Banyan Tree Bintan — Hotel in Bintan Island

This is my first trip to Bintan and I had chosen to stay at Banyan Tree Bintan, an Accor group of hotels. This resort along with other independent properties, sits on the northern coast of Bintan Island, which are hosted by Bintan Resorts.

I had taken a one-hour ferry ride from Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal in Singapore to Bintan’s Bandar Bentan Telani Ferry Terminal. The property is a 15 mins car ride from the ferry terminal. I had arranged a return transportation with the hotel at IDR350,000 (SGD31 | USD23).

Security is good at Banyan Tree Bintan. To access the resort, you are required to first pass through the security checkpoint of Bintan Resorts grounds before reaching another security checkpoint located at Banyan Tree Bintan.

Banyan Tree Bintan is comprised of 64 villas modelled on traditional Balinese architecture and beautifully located in a forest and seaside setting. This resort has been operating for 28 years since 1995. With that in mind, I would say the vibe here is rustic luxury. Although the furnishings look dated, I am impressed the management had maintained it well. The interior was newly painted, the wood furnishings had been varnished, with the shower fittings and air-conditioning unit looking new. By managing this expectation, you will be able to enjoy your stay here.

For my two night’s stay, I had booked the Rainforest Seaview Villa (No. 204). This villa is conveniently located by foot to the hotel lobby, hotel restaurants and pool area. The resort is huge and if you are housed in a villa at the far end, no worries, the buggy service is always at your service. Simply WhatsApp or call the reception staff to arrange one and the buggy shall be at the doorstep of your villa in 5 mins.

My villa offers a King Size Bed that can accommodate 02 guests. I had reserved an extra bed which costs USD100++, which includes daily buffet breakfast service. Due to limited space at the villa, the extra bed is actually a day bed prepared with bed linen and pillows.

The villa is housed within a forest canopy, which allows you to connect with nature. You can hear the chirping of birds, see bats and occasionally hear the soothing sea waves. For the guest’s comfort and well-being, fogging in the resort is performed during the late nights on every Tuesday and Thursday. The hotel is also thoughtful to provide mosquito coils at the property.

The Wi-Fi connectivity in the villa and resort grounds is good. Although there is no SMART TV, you can enjoy their more than 20 Cable TV channels such as CCTV, NHK World Japan, HBO, HBO Hit & HBO Signature.

The shower experience was good, though not excellent. The bathroom offers a bathtub with Hansgrohe shower fittings. I prefer using the hand held shower than the rain shower as I felt the shower pressure was intermittently strong. At times, the shower water was warm and cold the next. However, I like that the bath towel is thick and fluffy.

You can find three food and beverage establishments in the resort, which are Treetops, Saffron & The Cove. The buffet breakfast is served at Treetops.

There are two outdoor pools in the resort, namely Rock Edge Pool and Beach Pool. I prefer swimming at the Rock Edge Pool as it is more tranquil with lesser guests. The opening hours for both pools are from 0800hrs to 1800hrs.

There is no ride-hailing service (Grab or Gojek) in Bintan. You would need to arrange a local taxi to bring you around the island for your sightseeing trips and seafood meals in the kelong restaurants. The nearest kelong restaurant is Kelong Restaurant Nirwana, located about 6km away. I had booked a taxi which costs SGD25 for a return trip. The journey takes about 15 mins for each way. Yes, the drivers in Bintan accepts SGD for payment.

Despite operating for 28 years here, Banyan Tree Bintan has aged well, like a bottle of fine wine. What’s most commendable is the resort’s first-class service. Every staff is smiley and offers a friendly greeting each time they meet you. It has been a...

The resort is beautiful by means of it being surrounded by greenery and sitting right at the tip of Bintan’s sparkling (private) beach. Communication for buggy services, room delivery, itinerary changes are all managed through WhatsApp.

The beach is clean, spa is fantastic (especially for the resort-only special rate that wasn’t communicated to us earlier on), staff are incredibly friendly and welcoming, food is great (depending on what you order) and select activities are fun.

Unfortunately those are the only things that keep Banyan Tree Bintan a premium resort. The quality of the rooms, lack of detail in resort activities, miscommunication via the other resorts (that share vacation activities), made our stay at the fabled Banyan Tree less than satisfactory.

The rooms itself, while premium and lush are quietly falling apart. We had issues with leakage through the window, spotty hot water in the baths, peeling paint, select power sockets that didn’t work, stained bedroom slippers and other small, irksome flaws.

You get around mostly by buggy, chauffeured by the hotel staff. The resort is hilly, so extremely inaccessible for some with injuries or ailments.

We had our plans miscommunicated (taxi pick up, spa reservations and prices, location of Zumba classes) multiple times. And not to mention, the plethora of activities that were on offer lacked clear details on what attendees could expect. For example, a nature trail through a largely rocky terrain through a rainforest saw many unknowing guests turn up in crocs, flip flops and handbags.

This was all made up to us with a complimentary meal at the end of our stay, but it only made the majority of a trip a patronising one rather than one where we could really kick back and enjoy.

I think the resort just needs to upgrade and constantly keep up room maintenance for the experience to be better. Otherwise, my experience was that it was an exorbitant trip (Banyan Tree is NOT cheap, from the daily rates down to the daily expenditure for food and drinks) for an average stay.

Although a special mention to our tour guides, service staff and even Zumba instructor for being so warm and human. The service here is from the heart, you feel like you’re friends with them after a...

Pros: -service was very friendly and thoughtful with morning sweeping of balcony (because bats will leave stuff overnight), evening turndown providing mosquito coils & net setting (very labor intensive resort) -body scrub & deep massage was amazing, every movement was well thought out -saffron restaurant both lunch & dinner was very good and I don’t even usually like Thai food -Treetop dinner food was good -very peaceful and tranquil with private villas all spread out amongst the jungle -jungle bike tour was fun but only if you are taller than 5ft 3 or they don’t have bikes for you staying at the ocean front meant we didn’t really need the buggy to drive us much

Cons -very old and dated but renovation is happening and I can imagine covid didn’t help. Things break (curtain, door handle, PowerPoint, etc) but staff were quick to attend. When it rains the place can look quite depressing with rusty windows, wet patchy cushions, broken wide decking and drainage that clogs. -if you aren’t very steady I wouldn’t go. The stone footpaths are quite uneven. I also wouldn’t want toddlers going with all the broken planks in the decking around the pools and stairs (hopefully they will fix soon as I think it’s a huge risk) -ask for the villa with the blue pools (we had the old yellow one and it looked quite unappealing) -don’t go if you are afraid of nature, there are lizards, bats and monkeys -it’s a place to relax so don’t expect punctual arrival of the buggy but when it does it’s always with a massive smile

Point- apparently they reuse the slippers which I found doubtful as it’s quite flimsy so won’t let guests take them. I suspect it is more because it is sold at the shop. So if they actually dispose of it I would find that quite environmentally wasteful. Also they are constantly using petrol leave blowers which are very smelly and also not very environmentally friendly since electrical options are available. So hope management will reconsider these two minor areas.

In summary, I would return, especially after they complete their refurbishing. Covid has been tough on the industry and all the people working there are so lovely I hope to see...