What a nice change to find a small, very personal hotel in the building site known as Dubai.
I thought the place was excellent, very friendly, good service and not too busy even though the place was almost full.
I have stayed at most along the beach including the One and Only resorts, Meridians, Burj and must admit i thought it to be the best.
If you are looking for pure tourist bedlem then dont stay here, but if you want a sun lounger pre-set with towels drinks etc every day set in your favourite place then this is the hotel for you.
The staff could not be faulted, the food excellent and general feel of the hotel very calming and a real touch of class.
Dont get me wrong there is not really a bad hotel along the beach but if you want something a little quieter with a little more quality then this is your place.

The Ritz-Carlton Dubai, what can I say, great Nigerian guy at reception, very friendly, extremely helpful and pleasant hostesses Christina at the VIP Club Suite and great cherry tomatoes at their signature restaurant “La Baie”. Everything else was very poor. This is the first time I have ever felt the need to write a hotel review but the comical farce of errors experienced in 24 hours at the Ritz has left me basically with no choice. At USD 700 a night, I expect a lot and I simply did not get it. Let’s begin:

Upon check-in we were ushered up to the VIP Suite where out of date fruit was available. I was asked to sign my check-in bill where the price quoted was USD 1000. I complained that I was quoted a much lower price. It was quickly fixed. From that we went to the spa where inside, there was a notice, drink plenty of water prior to using the steam room / sauna. Good idea I though, let’s get some water. The search began, I looked everywhere and off course there was no water. Finally I asked the Spa attendant and he returned several minutes later with a fairly warm bottle of water. The spa was disappointing, very dated, very small and no chill out sun loungers. There wasn’t room to swing a cat. After an hour, I wandered to the pool, amazing, lush and plenty of palm trees and green soft grass. I started to cheer up, and then went looking for a sun lounger. I could not find any. Finally one appeared and I asked for an additional lounger for my wife and an umbrella to fight of the 40 degrees heat that was baking down. Simple request for a 5 star hotel. It took 30 minutes to get the additional sun lounger and the umbrella comes on the third request. It was not the waiters fault, there was only two in total. Not once did someone come and offer me a drink, bearing in mind the extreme Dubai temperatures. Night-time and it was off the join friends at "La Baie" and to be frank, we were very disappointed with the service that we received.

Upon receipt of our bread basket, we requested olive oil and balsamic vinegar - we were still awaiting this at 11 p.m. despite the waiter assuring us that he would "try to provide this". As an European fusion restaurant, I would assume that this would be readily available.
We were offered a second bread basket (Please note, we did not ask for such). We responded by saying that yes, that would be appreciated - again, we were still waiting such at 11 p.m.!!
The four of us ordered the chef's special - sword fish accompanied by rocket, raspberry and potato cake. Upon arrival, we all enthused about the flavour however were incredibly disappointed with the portion size. We are all very familiar with restaurant dining, however believed this portion to be, quite frankly, on the rather mean side especially considering the price of USD 57. Due to this, we enquired whether it would be possible to have additional potato cakes however were told that as these were a chef's speciality were limited, therefore we were offered the option of rosemary potatoes which we accepted.
Upon receipt of such (we required one portion, however two were delivered to the table and subsequently charged for!!), to our horror, we discovered that they were under cooked. Again, we are very conscious of "al dente" vegetables however this usually applies to green/root vegetables and I have never experienced potatoes cooked in this manner. Frankly, quite impossible to digest.
We had ordered a bottled of Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon to accompany our meal. A member of our party requested a further glass of the same, of which the remaining three also decided to follow suit. Upon tasting, I knew instantly that this was a different wine however the Sommelier insisted that no, it was exactly the same - a Merlot!! We asked to see the wine menu in order to show the gentleman what we had previously ordered, however after requesting the menu on four separate occasions, we continued to wait!! Eventually, it was established that we had been drinking a Cabernet Sauvignon and NOT a Merlot but I do not expect to have to liaise and negotiate with a Sommelier when we are the customers!!
Next morning, it was off to Breakfast. We went into the restaurant and it all looked good. We ordered tea and orange juice, had a read of the newspaper and then went up to get the food from the counters. There was a total of 2 couples there, on the way back down to the table, I was shocked to see that the waitress in her efficiency had totally cleared out table, orange juices, newspapers and teas. We sat down at the same table and re-ordered everything once again.
As you can see from the above points, ours was not a particularly enjoyable experience. We spoke with Jorge Mejia (we think Assistant Manager) to comment upon our grudges however did not receive a satisfactory response. Upon paying the bill, we also spoke to Osama Wannous but no form of recompense was offered.

All in all forget this place, it you want five star in Dubai go to the One & Only or Le Meriden. These are the real 5 star hotels.

The service was excellent, on par with other Ritz Carlton hotels. The concierge was friendly and the staff was attentive. The pool was average.

The hotel is a bit out of the way so you need to take a cab everywhere, not walking distance to anything. At the same time, if you stayed anywhere else, you'd still have to take cabs everywhere.

I didn't stay there but we had dinner/drinks at Madinet Jumeriah and the One and Only. They are about the same price as the Ritz and both hotels seemed better.

Lovely hotel with all the regular stuff you'd expect from a 5 Star establishment but nothing extra special as everything in Dubai seems to be done on a hugely commerical scale. Personally, I don;t see the point of travelling all that way for shopping! The malls (albeit fantastic) are unecessary, unless on a holiday, you are a shopaholic handbag freak that gets the shakes when they haven't been to Bluewater for at least 3 days! I couldn't get my head around the fact that I was in Dubai and yet standing in front of M & S with Debenhams & Boots around the corner! weird!!

Although the food was good, the ambience was lacking and we struggled to find other placess to eat that didn't have that 'Disney Feel'. The Spa treatments where outstanding ( and trust me I've been to the best)!

It's not a place that I personally would go back to but that said, if your looking for 'winter sun' and especially if you have kids, then this is a great place for you. Its safe & theres plenty of family based activities but for us it was a bit like a 5 star Butlins (Dubai, not the hotel)!

I wouldn't recommend it for couples that enjoy an ambling holiday of peace & quiet with quaint restaurants and culture - if you want that then hold out until June & go for the South of France or southern Italy...oh and if you don't like Disnleyland or shopping malls then forget dubai in general!