We just returned from a week at Beaches Turks and Caicos, February 16 – 23 (Presidents Week.) This was our second trip to Beaches, we also went the same week 2 years ago. We traveled with our kids, a 12 year old boy and a 8 year old girl.

Arrival

We arrived at PLS around 12:15 pm, and breezed through Immigration. There is nothing better than stepping off the plane to the stairs and feel the warm sunshine on your face! We eventually collected all of our luggage (the luggage carousel kept stopping so it took a while for all the bags to come off) and proceeded through customs and off to meet the Beaches staff. Check in outside the terminal was pretty efficient and we were immediately offered bottled water. Our room numbers were written on our luggage tags and we were on our way in about 15 minutes. The taxis hold 8 – 10 people, so they try to match groups up together. The French Village has a separate check-in, so we were with another family staying in that section. It is a short drive to the resort, about 15 minutes. The drive isn’t very pretty – don’t let that discourage you. Grace Bay is absolutely gorgeous. The main road from the airport, however, doesn’t give you a sense of what lies ahead.

Rooms

We had requested 2 connecting rooms in the French Village and were delighted that our request was honored. Check-in at the FV lobby was smooth and our rooms were ready even though it was only 1:30! The luggage was delivered within minutes of us getting to the room. We were in the Lyon building on the first floor. The kids had 2 double beds plus a single chair that converted into a sleeper. We had a king plus a larger sofa that converted into a double bed.

The rooms were very clean. We were always provided with fresh towels and had turn down service every night but one (not sure why). There was a dehumidifier in the kids’ room that stayed there all week. The room didn’t feel damp or musty to me at all. The furniture in our room was in need of repair. A couple of drawers were crooked and broken. We made do.
There is a small safe in each room to hold your passports, money and other valuables. I like that you set your own 4 digit code (rather than using a credit card) to open and close it. The bathrooms were good size and there is a second sink just outside the bathroom area with a large mirror, vanity and hair dryer.

Pools, Beaches & Activities

We spent most of the week at the Iguana Pool so the kids could play volleyball, but we also spent time at the Pirates Island Pool, French Village Pool and the beach. We loved all the pools, but we found that the French Village pool generally had younger kids (it is ideal for kids who can not swim since it has a separate area they can walk right into and never go over their heads!) I thought the FV pool was a little cold, at least compared to the Iguana Pool. They generally had music playing at the Iguana Pool – my only complaint was the Players seemed to have a couple of favorite songs they literally played over and over again. One time they played the same Michael Jackson song 3 times in a row.

On weekdays, there is water aerobics with Natasha. I think it was at 11am. It was a lot of fun and she really gives you a workout. I can still hear her “Single, Single, Double Double..” If you go, you’ll know what I mean.

We all had a lot of fun playing volleyball. Everyone just joined in and came and went as they pleased. Be careful if sitting at the swim up bar – don’t turn your back if there is a volleyball game going on! I counted 9 floats in the Iguana pool. If you wanted one, you could usually find a free one. My kids enjoyed playing water polo. The Players staff set up goals and invited anyone who wanted to play. Kids, teens and adults all got in the action. There were 2 or 3 games during the week.

On Monday, we walked down to the Coral Gardens and went snorkeling. To get there, just step onto the beach and turn left. You walk past all the Beaches chairs and people and the beach becomes surprisingly deserted. It is beautiful. I used the empty beach area as an opportunity to take some great pictures of the kids! It is about a 10 – 15 minute leisurely walk down the beach. There are signs warning of fire coral inside the marked areas and the buoys are easily identifiable. You can’t miss it. The water is very salty so we found we floated with ease. I generally sink like a rock in pool – but no problems staying afloat in the ocean. The kids and I made it about 1/3 of the way when we decided to turn back. We are all big babies. My husband went all the way around and saw turtles, a barracuda and tons of fish. I thought the snorkeling here was fantastic, but at the same time I have an irrational fear of creatures in the sea, especially sharks (more on the shark story later…) I wish I could overcome my fear, because it really was gorgeous. If you like snorkeling, you will love it here.

