want to make that very clear. Just the dryer being on was spooky. Other than that, pretty please install more lighting in the parking garage! Breakfast was good, 7/10. We went to another restaurant twice, can’t remember the name but it’s by the pool. It was okay. The beach had seaweed but the shuttle to the other beach did not run on the days that we were there. Seaweed is not the fault of the resort, however I would suggest offering it daily when the beach is unusable. The ride to savy on the bay, round trip, for 2 was almost $100. We are beach people and did not want to spend that for multiple days. The resort grounds are absolutely beautiful. The historic buildings are well maintained. The manager, especially when dealing with our room situation, was kind and pleasant. We didn’t have time to revisit the issue because we wanted enjoy the time we had and also leave on time. If it wasn’t for Donna, we wouldn’t have met Chester! Chester was so knowledgeable, cheerful, and made our time 100% worth it.

Overall beautiful campus. Poor customer service. the staff wasn't very friendly or helpful with the exception of a few. (Joan, Nicole, Daniel, Maranda). First, we were given the wrong room. paid for ocean view and receive garden view. The room was nice, but not what we paid. Once bringing it to their attention (Ms. Joan ), it was corrected immediately. The Ocean view was definitely an updated room. The master bathroom toilet had a bright sensor light that would come on unprompted. The restaurant we wanted to frequent (lazure), was being remodeled. This was not communicated before arrival. We were forced to go to Carriage house. Beautiful view, but the breakfast was subpar and flies were overwhelming. The beach was not usable due to the amount and smell the seaweed. This also was not communicated to us prior to arrival. We would have chosen another resort if we knew the beach was not accessible. Their remedy was to bus us to another resort (The Casablanca), clearly a much lower ranked hotel with a public beach. We were forced to remained there from 10am to 3pm, unless we paid our own cab fare ($50) back to the Crane Resort. We were informed that we couldn't bring any food or drink to the beach, we'd have to order from the Casablanca only. The food was poor quality. Upon, returning to our room we noticed our room door was ajar. Reportedly, the housekeeper forgot to close a room door. According to security, it was left open for 4 hours. How unsafe!! The next day, we decided not to return to the public beach and just deal with the seafood on Crane Beach. Apparently, the hotel had already canceled the public beach bus and deemed the Crane Beach open. This decision was last minute and a lot people were unaware as expressed. There was so much bad communications given to us from the staff, such as wrong times for bus pickups and car pick-ups...etc. The staff was not always professional. Our 2nd day, we couldn't access the elevator in our building because the construction crew was on-board with a wheel barrel carrying cement. We had to take the stairs to the 3rd floor. While the resort is beautiful. It is not 5 stars. It was missing all the details that make the 5 star difference. For the cost, I expected better.

Just back from a very mixed experience at The Crane which would mean I would never return nor recommend it to anyone I know, despite some positives. First of all the positives: the rooms are good, the location and views are stunning (if remote), the pools are wonderful and plenty, and some of the staff (generally the poorer paid ones, like cleaners and waiters) are friendly and helpful. The negatives began upon arrival: we arrived after a 9-hour flight and checked in. The location of our building/room wasn't explained to us, and we had to ask for someone to show us. This person then offered no help with our bags, which was made worse as he took us to the wrong building the first time. When we got to our room, we realised the receptionist hadn't explained our half-board package to us. Where were the restaurants? Was our package valid in all restaurants? We just didn't know, we weren't told. We had to look at information on a third-party website to find this out. Dining is perhaps the biggest issue at The Crane: there are 3 restaurants and one bar serving food. There are no buffets, and while there is a reasonable amount of choice on the menus in all restaurants, if you are a vegetarian or have any dietary restrictions, you're going to end up eating the same 2 dishes every day for your holiday. You also have to book in advance, every single day, for your evening meal. This is a slow, slow process over the phone, where they will place you on hold and then ask for your name, room number and email address every single day. They could simply this by just taking a room number as they have the other information already, but don't. My tip: book online. You still have to enter all this information, but it is quicker. On our second day, they took a reservation for the L'Azure restaurant over the phone, and when we got there, it was closed for reservations. I do not understand how the reservations department didn't know this, or why we weren't told that one-third of the restaurants on site were closing for refurbishment at check-in. The biggest issue for us is one that perhaps we should have researched beforehand: The Crane is a 20-30 minute drive away from everything. The nearest supermarket/convienience store is a 2.5km walk away. Buses are infrequent and taxis and expensive, and it is a US$80 roundtrip to Bridgetown. Whilst this is out of the control of the resort, the beach was polluted with tonnes of seaweed forming a metre-high barrier between the beach and the sea for every day of our visit. They did compensate by providing a (35-min each way) shuttle bus to another resort, but if the beach/sea swimming is an important part of your holiday, book a hotel on the west coast of Barbados.

We Booked a stay at The Crane for our honeymoon and were blown away from the time we stepped out the shuttle that came to pick us up once we arrived at airport. The staff at The Crane go above and beyond to make you feel welcome and ensure your stay is perfect, and they delivered on everything. The Resort is absolutely stunning all the plants and flowers that were planted are manicured perfectly and the you can tell they take great pride in the how the grounds and facilities look for their guests. We were pleasantly surprised by our room as well. Knowing the Crane has more traditional rooms to fit the style of the original hotel and Carribean style, we had a newly renovated room and couldn’t have asked for anything better. We felt right at home and again the staff at the Resort make sure they accommodate your every need if possible. The Restaurants on Resort are some of the best food I have ever had. The Italian Restaurant and Zen were my favorites and loved the atmosphere looking over the Ocean for spectacular dinner time and sunset views. If you’re staying on the Island I would highly recommend staying at The Crane we will 100% be back.