voco Dubai Monaco Heart of Europe by IHG — Hotel in Dubai

With the understanding that this property is still under construction, the area that they do have complete is pretty amazing. The facility was very clean, the available 5 shops they had (hair salon, mens clothing, womens clothing, ice cream, and a convenience store) were a nice size and had a pretty good selection of items (although a little pricey, but to be expected). Another shop was getting ready to be opened.

They have a raining street in-between two wings of the hotel and I have to say that this was awesome! It rained for about 90 sec every 30 min or so. The street has a European feel with a cobbled walkway, murals, and a huge umbrella for photos. They even have small patio tables under a couple awnings so you can have a coffee (or food) on the patio with the rain effect. Very ingenious and fun idea!

They have a huge pool area and pool-side bar between two wings (with two more identical planned with the completion of the hotel build). The only thing I would recommend with this area is to change out the solid state lounge chairs with ones that you can adjust. Their were only a couple adjustable ones and those were the preferred chairs for all of the people we spoke to. The music and vibe were great. They had a DJ playing music at all times and it was really good (they switched out DJs for shifts, so there were 2 to 3 each day).

The room we stayed in was just beautiful. We had a wrap-around patio with sea views on each side. Plenty of sitting on the patio and inside. There was 1.5 bathrooms, which was a first for me and oh was it super useful. The one thing that was a negative for the room is that the room is all smart, and the lights in the bedroom are not wired correctly. There is a button to turn on the lights on the headboard of the bed, but it does not work. They are tied into the main bedroom light. So, if you want to do some late night reading, you have to have all the bedroom lights turned on, which defeats the entire purpose of headboard lights. There was a really good hotel guide on the television home page, but no one told us about it. I happen to see it on day 3 and realized that we had missed out on a bunch of stuff because we were not aware of it. This is an easy thing to fix by ensuring you tell your guests about it during check-in. I was super sad to realize if we had seen this earlier that we could have done a free tour of the island and that they had a walking path.

The food was good, no complaints there. Plenty of selection in the two restaurants or in the buffet. The waiters were so nice and attentive. Emmy helped us every day we were there, starting with our first dinner. She was super sweet, attentive, and had a great memory. Her smile was contagious!

Really, the only reason I did not give these guys 5 stars is because of the major communications issues. When you book the hotel, they send you an email and tell you to reach out to the concierge to reserve your boat ride to the island. Getting a hold of the concierge is a little hard. The number they gave me goes to the front desk and they did not know how to transfer me. They told me to download WhatsApp, but I cannot do that on my work phone. When I got a hold of them, they could not find my reservation (even though I was looking at the email from them confirming my reservation), so I had to email them again and then they found my reservation under a different number than the booking. Once I got that confirmed, they then told me that I could book a car from the airport, but had to respond with additional information (headcount, bags, time, etc). When I did respond, it began another round of confusing communications. They responded that I needed to reach out to the concierge to reserve your boat ride first (which I had already done and was in the email chain communication). I later found out that they have a website that I could book the boat trip to and from the island myself. All in all, it took me about a week to get all of this sorted Thank goodness I had done so about a month before my trip. This back and forth from different people could easily be fixed by being able to talk to one person on the phone, getting one email with all of the information (boat and car directions, boat website link, etc), or just putting all of this information on a website (like they have for the boat reservations, something for confirmed guests only). For those of you that plan a trip here, just get an Uber from the airport. It is cheap and everyone knows where the boat jetty is that you have to get...