As for the shark rumors, I wasn’t there to see it, but we did her talk that there was a shark sighted in knee deep water off the beach on Wednesday. I head they were calling people out of the water, although some were actually walking in the water towards it to get a picture. This was later confirmed on TA – see post on Sharks. Given my intense fear of these creatures, I was hesitant to do anything else in the ocean for the rest of the week. My daughter wanted to ride the banana boat so we checked into that on Friday. The guy on the beach wanted $100 for 4 people. That seemed awfully steep to me. He agreed to $80, we offered $60 and he wouldn’t take it. My husband tried negotiating with him – arguing $60 was better than an empty boat and $0, but no deal. I’m stubborn so I wasn’t going to go back and say $80 was okay. Besides, he said to me, “You’re staying at Beaches, you can afford it.” That really put me off. So we walked down the beach in the other direction, toward the Alexandra. We hoped to try to ride the banana boat down there, but he was having some engine problems with the boat so we didn’t get to go. After the shark stories, this was fine by me!

Instead of the banana boat, we decided to go sailing. We don’t know anything about sailing, so one of the Beaches staff took us out for a ride. It was later in the day and he seemed like he would rather be home – one of the only Beaches staff that wasn’t super friendly or helpful. He wasn’t bad – he just didn’t say a word other than “move up” or “move back” the entire time. Anyway, we thought it was nice that they had someone to take us out. It was a great day for sailing and my kids really had fun.

Scuba

My husband is a certified diver and stopped by the dive shop on Sunday morning to sign up for a few dives. He was required to attend an orientation which lasted under a half hour. Also, it was nice they were able to store his gear in a locker this year – his bag is heavy and last time he had to bring it back and forth from the FV every day. He was also able to sign up for dives for the entire week – we thought he had to sign up for each dive the day before. They offer night dives, but they need a minimum number to go, and although he signed up – they didn’t have enough to dive until our last night, which wouldn’t allow him the required time before flying. He did double tank dives on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The dives were great and they even saw humpback whales on 2 of the days. He said he could hear the whales during the dive – very cool. He saw turtles, a spotted eel, sand sharks, stingrays and more. He was very pleased with the diving.

My 12 year old opted to try the resort course. The course cost $80 plus $10 for a wet suit rental. He spent about 2.5 – 3 hours in the morning where he had to tread water for 10 minutes, learned about the equipment and did some skills work in the pool. The instructors were excellent. The resort course divers go out for a shallow dive at 2pm. Max 4 divers to an instructor – but he had a group of 3. He had an amazing time and got to see a barracuda about 5 feet away! I felt the entire staff was very cautious and they patiently answered all my questions and calmed all my fears of allowing my son to go out in the open water without us!

Spa

I had no problem getting a spa appointment. I stopped over at noon and was able to get a massage at 4pm that day. I had the Tropical Bliss, which is basically a Sweedish massage. It was very nice. I didn’t take advantage of the plunge pools, sauna or steam room. I basically just had my massage and left because we had plans. I have no complaints about the massage – it was very relaxing.

Dining

We tried all the restaurants and can found the food to range from good to excellent. I did hear people complain about the food – I honestly can’t understand that. Sure, some of the buffets had dishes I didn’t care for, but there were plenty of options to choose from. My only real complaint here was the drink service. Several times, we didn’t even get our drink order taken until we were finished with our meal and moving on to dessert. Once, we ordered drinks that never came. We tried to grab a waiter/waitress, but they seemed busy and overwhelmed. Everywhere else in the resort, the place seemed well staffed. I felt this is one area Beaches needs to improve on by having more people taking drink orders. A few times, we just went up to the bar and got drinks ourselves.

As far as the food goes, here is a quick review of each one:
Schooner’s – this was one of our favorite meals (excluding the adults only). Be sure to ask about the specials – they had a tiger prawn special that was amazing. The food was fresh and the setting was perfect. We ate dinner here twice – both times outside – and there was music one night. Kids got up and danced – it was very cute. Our kids were able to go down and check out the beach while we waited for our food to come. We also ate lunch here once (Signature Guest Luncheon) which was absolutely our best lunch of the entire week. I wasn’t sure if we were going to go or not – but I’m glad we didn’t miss it. We had breakfast here on our last day and wished we had gone there for breakfast at least one other time. The French toast, eggs benedict and chocolate chip pancakes were outstanding.

