Hideaway At Royalton Negril

Everything we did at this resort exceeded expectations! We stayed in the Hideaway, adult section, our room was a few short steps from everything we needed. With the pool and beach right out front of our building we could be snorkeling in minutes and could go for hours with all there was to see. The buffet was the next building over and all the other restaurants and shops were next to that. The food and drinks were very good and the buffet was large with a very good selection of great food options. [Details]

If you keep your expectations in check, the hotel is pretty good. The price is it worth it ratio is debatable (did I pay for the Jamaica name more than anything else perhaps?) but this is different for everyone.

Overall, the hotel is a typical all-inclusive resort in the Caribbean. The food is better than most places, with a few exceptions. I was disappointed in the lack of fruit and vegetable selection at breakfast and lunch. I was also disappointed with the lack of choice and places to eat during the day. You get the buffet, a food truck, jerk hut and a coffee shop / ice cream place. That's about it. Would be nice to have more options. You can order a-la-carte via the television, but the choices are minimal and time to bring food is pretty much 45 mins to an hour minimum.

The rooms and resort are comfortable and relatively clean. I hated the pillows, but they were typical hotel pillows (way too soft for me). Beds were comfortable (a bit firm for some people maybe, but that's how I like my bed) My one minor negative here is that, while damage does happen in every hotel, they seem to be behind on some repairs. We saw more than just a few re-plastered walls in hallways or dining areas, but not repainted yet at all.

Beach in Bloody Bay is always amazing. The water is calm, clear and access is relatively easy. Snorkeling even locally in the bay will allow you to see starfish, minnows, barracudas, crabs, needle-nose fish, and the occasional sting ray (it is an ocean).

Pools are clean and there are plenty of them. There seems to be a lack of towels sometimes if you want fresh ones. There seemed to be very few towel locations (I can think of 4 and that's it). However, I only tried to refresh my towels once (and nothing was available around noon-1pm that day), as our butler ensured we had beach towels stocked in our room every day.

We had a swimout from our room. It was clean, and really nice. Be warned that most of the swimouts, because of the orientation of the hotel, will be in the shade for most of the afternoon. Sun in the morning, shade by about 1230pm-1pm. We went in January, and the swimouts were almost all in shade, and, because of the time of year, not really used by a lot of people since the water temperature was pretty cold in those pools.

Staff was amazing for us. I have no complains about the staff. We took diamond club and had a butler. Honestly should rename that position because they aren't butlers in any traditional sense (and some people seem to think this means they do whatever you tell them to). But ours (Oshane) was one of the nicest folks, and helped us out with restaurant reservations and any minor issues we may have had throughout our stay.

Booze is typical all-inclusive. Tons of cocktail sugar drinks you can order and get a headache or bad hangover from. For diamond club, I would have expected a bit more of a selection of more "premium" booze, but it was very small (I think Grey Goose was the most recognizable booze I was allowed to get for vodka). Most of the booze, however, is the headache inducing cheap stuff. Its Jamaica, and they don't serve Appleton?! The resort seemed to be in a deal with Wray and Nephew liquors. Fine, but Appleton Rum is really famous, and to have a resort in Jamaica basically not serve it is kind of weird. If you want particular types of booze or bottles, be prepared to pay (a lot and easily overpriced) for those bottles separately. [Details]

Rooms are large and have everything you need including a view of the ocean. We were on second floor over the main building which meant a huge balcony but not a lot of view of the grounds, just the other side of the bay but I preferred this to the swim up rooms in front of the pool. The staff are plentiful and really nice, each has their "job". We were very secure here also whenever we left (including walk on beach) we left our room number. There is a quaint market across the street, very safe. The sunset views at the Oceanpoint restaurant were spectacular. We chose to be couple only so most of the kids activity was at the Royalton side of the complex which was really nice. Lots of evening restaurant choices with really good food, although the ZEN was not worth the show for us (we should have perhaps skipped this for the patio seating a la carte). When there was wine for purchase we felt it was over priced as were the spa services; perhaps if prices were better they would sell more.
Too many people reserve chairs at the beach early (although the signage says we are not allowed), we did however manage to find 2 seats when we wanted them. The beach area is small-ish
I would definitely recommend. [Details]

I would really recommend this property, staff are very friendly, customer service is great and food is well flavoured [Details]

The staff are amazing. Our accommodations on the other hand were not. I want to quantify my comments by saying, we did not reach out to anyone regarding our room (our error), the telephones in the room did not work, had there been an emergency we'd have to go to the front desk, the other problems were minor, however, when you spend a good amount of money, you expect better. [Details]

We loved our stay over-all. But the policy of people having to stay in a room that is not their own for the first night & THEN being moved to a room with either one king sized bed or two separate Queens is a very poor policy. I heard MANY FIRST TIME GUESTS VERY UPSET ABOUT IT & WD WERE REALLY UPSET. When we arrived, tired from travel & learned we'd have one room one night & have to move to a different room the next day or two, we feel that is a huge financial RIP-off. All Inclusive Guests should not have to semi unpack...then two-pack & move! This robbed US of time on a very expensive vacation. PLEASE CHANGE THAT POLICY and then we will consider returning. After we were given our room...the service there & the stay was just beautiful! Wonderful wonderful Jamaican staff...great food... the adults only beach is small but lovely... the view gorgeous... the rooms comfy & lovely, it was a beautiful lovely time... just a bad start with being shunted about the first nights & days. Otherwise....wonderful!!! Thankyou! [Details]

My friend and I visited this complex in Jan 20 for my annual birthday trip. The hotel knows that I'm a travel agent and that it was my birthday, so they asked if they could upgrade us to the Grand Lido (their au natural boutique hotel).

