Drop Anchor Resort & Marina — Hotel in Islamorada

I travel frequently, and am not the type to leave a review, in fact for a hotel experience from the booking of it and the actual hotel stay, this was the worst hotel experience I have ever had in my 56 years. I had to put the time in and get this review out there. It's not just the hotel, it's also Hotel.com which I will never use again, and the hotel Drop Anchor in Islamorada, Florida Keys.

I go to Florida Keys 3/4x a year, me and the guys do fishing trips. We always stay at the Breezy Palm in Islamorada. Normally I call and book it over the phone. This time however, I went online, wrote into Google, "Breezy Palm" and the Breezy Palm hotel pictures and facility came up. So I continued the online process, checked availability, the Breezy Palms had the opening on my dates, and I went ahead and booked my room.

Turns out the online process runs through Hotel.com and they took my money for the whole 3 nights stay. (Which normally the Breezy Palm only charges the 1st night and we square away on checkout) but, I didn't care, in the end, the amount is what it is. They sent me a confirmation email with reservation number.

So on the date of my stay I arrive at the Breezy Palm (along with 9 other people for our fishing trip) the date is March 13, 2021, much to my surprise- no reservations!

I pull up my reservation number and the lady at Breezy Palm points out it's to a Drop Anchor Hotel 4 miles away?? And they are sold out at the Breezy Palm. Why did Hotel.com show Breezy Palm pictures and facility, lead me to believe that I am booking the Breezy Palm, but really book me some where else? THIS IS BAIT AND SWITCH TACTICS by Hotel.com. The room rate was also $743 for 3 nights? Which is a little higher than normal for Breezy Palm, but at Breezy Palms there decent rooms, with bedroom, kitchen, and living room with pull out additional beds, the rate was marginally higher due to spring break season, which was Ok for the Breeze Palm to stay at.

I would never EVER have paid that rate for the Drop Anchor no star hotel Hotel.combait and switched me too!

When I get to the Drop Anchor, the room is about the size of a large over size closet and only one bed that barely fit in it - which didn't work for us, as we were two grown men that aren't gay.

I immediately protested the room. They were sold out also, and didn't have rooms to switch, after some debate the attendant there brings a mattress that barely even fits on the floor. The room I am not kidding is the size of an over sized closet 10 X 8 maybe? With the bathroom! I have pictures and videos of the room. $743 for 3 nights and your in a oversized closet of a room, the a/c doesn't work - and it gets 90 outside, no closet to hang your clothe, no door for the bathroom (it's a sliding door with holes with no lock) the bathroom is maybe 2 feet wide? No fan for toilet, you can't sit where the toilet is as there is no room (has to be seriously out of code), you have to enter the shower sideways and slide in. The toilet paper holder is hanging from the wall. Again, I have pictures it's shocking. The shades on the windows are all broken and has holes all over them. This room isn't even a Motel 8 caliber $59 a night room? This room was most likely a storage room jammed together and converted into a very poorly made half bedroom to try and squeeze more rent out of something that shouldn't be rented. I also question the safety of the room due to the bathroom serious out of code (spacing) construction and/or lack of its proper up keep and maintance.

When I complained and left a bad review, as Hotel.com sent me a link, the hotels response was "you booked it like that" which was never EVER the truth. I am going to look to see if there is any legal recourse for leaving me stranded on my vacation like that for both Hotel.com and there bait and switch online tactic, as I'll bet I am not the only one this has happened too and Drop...

Here's the good, bad and the ugly: THE GOOD -- The outside area. Palm trees, Weber grills for cooking, the view, and a heated saltwater pool. Granted, we were one of two couples staying at the property, so the peace and quiet was nice. THE BAD -- We experienced plumbing issues right from the start. The kitchen backed up when we took a shower, and the hot water was, well...hot and cold. The patio door latch was broken and would not lock. We arrived late, so we had to overlook these items until the next day. The next morning, we ran into a couple who was staying in the room directly above us. They informed us that they had been upgraded to a better room because of plumbing issues, cleanliness, and inconsistent hot water. So, we met with management who told us that they would move us. But they wanted to move us into the same room they just moved the other couple out of. Wait...what? Do you see a pattern starting to evolve? We, of course, said no to that suggestion, and they agreed to move us into the more expensive room overlooking the ocean. Great view, more spacious, bigger bed. Great! Then we went to take a shower and there was no hot water. We waited until the next day to inform management of this new development, and unbeknownst to us, you have to turn on the bathroom faucet and let it run simultaneously while you take a shower to get hot water. ( I promise I'm not making this up) There's 3 problems with this: It reduces water pressure, it's a waste of water, and in my 54 years on planet Earth, I have never heard of this Harry Potter trickery. Okay, so we'll play along..... I mean, we do have a bigger bed and an ocean view...LOL Next up, the A/C goes out at 10 p.m. at night; completely froze up and coughed out chunks of black mold. THE UGLY -- At this point, we had decided it's time to stop overlooking the injustices of poor quality control, especially for the price. I always give the benefit of the doubt, and I get how the world works. I have been in hospitality and customer service for over 25 years, and want to say that I do appreciate how management tried to put lipstick on a pig, but the whole dynamic changed when I had a face to face discussion with the manager and I was gaslighted and subtly patronized. But don't take my word for it...Feel free to check in and enjoy! (I'm only sharing the good photos since there needs to be more positive...

Kudos to Zach, Amanda, Andres and Steve and anyone else who pitched in to make my mom and my stay such a wonderful time. All made certain my mom felt very safe navigating up and down the stairs, being disabled and legally blind. They helped carry all of our measly light bags up to our room and then repacked my truck for me, I'm disabled too. Room 7 was such a delight, I really enjoyed sitting out on my private balcony shooting pics of the very territorial woodpeckers with my camera. One word of advice...cushions would make those Adirondack chairs easier for us older bad back folks to manage. loved that I didn't have to go hunt for an ashtray as it was right there. Thank you for helping me order dinner our first night...I never got to eat the full sandwich but I picked at it after chowing down on that scrumptious pasta salad (I honestly thought it would be a spoon or two not half the container and once I started on it...). Our king bed was so comfy, I appreciated that it wasn't so soft, and all those pillows, I did think about trying out the futon once I saw how thick the mattress was for it but by then mom had stolen ALL the covers and turned the AC down so she wouldn't be hot. Really loved having beautifully tiled floors...so much nicer than carpet but a few strategic rugs might help like at the slider, front door and on each side of the bed to help control sand, nothing sucks quite so much as accidentally tracking it into bed as I did then spent half the night trying to remove it. I have told all my friends and business acquaintances about you, plus gave digits and names, website info, address, you name it. Hope to be back as soon as I can convince my girls in Houston along with hubbies and all 5 grandbabies to roadtrip there en masse for a grand weekend. btw, loved the complete kitchen AND the special touch of a full ice tray frozen waiting for me....that right there bought my heart! Others may be bigger or be more well known and cost a boatload more but you win hands down and anytime i come to the Keys with or without family, I'm coming to stay with y'all...thanks again for such a peaceful and lovely time. Really appreciated that the quiet was...