Giuseppes – We ate dinner here one night and had breakfast here several times. Dinner was good. I didn’t particularly care for a couple of the dishes, but then we found the lamb chops – which were superb! The kids enjoyed the made to order pasta station. Breakfast is pretty much the same at Giuseppes and Reflections. I loved the chocolate croissants!!! I had to force myself not to eat them every day. I thought the flow of the lines worked better at Reflections – it always seemed a little jammed up at Giuseppes, but not terrible.

Arizonas – We ate lunch here twice and dinner once. The shrimp fajitas at lunch were very good. The fajitas at dinner were also good, but very spicy. If they have mahi mahi on the buffet line – go for it! It is delicious. Many people don’t realize at lunch there is a buffet inside and a grill line outside. The lines for the grill were a little long, but not terrible. Overall, we thought lunch here was very good and dinner was pretty good.
Le Petit Chateau – Outstanding! We are dinner here twice. I had the tenderloin (amazing) the first night and the salmon (very good) the second night. The onion soup was perfect and the goat cheese salad was superb! The service on the second night was a bit slower than the first – on the first night the service was impeccable! I am guessing someone called out sick because they were very short handed, which resulted in several tables not being seated. They even had one waitress in the Arizona’s uniform (jeans, red bandana) working. The food was still magnificent!

Reflections – We ate here for breakfast most mornings because the buffet lines seemed to run more smoothly than Guiseppes. We also accidentally stumbled upon the seafood buffet one night – we were taking our kids to eat so we could go to Le Petit Chateau later. I had a lobster tail that was excellent (I was surprised at how tender it was!) My kids love seafood, so they were in heaven.

Bobby D’s – The food options here were more limited than last time. (This was fine with me because there are so many better options.) Half of the hot buffet has been removed. No more burgers that we could find, but you could get chicken nuggets, macaroni & cheese, fries, etc. The kids still loved the ice cream and the cotton candy machine was a welcome surprise!

Pizza – This was a surprise hit! A new addition since our first trip, we grabbed pizza for a late lunch on our first day. The shrimp boat pizza was outstanding! You can get a slice or order an entire pizza. They even have carryout boxes if you want to take it with you. We tried a lot of different pizzas, and our favorites were the shrimp, the meat lovers and the chicken barbeque. This took over as my kids’ favorite over Bobby D’s.

Café de Paris – The pastries, muffins and cookies were a special treat. My daughter loved the chocolate chip muffins. I had a rum ball on the last night that was amazing. We sampled many other delights there.

Sushi Bar – Only my husband eats sushi so he went one night. It was packed. He said it was pretty good, but when I suggested he go back later in the week, he didn’t jump at the chance. So, overall, not bad – just good.

Kimonos –We called for reservations as soon as we got to our room (approximately 2pm on Saturday.) By then, we could only get an early (5pm) or late (9pm) reservation until Friday. We took Friday since we could get a 7pm reservation. (Later we would find out that would conflict with the “Soon Come Back Party”, but we kept it anyway. We met a family who waited until Sunday morning to call and they were told it was booked the entire week! Based on reviews on TA, we requested Nigel, the American Idol. At first Nigel started to work at our table, but then Iron Neal came over. They said something about Nigel having cut his hand the day before, so Neal would be taking over. However, we ended up getting 2 for the price of 1. Nigel and Neal played off each other and Nigel sang for us keeping us all entertained. He did a Michael Jackson impersonation – the 3 phases of his career – that was very good, and very funny all at the same time. The food was prepared very well and we enjoyed our meal here.

