Four Seasons Resort Hualalai — Hotel in Hawaii

We had a wonderful stay at Hualalai to celebrate our anniversary belatedly. Our rides to and from the airport were coordinated perfectly, and the drivers were excellent and so friendly!

Alicia Grogan from the Intimate Dinners Team was great to work with in advance. Chef Christopher Roark Marquez put together a delicious Dinner Under the Stars for us that we only wish we could have eaten all of (so much excellent food!).

We liked our room, 3002, and will probably request the same room again in the future because of the excellent quiet location! We also enjoyed our afternoon massages in the spa and appreciated having our late check-out extended to 6 pm on the evening of our red-eye flight. Thank you so much for that extra time to rest and prepare for the long journey.

We won't return during Spring Break as more families and children were around than we had expected. Spring Break was already over where we live, so it was unexpected. Breakfast could be chaotic, and there was a lot of kid noise. We would like to see if there are quieter times to stay at the resort and enjoy breakfast more.

On our first night, we dined at 'Ulu at 7 pm, and it seemed we were forgotten until Lee came along and asked us if our server had come by yet. Whoever our original server was, they had not come around. Lee apologized, went to see what happened, and eventually ended up being our new server, which was lovely because she is an absolute delight and very sweet. My glass of wine was complimentary because of how long we sat awkwardly with our menus and some water. Lee is excellent -- thank her for us! She saved the night!

Our other negative experiences were our cabana and daybed rentals. On April 3rd, we had the Ohana Package at Beach Tree. We loved the cabana with the pool's extra seating, but the service was less than desirable.

The guy assigned to serve us wasn't made aware in advance that we had reserved an Ohana Package. He also wasn't very polite or warm; he just popped his head in occasionally and curtly said, "Need anything else?"

It took a while to even get water. It was as if we showed up, were directed to the fabulous cabana, and then forgotten about for over an hour. My husband went and got water by himself, and then suddenly someone else showed up and said, "Let me get you some more water!" Then, we were overwatered. It was really odd. Then nobody told us about our Ohana Package options either, so we ordered whatever it explicitly said we were entitled to on the arrival itinerary from the Concierge.

The guy assigned to us had no idea we had the package. I don't know how they assign people, but the cabanas should have a designated assignee. It was not worth $418.85 a day because the service was nothing special whatsoever. If anything, the guy who cleaned sunglasses and came around with popsicles was the highlight. He was great!

Our next cabana rental, which was $471.20, was on April 4th. We reserved the Siren Package and were led to a very nice Palm Grove Nest. The pleasant girl who led us there brought us water, coconut water, macadamia nuts, and the Project Reef Aloha Bag. She was lovely, and we hoped she would be our server. That is not the case. We were passed on to someone who yet again didn't seem to know or care that we were there.

My husband and I discussed that some investment could be made in a system similar to how Brazilian steakhouses have little signals on tables. Why not have a little nautical flag to raise and fly when you want something over at your nest or cabana? At least it would be more FUN than sitting there until you give up and get water or order food yourself.

That is our experience, and we would still love to return, but we won't come again during Spring Break, and we won't reserve any cabanas. It didn't seem worth the money in the end. I had a far better cabana rental experience at the Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne for example, and would rate theirs a 10/10 and Four Seasons a 5/10. The Dinner Under the Stars was terrific and exactly what we expected...

The Four Seasons in Kona is such a let down compared to our previous stay to that at the Four Seasons in Vietnam. Gosh where do we start? *we had one of the premium rooms which is right outside Kings Pond overlooking the ocean beyond. The room offers very little privacy. And let's just say, when we were having adult fun in bed, we noticed one couple staring/watching us and they were standing on the pathway around Kings Pond. Of course they walked away when we glared at them, but there is no privacy; if you are doing that, you must close your shades, you cannot keep them open to see the ocean. Four seasons should grow some more shrubs or have thought about lowering the pathway around the pond so guests have privacy *we had very poor experiences at their ULU restaurant, which seems to be highly overrated. Of our comment regarding ULU sushi grill which is on the Four Seasons Kona property: it’s mediocre. The toro is great, and that's really it. The servers are generous with their sake pours which is terrific as well, and that's really the only other positive about the restaurant. We had generous saki tasting pours with our waitress Regina and also another waitress Alicia since we ate here for two nights. The negatives: the rice in all of our dishes had too much rice wine vinegar or something and the rice texture was not ideal so the nigiri is ruined and the rice bowls are not good. Regarding terrible service: on one of our dinners where Crisha and Courtney were working, both ladies failed to give us seats to the restaurant as resort guests and only comped us an appetizer and dessert AFTER we complained. After the front desk senior staff had to speak to these two ladies to help us get a dinner seat, and only after mentioning we knew the senior executives at Four Seasons, is when both Crisha and Courtney apologized. The problem is, what are they actually sorry for?? Think about it: what did they do wrong. Apparently they should not have done anything wrong if they were turning us away due to a full reservation that night (by the way, there were empty tables and once we got seated after all the issues were settled, there still never was a full house at the restaurant at any given point that night). It was only after we complained to front desk and that Crisha and Courtney said a table just happened to become available: if that was the whole truth, what are they sorry for? Are they only apologizing because we know Senior executives at the Four Seasons and they realize how rudely (especially Crisha) they treated us. It is unacceptable at this level to treated like that at a resort restaurant especially for the premium room guest as we were staying at the Four Seasons. Resort guests should always have seating for their resort guests because there are no other restaurants nearby: guests should always have preferential treatment when it comes to seating compared to out-of-Resort guests *The breakfast is terrible for $45 USD a person. Also during breakfast the restaurant does this weird cheap "Costco" like thing where a man is promoting Kona Coffee and offering coffee tasting outside ULU restaurant. The whole approach is coming across very cheasy and at a place like Four Seasons it is pretty embarassing *For the outdoor beach service by the Kings Pond: Craig the waitor was not good, but Johnny was great. *if you're looking for a quiet resort, this is not it. There are a a ton of guests and non-resort guests on the property *the only thing I liked about the hotel that stood out was their 24/7 text messaging service. They always responded super quickly. That would be great if more hotels offered this service *worst off: my boyfriend was sent a comment link email after our stay. He filled it out with some of our main concerns/feedback and mentioned Four Seasons could contact us. The hotel never bothered to reach us to rectify any of this.