Amazing experience at the Hotel and thoroughly enjoyed the entire experience!!||Getting to the Hotel provides an exceptional experience in itself as we travelled by Yacht.||We arrived 30 minutes or so early and were able sit in the shade, however at the side of the Canal, I’d recommend Bruno g an umbrella to provide your own shade if the boat is busy.||The boar concierge was excellent and provided us with bottles of Ice cold water which was greatly welcomed!!||My wife sat inside the boat which is furnished with fans and couches. (Have to take your shoes off before going inside). My son and I sat on the top deck of the boat to make the most of the view and picture opportunities. The boat trip to the Island was fantastic and took around 45 minutes. I have to say, if the temperature is around 38 degrees or so when travelling, you will be dripping when you get there!||Luggage is tagged so no need to attempt to drag it with you to the hotel to check in. ||As an IHG Diamond member, we were personally greeted when boarding the boat by Habiba, and then did not have to join a queue to check in as were sat down with Salma to check in speedily and privately. ||Could not praise both Habiba and Salma more as their customer service and warmth in dealing with all clients was fantastic. Thank you from us all 🙂.||We were really made to feel special by the whole team, including the Concierge team and Chef within the Brasserie.||We travel to Dubai in August as it is a quieter albeit hotter month of the year.||The hotel was clearly well occupied but not what I would call too busy to deal with.||Pool area is great and the bar food looked very nice although we didn’t personally have it ourselves. Bottle of Sparkling wine at the pool is 275-300 Dirham depending on white or ping and soft drinks 25. In comparison to the rest of Dubai, very similar and expected.||Room was fantastic, great view and nice and cold. Stocked minibar.||Shower was excellent and plenty of coat hangers which was a bonus.||Don’t come here expecting to rest peacefully by the pool and snooze in the daytime as the hotel is not about that ‘vibe’ I’m 52, travelling with my wife 50 and our 19 year old son who had his own room opposite ours. We gave him the room overlooking the pool.|There is constant club/dance/R&B/mood music which is loud from morning until the early hours of the morning. Loved it, as we came to that hotel for that kind of atmosphere rather than the City vibe.||We had the buffet for dinner which was great and included water or orange juice although we were not presented with a drinks list at any point even though there is a bar area at entrance.||I’d highly recommend the hotel to IHG members spending time at other hotels in the city. Go for a night as we did and have a great party time. We left on the day after our stay on the 5pm boat arriving back to the city at just before 6. ||When arriving back we had booked an Uber for 6:15 just to be on the safe side, however due to there being some high-end local residences, they do not want Taxis stopping to drop people off right at the location where you will make the short walk to or from the boat or people hanging around on the curb side. It was suggested to us by two separate private security people that cars may not stop there as are being fined. To be fair, they said it wasn’t our problem, it would be the drivers problem. We moved a little further up the road to the corner and fortunately as having no WiFi, we didn’t actually know the reg of the Uber that would pull up. However, exactly at 6:15, a Lexus ES approached which was clearly our Uber as most Uber’s are this vehicle.||Couple of tips:||Don’t forget your residents ID or passport as must be shown when getting on the boat! No exceptions! If you forget it, you’ll be going back for it.||Take an umbrella for shade while waiting for the boat especially if you are early!||Make sure if you want to be inside the boat, get there early to get a seat near a fan. ||Take a later boat when coming back and maximise your time at the hotel. The 5pm boat had 10 of us on rather than 40+ on the...

Don’t believe the (paid?) influencers - this hotel seriously lacks attention to detail and organisation. It’s not worthy of IHG. It needs to bring in some good managers to set things straight.

Let’s start with the positives. The location is obviously beautiful and unique. The beaches and pools are nice (although the pool ladders aren’t ideal; see below). The food is not bad (but not amazing). The staff at La Brasserie were great; in fact the best we encountered during our two-night stay. The eco-friendly slippers in the room were nice.

The negatives: First of all, everything is completely unorganised. No one contacted us before our stay to tell us we needed to book the boat to get onto the island; we only found this out when I called the hotel on the day of arrival, at which point they sent me a Whatsapp message with a booking link. The boat was already fully booked for the 4pm departure, so we had to settle with the 6pm boat. All of this only happened after I had spent 20 minutes with generic IHG customer support; for some reason it was extremely difficult to get in touch with someone at the actual hotel. But again, we shouldn’t have to contact the hotel to get vital information - the hotel should reach out proactively.

When we arrived, we were told that we had been upgraded from a premium beach view room to a premium pool view room. Upon inspection, the latter turned out to actually be a downgrade as our view were basically into another building. We were told that this room would be better for us as ”the music on the beach gets loud at night”; this was of course untrue. When I talked to the manager, he was nice enough and tried to get us moved to another room, but there was only one better pool view option available and no beach view option so we didn’t bother and accepted our fate.

We then tried to have dinner at La Rive restaurant, only to be told that it was fully booked. Again this is something we should have been told before our arrival; that we may want to make a dinner reservation as the restaurants could be full. (At this point we made a reservation for the next day. When we arrived, our table was set for two pax, despite the reservation being for four…).

And now comes perhaps the biggest let-down of the stay. The next day we went for the Saturday brunch. On our arrival, Alina, a staff member, told us that the house package costed 399 aed. When I said that it is advertised as 299 aed on their website and various flyers around the hotel, she doubted me. After a long wait, she proceeded to take a photo of my phone (with the hotel website advertising the 299 aed price tag), instead of just checking it herself. Well, she did charge us 299 aed in the end but didn’t apologies for basically trying to defraud us. At this point I was pretty angry.

There are then many minor remarks. There is only decaf coffee available in the rooms (quite strange, no?). The sinks in the rooms are loose and shaky. The pool ladders are rounded and slippery; they don’t feel safe.

When we arrived to the boat on the way to the island, we were asked by security for our room number and passports/EIDs, but it wasn’t a particularly friendly welcome and we didn’t feel like guests (in fact no one told us welcome at all until we reached the reception). When we waited for the boat back (which again, no one told us we needed to book), we weren’t allowed to board in advance despite the boat being ready, so we had to wait outdoors in the heat.

I could go on but this is enough for now.

Generally the hotel is extremely disorganised; no one knows what’s going on. They need much better managers; someone who informs the staff on a daily basis of what’s happening and other information. We are IHG Platinum members and have stayed at all their chains; this is by far the most disappointing...