AMR Echo Beach Villa’s Canggu — Hotel in Pulau Bali

We first stayed here in May 2018 and we had such an amazing time we rebooked for 2019. The Manager Ketut came to see us every morning, asking us what we wanted to do, made suggestions for kid friendly activities and was generally so helpful and friendly and everything was perfect. So we rebooked for 2019 and just like last time we booked a pool fence, a bed for our 3 year old daughter and food supplies for when we arrived.||||But 2019 was not the same experience.||||A month from arriving in 2019, after getting no responses from 5 emails I sent to the booking address, I contacted the manager directly on whatsapp. He told me he no longer worked there and the villa has been sold. We finally got hold of the old owner who confirmed by email a week before we arrived that the villa had changed hands but our booking would be honoured, and everything we had organised was included. They provided me with new contact details for the villa. I then tried to organise the airport pick up with the new owners. ||||We arrive and they take us to the villa next door to the one we had last year. There is no pool fence, no bed for our daughter and none of the supplies we requested on arrival. The new villa manager turns up and has no idea what I am talking about. I had printed out the email which confirmed all of the above so I showed him that. The manager takes a photo of the emails and wanders off and starts making calls. ||I tell him I thought we had booked the villa next door and he checks the villa next door and there is the pool fence but someone is coming the next day so we can’t stay there. They wanted us to stay with no pool fence and a 3 year old who has already tried to jump in the pool in the short time we had been there. ||||After making calls they say we can stay 1 night in the villa we booked with the pool fence while they try and work out getting another pool fence. I ask about the bed and they say they haven’t got one and in the end she got a mattress on the floor. No sign of the supplies so we ended up getting our own from just down the road.||||We message the old owner who said yes since we arrived the manager has been contacting her about our requests and she apologised and confirmed again everything should have been organised. That was just the start.||||We paid the balance and twice during the trip the manager came back to me and asked for more money as he said he had been told we hadn’t paid enough. I showed him the email saying how much we owed and I had actually rounded up and paid more than we owed. He took a photo of that email too.||||The main TV in the villa didn’t work. We told him on the first day. We mentioned it daily. On the 3rd day the manager came and tried to fix it himself and then switched it with a small TV from one of bedrooms. He couldn’t get that working either and finally got a technician in and fixed the little TV, but the big screen tv was never fixed.||||We didn’t get offered the evening cook service, we didn’t get offered a nanny (both of which were available last year). For the included breakfast anything apart from Mie Goreng was awful (see my photo of a museli bowl). I didn’t see the Manager for 2 days at one point and asked staff and they said he was at home and if I had questions they text him. 1 morning we wanted a driver and couldn’t find a member of staff for 2 hours. The 24 hour manned office was closed and locked. I’m glad we took the drivers number and just sorted it out ourselves from then on. ||Our driver and 1 other member of staff were both awesome but the rest of it left a lot to be desired. ||||The villa itself is still in a great location, has been repainted, has an awesome pool but even taking into account the way things happen in Bali the level of service was awful and made what should have been a relaxing holiday stressful at times. We honestly don’t even expect 5 star treatment but all the little things added up. By the end of the trip I couldn’t wait to go home.||||And to top it off in the villa car back to the airport the electrics stop working and all the external lights stop working. That’s right, we were being driven to the airport, at night with no headlights, no signal lights, and when we got to the airport they couldn’t get the boot of the car open as it was electric and had to pass the luggage through the side doors.. What way to end the trip!||||We had already made plans to come back next year with another family as we’d told them how good the previous year was. When we come back, next time we will more than likely find somewhere...

We stayed for a month in villa Pray, the last villa in the street.

One good thing about it is the location, close to beach and lots of cafes. Another small plus was the open feeling due to a little bit of view from the bedrooms. Hence 2 stars. There’s no wall next to the pool, so you can see the river and rice fields on the other side. But this also makes an easy entry point for very large lizards, frogs and huge spiders.

The beds / mattresses are extremely uncomfortable. They are so springy, when one person moves just a tiny bit, the other person can feel everything. The vibration can easily wake you up at night if you’re a light sleeper and the other turns around.

The living room smells very bad. There’s mould/moisture in various places with paint coming off the wall. Every time you open or close the curtains, some white paint like stuff keeps falling down. Water pressure: in one bathroom, you have to turn the bath tub tap on to get pressure in the shower, in the other one you have to flush the toilet to get pressure in the sink and shower. No ceiling fans in the open areas, so the dining table becomes unusable in the heat.

It was mostly the lack of service that ruined the experience though.

Twice per week cleaning was included in the price. That’s not frequent enough. Between cleaning, so many dead insects, ants and lizard poop start appearing all over the house, mostly in the upstairs hallway as they get trapped there. They charge you for laundering towels and bedsheets. Despite agreeing a cleaning schedule, the staff have no initiative to follow through on that schedule. You have to ask every time. And you have to oversee the cleaning process. It is not thorough at all. There are cob webs in various locations throughout the property. Staff is also not well looked after though from what it appears, sitting and presumably sleeping on the floor in a small cabin...

We (4 of us) stayed in a 3 bedroom villa. The pictures do not do the place justice. It truly was luxury only made better by the wonderful staff. The villa manager Ketut could not be more helpful while also respecting our privacy. The staff were available if needed around the clock. ||||The rooms were spacious with water dispensers in all the bedrooms. I personally really appreciated the mosquito net. Really comfortable beds and high standard accommodation.||||We organised several times for beauty treatments and massages and they were far superior to the local spa and also cheaper, highly recommended. ||||Echo Beach is a short 5 minute walk. Its a beautiful beach with an amazing sunset. The only downfall of the beach is that it is too dangerous to swim in. A couple of the days we went to Batu Balong beach for surfing. We were offered a drive in the villa car but we just got a taxi to suit our own times. There is a taxi stand on the road beside the villas. I think the taxi was about 3 euro to the other beach. There is no problem getting taxis from that stand. The next part of our trip was to Ubud and Ketut kindly organised very reasonable transport for us to our next destination.||||||Again I couldn't recommend this accommodation highly enough. Such high quality service and accommodation for the price. I really hope to return and stay here...