Belmond La Samanna

Our return to La Samanna left us disappointed. This is a beautiful older property on a very private beach but the level of service and room accommodations are no longer 5 star nor luxurious. Our 2 bedroom suite looked like a cheap Airbnb. We stayed in J10. Faulty AC, beds so hard it was difficult to sleep, old furnishings, a mildew covered porch umbrella. The location on the beach was nice but the room is very outdated and tired. Upon check-in, we were assigned a butler but all my WhatsApp messages went unanswered. The hotels location, beach, pools , lunch restaurant are all idyllic , but the accommodations and service need a revamp to live up to Belmond pricing and standards. I’ve found Auberge hotels to be far superior .

Arrived in Sint Maarten with big expectations and was excited to go to a Belmond Hotel called Los Samanna. Beach and Water beautiful, location good, restaurants are good.. Restaurant service generally 10 out of 10, Valentina and Paola are the stars.. for sure.. including Luca, Sophia, Nouguy, Marc and Sam. Margot and Marketta as restaurant hostesses were really good. You get a butler who never showed his face once.. they had assigned Maxim to us but I can't tell you it was a guy or a girl and he was supposed to get our restaurant's reservations etc. never met him in 7 days. Rooms were older and in need of a renovation, however we did have a one bedroom unit, mattresses were hard as rock. The room had outside seating which faced the sea and the beach where we set most of the time. Roy and Sean from the beach sports were excellent and a good source of information. Front desk was very forgetful, nonchalant, and made you feel like it was a privilege for you to be in their company. They would say yes to everything, but if you didn't follow up with them three four or five times nothing got done. Sherton at concierge was good. Overall I rate the location and the beach a 10, Beach sports hut at 10, Restaurant and service a 10, room a 3 and in need of a renovation, front desk a 1. We did not get a chance to sit on the beach as we're sitting and relaxing, viewing the beach and sea, in front of our room, most of the time , 50 yards to the sea and beach, which I would say was the great part. I saw the guys and gals working the beach chairs were busting and running around delivering food and making sure that the customers were happy on the beach. They were busy indeed. We fell in love with the water and the location, the restaurants and the restaurants staff. Front desk attitude, needs to change, and their follow up has to change as well. Going back now to the Four Seasons in Anguilla, Looking forward to going to visit another Belmond, Venice , the Cipriani.. I'm sure it'll be better. For the money, the value, The treatment of the front office staff I would say don't come back to LA Samanna or don't come. Come for the restaurants, come for the restaurant service, come for the beach and come for the water. I wish we had a better experience with the front office staff and generally, front office staff would not say hello unless you said hello first. we stayed for 7 nights. The locals working at the hotel were kind and friendly. In conclusion. Front desk is the face of the hotel, after all, as are the invisible butlers. Richard C B12.

The hotel property is excellent. The Beaches were beautiful. The staff was very friendly. This issues we had is the hotel is run cheaply and the staff, especially at the concierge, was not trained and made the experience difficult. The room had a pool that kept losing water and on the last night we lost power to half the room and lost AC for the duration in the bedroom. One example of the lack of training was I wanted to go to town to pick up some items due to the fact the hotel does not have a store to buy even tooth paste. They asked when we wanted to go, and I said I could go now it was 9 am. They said fine and got me a driver and left only to find out the stores don’t open until 10 am. So we sat in the parking lot for 45 minutes. Don’t you think they should know that as the Concierge? Just saying. The sliding door to our room also had no handle coming from the outside so we had to struggle to open it. Also, upon being shown to our room, we were shown the plunge pool on the roof deck. We had asked a question about it and no one ever got back to us on it. No one clearly was checking the pool daily because we had to call to let them know that the filter was sucking air because the pool was either leaking or the water had evaporated two days in a row. The connected us to WhatsApp and said if you need anything just text us. So we left for dinner at 4 for a 6 pm reservation thinking we would have plenty of time for a drink and sunset. Wrong again the traffic was horrible then we got stranded with a flat in their VIP car with bald tires. Pulled into the. Restaurant at 6. 2 hours to drive 7 miles. I text the WhatsApp connection o the concier and the never responded back to me. Again the staff was very nice and the beach and water was excellent as well as the breakfast. In my opinion is not managed and run well.

I’ve never experienced such a positive experience from staff as I did here, after 5 million airline miles and corresponding hotel stays.

My husband and I stayed at La Samanna for my birthday for 3 nights. From the moment we arrived to the hotel, we were treated like VIPs! This was our first Belmond stay and the entire trip we kept telling each other that we only want to stay at Belmonds moving forward. The property is beautiful and well maintained but what really made our stay special were the people. From the team that welcomes you on arrival to the beach attendants to the the restaurant servers, everyone is genuinely doing everything to make your stay special. The price point was beyond our normal budget but I will say that it was 100% worth every penny. They have more than enough beach loungers for everyone in the hotel. You are never fighting for pool/beach chairs or reservations at restaurants. We cannot wait to be back for another stay.. Thank you to everyone at La Samanna for the incredible hospitality. Special shout out to the beach team- Nicolo, Hugo, and Francesco; Eduardo, Simon, Rafaela for the incredible welcome on arrival; our server at La Spaggia on Sunday night. A wonderful woman server who brought us some snacks as we popped open our champagne at the infinity pool on Monday night. Every detail and small gestures went such a long way. THANK YOU AGAIN! We are forever Belmond people now. :)