Occidental Arenas Blancas — Hotel in Cárdenas

2-stars, leaning on 1. Don't book here. Hotel is in dire need of a massive refit. Yes, staff is generally nice, and beach is the best, but the rest is simply not up to decent standards.

Rooms are very run down. Ours fortunately had "basic" needs fulfilled: A somewhat comfortable bed (but horrible pillows), cooling was working, and we had hot water. That's pretty much it. The patio door was extremely hard to slide and wouldn't completely close, letting us hear the drunk, loud Russians and Canadians partying until 4am, relentlessly. Entire room was dilapidated, bidet didn't work at all, bath was flaked and dirty, needs to be changed. Sometimes you get towels, sometimes you don't. Sometimes ONE water bottle, some days not. Want water? Go buy it downstairs at the shop (!!). There's a fridge, with nothing in it. Some of our friends didn't even have one at all, in their room. Some had to change room because the toilet wouldn't flush. We always had toilet paper, but some of them didn't. Some had problems with the keycard. One had the room handle stay in their hand. Some doors don't even close properly and NEEDS to be slammed hard, to be locked.

The hotel itself is nothing special, everything needs to be repainted and fixed. The elevators are dirty and old. Once, it literally stopped mid-floor and opened its doors between them. Some drunk idiots keep breaking the glass doors and windows all the time, or the wind pushes the doors so strongly that they break. Not the hotel's fault, but something needs to be done about that. I didn't see a single day without a broken glass somewhere in the lobby, or someone changing glass somewhere else on-site.

Buffet is boring/repetitive, I hope you like chicken, pork and eggs! No pasta, no American foods (potatoes/fries, sausages, burgers, etc.), no seafood at all. Basic coldcut meats. Cheese and butter sometimes. Sugar 2 days only, then it's back to flies-filled honey. Anyone else we talked to, from other resorts, had better comments about their buffet. Some people in our group ended up paying a lot of money to eat off-site in the city (so much for "all-included"). Coffee is subpar, nothing special, including the lobby-bar coffees. The public restrooms are somewhat okay. Check if you have toilet paper before locking your stall door. Did not notice any crazy bug infestation. Yes, ants sometimes in rooms/hotel, yes some flies on the food, but wasn't a big concern, when we were there.

Three "À-la-carte" restaurant, all of them forgetful, but still a much-welcomed change from the buffet...

Bars: The beer is good, never in shortage of it. Sometimes wine, but most days not (bye bye sangria). Hard liquor drinks are extremely lackluster. Sometimes they're out of cola (?!). Staff puts so much alcohol in them, that they become undrinkable, there's no half-measure. There is nothing fancy: Don't ask for Pina Colada or Daiquiri or stuff like that, they don't have that either. 50% of the time, the "10pm-to-3am snack bar" is just... Not open. You want a snack, to cut the alcohol a bit? Hopefully you brought your own, cuz the snackbar is closed.

Pools were well maintained while we were there, but I do not doubt those who say that, sometimes, they're not usable. Pool animation is basic, staff try their hardest, but I've seen better elsewhere. There's a lil bit of everything for everyone. Night shows are okay, nothing special either.

We were at the beach most days at different times of day, never noticed any animation there. Looked much better at the Solymar or at the Palma Real, the 2 neighboring beaches. There's a volleyball square, and some music. That's pretty much it, for beach entertainment. Would've liked more shaded areas and parasols. It's the classic "gotta get up at 8am to bring a towel on a shaded-area chair and leave it there while you eat and do other stuff, and then come back hours later" situation.

Location is great, 2-minutes walk brings you on the boulevard. Plenty to do there, if you want to spend some money on overpriced...