Entertainment

We went to a lot of the shows. Every day, we would check the schedule – it is posted in the “Beaches Buzz” as well as on a sign near the French Village stage. It was nice they posted the current day’s activities as well as the following day.
A couple of evenings they had movie nights. They called it the Dive In movie and they had a cool inflatable huge screen set up next to the Pirates Island pool. We were going to go, but never made it. I believe they were showing Flushed Away one night. Another night, they had an “Adult” movie near the French Village pool. I believe that was The Notebook. We walked by on the way back to our room and there were not many people watching.
The shows the staff put on were fun. Yes, the entertainment is a little corny – but have a sense of humor and you will enjoy it. My husband was a volunteer for a game of Simon Says that was hysterical. Another night they had a contest for Mr. Beaches. I thought the Caribbean night with the parade was excellent. They had a junkanoo parade that was very good. The Michael Jackson/Thriller show was also very good. I enjoyed telling my son that I was about his age when that song was popular. Wow, did I feel old!

They had Bingo one night that was pretty fun. The last round is Suicide Bingo where you are OUT if they call a number on your card. The winner is the last person with no shaded boxes. Pretty clever.

We never made it to the talent show or the fashion show, but we did see part of the fashion show on video at the Photo store. The kids seemed to really enjoy it.

We were generally back in our room by 9 or 9:30 every night, which was fine with us. We got a lot of rest on vacation which was nice.

Departure

In many ways, this process seems to have improved – the departure lounge wasn’t as hectic as it was 2 years ago. However, when we were called to load in the taxi, we noticed one of our bags was missing – the one with my husband’s scuba equipment. The Beaches staff was moderately helpful – more so when I started to make it known I was unhappy. After searching and searching the sea of bags, they told me to go to the airport and meet another manager at the arrivals who would be looking for our bag in the terminal. I found the manager immediately who tried to tell me she would be with me in about 30 minutes after she greeted the next flight. I “politely” suggested she needed to help me now – which she did. Although she hadn’t already spoken to security, as the woman at the resort told me she was “in the process of doing while we were en route to the airport”, we spoke to airline personnel who recalled seeing an unclaimed bag in the middle of the terminal. It seemed to fit the description, but no one knew where it was. We literally crossed the terminal 3 times, each time being redirected to someone else, until we finally went to security at the x-ray machine. The woman said she had a similar looking bag and, voila! It was ours and everything was still in there. I realize someone took our bag in error, but I wish Beaches had better control over the bags. The manager’s reaction seemed to suggest this happened fairly regularly and that when people realize they have the wrong bag, they just leave it at the airport. I think we were one of the lucky ones to actually find our bag again.

Security at the airport has not improved in the past 2 years. Check in at the airline is relatively smooth. The check-in line for Delta was less than 20 minutes. But then you have to go outside and get at the end of the security line which extends all the way to the arrivals! They actually had to loop the line back to the departures because it was extending beyond the building. There was a very helpful gentleman keeping the lines in order and calling people up to the front of the line if their flights were about to depart. He assured everyone as long as they had checked in, they would make their flight. We got to the airport about 2.5 hours ahead of our flight and we cleared security about 30 minutes prior to boarding.

Food choices are very limited in the terminal. There is a bar that offers hot dogs, sandwiches, pizza, bagels and snacks. Not much looked very appetizing, but my daughter had a bagel that didn’t look bad. We grabbed some chips and other snacks since there is little to no food service on the flights anymore. In hindsight, I should have grabbed some granola bars and cereal boxes from the breakfast buffet.

Flight Home

Our flights were uneventful. Due to a dramatic scheduling change by Delta, we had a long layover in Atlanta (almost 5 hours). We probably needed at least 2.5 because the lines for customs were unbelievable. They only had 2 customs agents for what appeared to be dozens of international arrivals. The line did move quickly, however.

Our arrival back in Connecticut was tough – there had been a snow storm the day before so it was cold! But that is to be expected in February – and it appears we picked a great week to get away!

Miscellaneous

We took advantage of the photo shoot and got some great family pictures. The price was a little steep – 20 photos on a CD for $288, I think. But we can make as many copies as we want. I tried not to think about their wide profit margin and instead focus on how great the pictures really were.

They were offering a $125 room credit of you booked your next trip while you were still on site, so we booked for next year! We had a fantastic time at Beaches and have found that this resort offers something for everyone in our family. We can’t wait to go back!