This was our 9th trip to Sandals South Coast since 2007. We enjoy visiting many of the Sandals, but we keep coming back home to SSC. Sadly, not long after we left Hurricane Melissa hit and caused significant damage to the resort. Much of the beautiful vegetation was blown away, trees knocked down and of course considerable damage to the buildings.
For this trip and all our past trips, we used Amy McHugh of Dream Makers Vacation Services as our travel agent (TA). This has proven to be especially helpful as she has contacts with the resort management and key staff to let them know of our needs or requests. We found that upon arrival both management and staff knew us by name and mentioned that Amy had informed them about us. At this resort we had the GM and various managers seek us out to say hello and mentioned that Amy had informed them of our arrival. In the past having a Sandals Platinum travel agent such as Amy has really saved us time and trouble when dealing with changes, possible flight delays or issues at the resort. She also checked in with us during our stay to ensure things were going well.
We flew into Jamaica the day before on Southwest from Baltimore (BWI). We booked Club MoBay’s arrival service, but it turned out Tuesday morning was a quiet time and so there were no lines which was the first time for us. But we enjoyed chatting with their representative and she helped retrieve our luggage as there were multiple flights using the same claim area. She also got us rum punch for the drive. We utilized Reggae Tours which was recommended by our TA for transportation, and they have a counter close to the Club MoBay and Sandals Lounge. The driver took us to the Luna Sea Inn where we stayed the night. The drive took almost two hours due to more potholes than we have experienced in the past. The Luna Sea is a very simple inn with comfortable and clean rooms, restaurant and bar. Another driver from Reggae Tours picked us up at 8 am the following day to take us to South Coast. Upon arrival we were met with a song, cold towels, and drinks. Since our butlers were busy and the room was not ready, we asked if we could go to breakfast. We ate at Bayside which is a buffet and has many options to choose from. This was our go to for breakfast, but we did eat at Schooners and Eleanors which are order from a menu type restaurant. All were delicious. One of our butlers, Melisa met us while we were eating and told us that she had reserved a spot at the main pool and our room would be ready later. She also provided us with a phone so we could communicate with her and the other butler during our stay. All in all, the butler service was outstanding. They arranged for morning coffee and fruits to be delivered early each morning, provided transportation to and from dinners, reserved spots at the pools, set up two baths for us with decorations, decorated the room with happy retirement signs and décor, and a full breakfast in the room on the last day. Staff at the resort were outstanding and friendly. Our favorite was Erroll at the main pool who is simply everywhere working on different things. We have enjoyed seeing him over the years and have been impressed with his friendliness and hard work. We enjoyed all our meals including the antipasto bar at Giuseppe’s, the French Café, and the new options of the chicken finger and taco trucks. We had no complaints about the food or service. The resort is simply beautiful, it is very lush with plants, flowers, trees. We did see staff daily cleaning, repairing and adding new plants around the resort. We noticed that pickleball is very popular now and there was a tournament going on at the courts which seemed to have a large group there. We especially enjoyed interacting with other guests especially those from the UK. They made the trip extra special.
We had booked the Longbeach Beachfront One Bedroom Butler Suite with Balcony Tranquility Soaking Tub (LB1). The LB1 is a new room in the Longbeach block. It was created by combining two rooms, so you have one large room with an L-shaped sofa, table with two chairs and a bar area with an island. They added a door between the two rooms, so the second room has the bedroom and bathroom. The bathroom, especially the shower was huge. The shower is a U shape with two entrances and two handles at each end for two rain showers and a handle in the middle for a handheld shower. Outside there was a large tub. The balcony stretches the length of the two rooms with a sofa and table, and outdoor soaking tub. One can access the balcony from either room through sliding doors. We had 3404 which is an end unit, so we had beautiful views of the Longbeach pool, beach, over the water bungalows and sunsets. The housekeeping staff was outstanding as the room was cleaned twice a day (mid-morning and evening), everything was restocked including the Red Lane products.
Reggae Tours picked us up on the last day to the airport, which took two hours again due to potholes and traffic. We did have the Club MoBay departure service, and we were happy to have it as the lines for their security and scanning was all the way down the terminal. We went through it in about 15 minutes and went to the lounge closest to gate 1 which is for Southwest. The service, food and restrooms were outstanding in this lounge, but it was very full. The Southwest flight to BWI was smooth and there were no issues. BWIs immigration and customs was super smooth especially since we had Global Entry. The longest part was waiting for our luggage and there were many running to catch their connecting flights.