Overall we are very disappointed with the Four Seasons Kona. If it was our first Four Seasons Experience we would not go to another Four...

Entire process from start to finish was awful. So many errors in every facet at a high-end resort. Depressing given it’s supposed to be such a memorable time in our lives. Long list leading up to and including the wedding day. Even after contacting higher ups once we sensed the continuing issues, we had a meeting on site and still had many mistakes. Obviously, lots of small stuff that we wouldn’t have cared about had it not been 5 months of errors and difficulty!

·Took 22 days for them to contact photographer and videographer to lock down dates (we ended up contacting most our vendors to save our dates after another bride gave us the heads up) ·Wrong appetizer, wrong display cake flavor, wrong chairs (refunded $680), wrong charger plates (refunded $18) ·Custom designed fans for rehearsal dinner not set out ·Overcharged $11k+ during the deposits process. Spent hours going through their accounting and pointed out the error and still told we were incorrect. Told the final bill would be sent 'contractually two days after.' Hadn't received it by Tuesday, so we asked for it. Received at 5:01pm on Friday night (6 days post event) and the credit card charged almost immediately. ·Paid for a guest’s room for Friday night. Found out Friday at 9am they were delayed until Saturday morning. The hotel told us they weren’t allowed to check in until noon Saturday (we were happily paying for Friday night to allow for check-in anytime and had to pushback on noon check-in for an already paid for 2-night stay). There was an additional room rate issue we had prepped the hotel for and yet they did exactly what we asked them not to do (which made an awkward interaction for us with our guest). ·Construction disclosed the day our deposit went through. Emphasized multiple times (literally every month) that the my now wife has a medical condition set on by loud unexpected noises so construction was not an option for us. Assured numerous times our rooms would not be impacted – yet noise and multiple large machines drove by 6 of 10 days. Stayed in two different rooms (pre wedding and then honeymoon suite) and both rooms were affected. Finally, they told us construction would additionally be happening on our wedding day (Saturday) even though we were told in June construction would be Monday-Friday 8am-5pm and our rooms would not be impacted. One of the mornings started at 7:27am. ·A band was playing 100 yards from our reception which we weren't told about. It was discussed we'd have our own music and would have happily not planned for that had we known there'd be competing music. ·Showed an Instagram photo of their twinkle string light setup during a teams call (pre-deposit) and told that was easy and the way we should go. Then told weeks later a tree had been cut down (way before initial ask) and so that setup wasn’t possible. Had to brainstorm how to fix this location and ended up actually moving to a different one. ·Pre deposit were told we could assign rooms. Two people were sharing a room but we couldn’t even be guaranteed double beds until month of the wedding and contacting the director. Wedding guests were also limited in golf cart use for arrival at the ceremony despite everyone being a hotel guest. ·The bar was opened before the ceremony even though we asked for alcohol not to be severed on several occasions before the ceremony. Also were told open bottles of wine could be take after events since we were charged for any opened. Yet we were also charged for an UNopened bottle that we never used and left unopened in the room to be returned. ·They lost my custom bridal hanger. After professional photos were done, they found it in the exact location I said it would be after they couldn’t fine. Several other personalized lost items (champagne flutes - they found 2 of the lost 4).

All compounded to ruin what was supposed to be such a special time.

UPDATED: I did finally speak with the regional VP & GM. They were genuinely concerned and apologetic. They did their best to...