Kiahuna Plantation Resort Kauai by OUTRIGGER — Hotel in Kauai

We recently booked 5 condos for 1 week at the Kiahuna Plantation Resort Kauai by Outrigger to celebrate a milestone family birthday. The location and natural beauty of the property were both ideal for us. We enjoyed coffee and açaí bowls every morning at the Little Fish Coffee stand located directly across the street. The long wait times were well worth it as the food was terrific. Of the 5 condos that we rented, our favorite by far was unit #164. It is an end unit on a one-story building that has been updated and has a great view of green space and the ocean. It offers decent privacy too. It was our favorite condo for our daily family gatherings. Unit #160 was our second favorite unit as the interior had a nice vibe and relaxing feel to it. Two of our other condos were on 2nd and 3rd floors offering nice ocean views as well. This brings us to unit #188, the unit in which we personally stayed. This is a unit to avoid. The unit is located on the ground floor next to a parking lot at its front and a public beach and parking lot at its rear. Needless to say, there is quite a bit of vehicular noise being generated from these two areas as visitors talking loudly come and go on both sides. Because the public lot is adjacent to the unit, there is a "privacy" hedge that does not provide much in the way of privacy but is enough to block the "ocean view" when sitting. We were also awakened several mornings by other guests in our building as they climbed up and down the stairs located just outside our bedroom window and shower as they came and went from their upstairs units. The sounds of edgers, trimmers, mowers and even nail guns permeated the tranquility of roosters crowing several of our mornings. To top it off, our door code stopped working on two occasions, one of which was after the office was closed and immediately after we had returned from the store with groceries. On that occasion, we were on hold for 20+ minutes waiting for a new code to be issued. The second time this happened was during office hours and only took about 15 minutes to resolve following a walk to the office. Regarding the interior of our unit, it is in desperate need of updating. From the floors, to the cabinetry to the wall paint to the front door louvers to even the toilet (which is so incredibly low to the floor that one almost needs help getting up) the impression is that nothing has been touched since the unit was built. To top it all off, we were welcomed to our unit upon arrival by a large cockroach that acted as though we were invading its space. in any event, this is all to say that we would never stay in the same unit again and would have to think long and hard about whether to even visit this property again when so many others...

My wife and I stayed at Castle Kiahuna Plantation and Beach Bungalows Feb 1-8, 2020. The location and grounds are great. Unit 441, where we stayed is up by Poipu Road, as far from the beach as you can get practically, but even so the walk to the beach was reasonably short. Unit 441 is quite dated and was not very clean when we arrived. One of the TVs did not work, the garbage disposal was jammed, the floor had a fair amount of sand left on it, the kitchen knives blades looked like they had been stuck into the garbage disposal, which perhaps is why it was jammed. We saw two cockroaches in the unit during our stay.

The grounds staff were all quite nice, but the front desk staff was about as abysmal as I have ever seen. The young lady who checked us in was coughing and sneezing so badly that she could hardly speak. Throughout our stay, we asked the front desk staff for assistance maybe four times, and each time it was painfully obvious that they viewed us as a bother rather than a customer.

That's the bad. Now the good, and I will also dispel a few negative myths shown elsewhere in some of the reviews. If I were only rating the location and grounds (including beach even though the beach access was under repair due to prior storms), I would rate 5/5. If there are cleaner, more updated units on the property, I would definitely recommend to a friend, just based on the prime location. We are pretty self-sufficient, so the almost total lack of support from the front desk staff didn't hamper us much, it was mainly disappointing.

Elsewhere in the reviews, I saw some concerns about lack of A/C. At least in February, we were totally comfortable with fans only day and night. I've also seen comments about noise from the roosters crowing. Roosters are indeed all over the island, and they do crow all day and night, however, at night the fans provided enough white noise to mask the roosters crowing, so that didn't bother us at all. I've also seen in the reviews complaints about traffic noise along Poipu Road. We were as close to Poipu Road as any unit on the property, and traffic noise didn't bother us one bit.

If I could occupy a more up-to-date, cleaner unit at this property, we would return. We will definitely return to the beautiful island of Kauai, but we will probably consider other properties in the same area looking for more up-to-date accommodations and friendlier...

This review is for building 41, unit 432, 3rd floor. This review is much needed so I'll do some details the owners should have done: First, 10pm-8am quiet time at the resort is real, and we were surprised that we appreciated and liked it (we're 40ish). We will pay more to stay closer to the water next time (and probably do the North side instead of the plantation, but Kiahuna is a nice place and we liked it), we'd absolutely recommend this place and would stay here again though.

Cooking supplies and kitchen fine for cooking (restaurants are expensive in Kauai) and at some point eating out gets tiresome.

Room is very nice, privacy is a bit of an issue at this resort for the larger buildings (as with many Hawaiian buildings), but if you're not spending most of your time elsewhere you're doing Kauai wrong.

Bed is good. The view from the balcony is just trees, nice, but no mountain or beach view would never be possible. It is a 5-10 minute walk to the resort beach, but Poipu beech is only a little farther away.

Cooling may be an issue in Summer, but in the Winter it wasn't at all.

For the budget concerned, this is a good South side option in the Poipu area; first timers to the islands are generally encouraged to start on the East coast, I agree that this is true for most, but it was our first time and we liked it here.

Guests are mostly older, saw few kids, few teens or twenty-somethings. Grounds are lovely and parking is no problem.

This condo has a few issues, photos aren't updated, furniture has been changed but for the better, the place needs art on the walls. The floor is faux-wood and your feet (which should be bare or you're tracking sand in) make squeaky noise, kind of annoying, but, meh, you get used to it. Lighting in the great room could be brighter.

General advice and thoughts for the area: Eat a Puka dog; buy snorkel gear or plan to rent it; take the helicopter flight, 50 minute with Mavericks and buy the video; sail the coast with Captain Andy's; eat at Root; go to the Lilikoi restaurant, sit at the bar in the evening when Liz is bartending, drink Mai Tais, and have someone drive you home; visit the secret beach; watch the stars at night; see sunsets and sunrises; do all the things because You. Are. In. Paradise!

You're welcome...