We agreed because we were told we'd be able to see the sunset from our room and that we could spend our time at Hideaway if we weren't comfortable with the au natural pool. The sunset was ABSOLUTELY incredible from the rooms and we never encountered any nudity in any of the public areas of Grand Lido that we visited. I'd recommend the Grand Lido due to its small size, the incredible sunsets and the fact that there is a front desk in the hotel until 10pm. We spent our time at the Hideaway, so that's what most of the review will be on though.

The Grand Lido rooms are HUGE and tastefully decorated. The rooms were always sparkling clean and we never wanted for bottled water! We had Demari as our butler and I could immediately tell that he'd been formally trained as a butler. I'm accustomed to luxury travel and butler service, but Demari far exceeded my expectations. For example, he'd learned our daily routine (likely from the front desk staff) and, by day 5, on my birthday, I came back to a fully decorated room with a bath drawn at the PERFECT temperature. He also took an unexpected day off to deal with a family matter, but he was still messaging us to make sure we had everything and to see if we wanted dinner reservations. He literally goes above and beyond.

I find that the staff are what makes or breaks my vacation and the staff in the entire Royalton Complex are second to none. Natasha, Junior, Shemar and Maximo from the Hideaway Vibe team did a great job of keeping the guests busy and entertained throughout the day. I find that typically resort staff have their favourite guests and tend to spend most of their time socializing with them, but not this team; they paid attention to everyone!

We spent some time at the Royalton and Diamond club pools and were also very impressed by Tev, Shane, Lloyd, Traye and Jermaine did a really great job as well. And in the evenings, the entire team seemed to work seamlessly to put on the entertainment, which was INCREDIBLE. Each night was very professionally done and diverse, including the performance put on by the Vibe team! It's clear that there are some professional choreographers (like Shemar) on the team!

One day during our stay there was TERRIBLE weather due to storms nearby. I was incredibly impressed at the entertainment the Vibe team had setup to entertain everyone: steel drum band, movies in the lobby, video games for the kids and board games. It was really well done.

There were other staff that also made our visit so memorable: Demario at the Hideaway pool grill, who gave me an enormous plate of Jamaican Patties for my birthday; Daina the bartender (that girl hustles!), Jamol the fitness assistant, who ALWAYS had a smile on his face and was the perfect amount of motivating, without being pushy; Kevan at the Calypso restaurant, Anneisha, Fayann and Mikhail. When either my friend or I wanted to go back to the room before the other, Mike the evening security guard would escort us to the security guard at the Hideaway pool, who would then escort us back to our hotel. The resort genuinely cares about the safety of its guests and I never once felt uncomfortable or unsafe. My friend went diving without me one day during our trip, but she didn't have a dive buddy. Kemar, the dive master, did an excellent job of being her dive buddy and showed her some incredible sea life on both the dives. She said he was very professional, knowledgeable and he made her feel safe and comfortable.

The last area of the hotel to address would be the food, which overall was INCREDIBLE. Breakfast with a view at Ocean Pointe was such an incredible way to start the day. But remember, you're in Jamaica, so it will be a leisurely breakfast, but so incredibly tasty. Most days we had lunch beside the Hideaway pool at the grill, but we had one lunch in the buffet and one take away pizza from the Italian restaurant and, again, they were both so good. We also had the chilli cheese nachos at the Diamond Club snack bar and I was instantly addicted. All of the A La Carte dinners were tasty and the service was wonderful, especially at Calypso and Armadillio!

Literally the only problem we had was that one morning we had an early excursion, so we pre-ordered our room service breakfast. When we called to check on it in the morning we were told it was almost ready. Twenty minutes later it was still "almost ready". At that point we had to go, so we asked if they could bring us up some pastries and some cheese (for protein) that we could eat on the run. The room service guy must have sprinted to our room because we received it quite quickly. We know that mistakes happen, that's natural, but what's more important is how they're fixed and room service definitely came through for us.

I cannot wait to send clients to this hotel because I know they will be so well taken care of and that they will have an incredible vacation. My friend and I are already trying to figure out when we will have the time and money to go back, because we can't wait! [Details]

Beautiful relaxing resort most friendly staff and great service [Details]

What an incredible experience. They stay was amazing from the time we arrived to when we left. The staff was friendly and helpful. There was a great choice of restaurants and were able to choose a different one every night. There was different entertainment every night plus different activities. The beach was well maintained. The hotel room was big, comfortable and clean. It was a very enjoyable stay. [Details]

We had the best time at the hotel, everyone was super helpful and friendly we will be back for sure [Details]

The hotel is spread out along with the Royalton and Lido sides for a total of 10 buildings. Luxurious rooms all with an ocean view with the most comfortable beds I have ever slept on. [Details]