The only reason I am giving this resort a 2 star is because I would feel deeply hurt for people by rating it a 1. Unfortunately we feel like there were many small issues along the way that just didn’t make it the 4-5 star we thought it was going to be. The people and the land of Cuba are beautiful, please don’t get me wrong. The people are warm and wonderful and always saying hi and the beaches are gorgeous. To start, we were hustled for $20 right outside of there airport right in front of the air port staff, this obviously happens 100s of times a day weather they want to admit it or not. That is not a good way for the people of Cuba. Our bus from air port to resort was delayed an hour because bags were lost, people were getting angry and it was not a good atmosphere to start off in Cuba. Finally we get to the resort. After my first meal, instant stomach problems, vomiting and diarrhea the whole 3 days we spent there. We did not want to bring this to the attention of the staff because this is obviously something common at resorts and we did not want them to feel we were not grateful for them or there hospitality, but we do feel this is something people should be aware of because travelling. I read many reviews about these things but did not believe I would fall victim to it. We brought $700 in spending money and left with nothing because everything is just as expensive there as it is back home, and you are asked to tip wherever possible. We spent $200 to swim with dolphins but only got to touch the dolphins and was an additional $50 to swim with them, the excursion was very nice but misleading when you buy it. We spent an additional $50 to snorkel with 100 species of fish but could only see a few species and the guides weren’t very helpful at bringing us to the spots necessary to find these fish Everything we did at the resort and off resort had over and above costs which was horrible because we didn’t bring enough money with us. The king size bed was a king size, but the mattress left us extremely sore and not a good rest any of the 3 nights, we expected more from a 4 star resort. The fridge never kept our drinks cold, and the bath tub was very small, again very surprising for a 4 star resort. Not much in the way of live entertainment and we could never get an answer from the staff about the games and events happening around the beach. I feel like for being one of the poorest countries you certainly have to pay a lot of money to do things you could do back home like jet skiing and boat rides. The travel back was terrible for us. Our flight was delayed because the Cuba airport implemented a new system and was slow getting people through which meant we didn’t board our plane for an extra hour. We paid a gentlemen $70 to have a VIP experience at the air port, by the time we got through there security and customs we only had 30 mins in the VIP, which would have come in better use had we been there on time and able to use the VIP lounge for an extended period of time, the only difference between VIP and upstairs waiting area is air condition and free finger food and alcohol, but by this time we weren’t interested in any of it other than the air conditioning. After finally landing back in Canada it was a miserable 3 hour line up between security and signing a declaration back into the country.

To all the staff, especially our Maid, and hard working people in Cuba and even the people of the Resort, we wish you all the best and we hope your government can work out the small kinks that would make your resort and stay much better for people who come to your beautiful country to sight see and enjoy your beaches. We know you can only do so much to fix these issues and we hope in the future we can hear better things about the flights and the accommodations.

Unfortunately the only thing that may ever bring us back to Cuba would be a free stay. We feel like we have gotten much better accommodations at other resorts for $1400+spending money + gratitudes.

All the best from...

My family came here for a six day stay and I really hope my review can help those who are interested in staying here learn more about the resort than what pictures and websites give you.

The activities that were mentioned on the Sunwing website for Arenas Blancas are not all "included" at the resort. I was looking forward to playing beach volleyball, but I could not find any building or person who could rent us volleyball equipment. So, we went to one of the scheduled beach volleyball times, where the Solymar resort stated they had a beach volleyball tournament every day at 2:30pm. We walked to the beach but no one was playing volleyball at any of the four courts and nor was there any equipment we could use. That was very disappointing.

However, the main highlight of our vacation was hanging out by the pool (our family liked the Arenas Blancas pool as well as the larger Solymar pool), enjoying drinkings, playing at the beach, and the nautical activities.

Of the free nautical activities, we were only able to do some kayaking (it is only free for 30 minutes), because the wind on the other days made it not safe for pedal boating and sailing.

The one thing I loved about this trip was snorkeling. It cost 20 CUC per person, so for our family of 4 it cost around $100 CAD. The experience was unbelievable. One of the guys who worked for the nautical sports company took us on a small sailing boat (just our family) and it took around 30 minutes across the ocean to get to the snorkeling location. There were many boats around this one area and the provided us with goggles, snorkels, and life jackets. It was very very fun to see the fish all around you. We were able to snorkel for 1 hour. One thing my mother really enjoyed was throwing small pieces of bread (each group had around 3-4 rolls of stale bread) at the fish. It was very fun feeding the fish and swimming around them. As we were snorkeling, another man approached us and asked if we would like pictures for an extra cost. He said it would be 45 pictures of us underwater with the fish, and he would do them with us alone, and all together. He mentioned that it would be 30 CUC (which is around $40 CAD) and that someone would meet us in the lobby of the resort at 6pm for us to pay him and he would give us the CD. We agreed, and we had many pictures taken of us in the water. I think it was worth it, seeing as we can look back on the cool pictures and remember our favorite experience during our Varadero vacation. This entire experience cost around $140 CAD, but it was very fun and unforgetful. Definetely recommend bringing some money and exchanging lots at the airport not only for tips but for experiences like these.

One other thing we liked was the performances at night. The entertainment company that had the shows were very good and their dancers were very good and exciting to watch.

Sadly, the hotel room was very disappointing and unlike any other room in a resort I have stayed in. I had moderate expectations, since I have been to Orlando, Florida many times and stayed in resorts there. But, at Arenas Blancas,

1. the room was smaller than expected
2. the bathroom was not extremely clean
3. the air conditioning failed to work for the first few days
4. we only found 2 towels when my family was 4 people
5. there were many ants all over the floor

In terms of the food, I knew going to Cuba that I shouldn't have expected fantastic food. However, I was pleasantly surprising by the decent food at the buffet. The only problem I encountered was trying to make a dinner reservation for the a-la-carte. I was extremely disappointed by the lack of communication and complexity of making the reservation.

Overall, it was a decent experience, as we tried to take advantage of the stuff to do outside the hotel room and stay positive...