Mahina — Restaurant in Marathon

The restaurant was listed as an Italian restaurant, Il Postino, when we initially researched the resort property (which somewhat made sense, with a Mediterranean diet as the theme of the white stone buildings looks like a Greek Island). In between that and when we booked it changed from Italian to Hawaiian theme, which I am not opposed to, but somewhat puzzled by.

When I tried to book the meal, I went directly to the restaurant to book, because OpenTable said they had nothing available.

But, when I went in, the restaurant staff had plenty of openings, booked 3 parties right before me. However, she then made a puzzled look on her face, as if they might not still have room. The fact of the matter was, they booked all the tables INSIDE.

The beauty of this restaurant is a advertised as an oceanside outdoor patio seating under the palms and white lights, which is exactly what I wanted. But, the hostess said, she wasn't sure if there was anything available. I looked and said, not even at the patio, because you could see on here monitor it was completely unbooked at the time. She looked back and me puzzled, and asked for a moment as she went to check on something. She then came back and said it would have to be on the patio, and I was like, yes, outside, that's what I want. But, she said the weather wasn't good and she wasn't booking anyone outside. There was 1 cloud in the sky, and no showers in the forecast.

I said I wanted to be outside by the water. She booked it and said, yes it was outside. She was being coy, as it wasn't out on the sand, but, under this protected patio, with curtains coming down around it to block the sun.

We specifically went there for a sunset dinner on the water, and got obscured view behind a pole, with curtains covering the sun. I asked to be moved out there, and the hostess and waitress kind of paused looking at each other. As they paused, walk in arrivals who hadn't pre-booked kept getting seated out on the sand. It wasn't right that those who tried to reserve in advance got worse service than walk-ins. I was trying to make a scene about it, but my girlfriend just wanted to sit and eat, so we stayed stuck underneath.

The meal was EXTREMELY overpriced for what it was. We had an appetizer of steamed little neck clams, but the things were tiny, less than half the size of what most littlenecks look actually look like. These were more like manila clams, but we asked the waitress before hand & she said littlenecks. She got a flatbread pizza, mostly dough with a drizzle over it and a ton of watercress. I got a poke bowl, which came with the stalest most flavorless saltwater crackers ever. I got an overpriced lobster dish, which was like $60 for a lobster w/o claws. She had a steak. We then split a key lime pie. For that simple meal, $260?!?!?

They had other more expensive offerings, we tried to stay away from. There were also some showy baked fish options, with the heads still on them, but, who in their right mind is paying $60 for a small order of white fish just because they don't clean it and put some flower blossoms on it.

I live in a major city, and drop $200-400 on meals all the time, so it wasn't a sticker shock situation. It just wasn't worth what you paid for.

That brought the biggest problem of the meal. When I made the booking, she wouldn't take the reservation without the room number. I didn't want to give it, because I knew they would try to bill it to the room. We didn't want both charges going on the same card. But, they wouldn't take the booking without it.

When we asked for the bill, they brought the receipt. My girlfriend put her bank card down to pay for the meal. The waitress took the bill, with the card, and then put it back on the table. When she went to sign the receipt, she noticed, they had just charged it to the room, not the card. When we went to get the waitress, she couldn't understand, and kept nodding that it was all set... but it wasn't for us!!!

This tied up our card for the rest...

Staying at the hotel for 7 nights we ate breakfast lunch and dinner at the restaurant. Food was great, service was agonizingly slow but generally friendly, understaffed, and incompetently run. Incredible ocean views. Expensive for the area but expected for a high end hotel.

The incompetence was demonstrated in several ways. First, they seated way more tables than they were staffed to serve. This just made everyone wait a ridiculous amount of time to get service and food.

Second, it was clear that the wait staff didn't have assigned tables. The wait staff was running around like chickens with their heads chopped off running between tables, not knowing which tables to serve next. Our table was serviced by the hostess rather than a waiter. About a half an hour after we sat down one of the wait staff came over and asked if we had been served yet as we were sitting there with no food or drink. Another table with about 8 people at it was getting served by three wait staff while all the other tables sat there with no food or service.

Third, there was one hostess who is a real bear to deal with. We tried to get reservations for the night of our wedding anniversary but she was snobbish and rude about even trying to accommodate us. We chose another restaurant.

I heard from the staff that they were going to remodel this restaurant is a Hawaiian themed restaurant rather than italian. I'm guessing the kitchen needs expanding based on their inability to keep up but I'm not sure that a new thene is necessary. I would put the money into fixing the management of the restaurant rather than...

The location and facility is fabulous! Our dinners were good. I had the grouper dinner and while the serving is small, it was enough for me and it was delicious! Our waiter, Garth, was very friendly and attentive. All the wait staff were friendly but you could tell they were not that experienced. When we go to a fine dining place, we do not like the dishes being taken away until all at the table have finished eating. It only serves to rush what should be a relaxing experience. We had made reservations for 5 people. Also, one of our group wanted Pellegrino and was very disappointed that they had none. When we got there, our reservation was for 4 adults and one child, so they had to make some adjustments to our table. The disappointing thing about our reservation is that they had offered the choice of inside or outside dining, and because of the time of the year, I specified inside dining. However, when we got there we were told there were no tables available inside. Although the dining room was empty, they insisted that they were all reserved, but then we reserved inside dining too, so we did not understand why our reservation for inside dining didn´t make the cut. There was no manager there to talk to about this, so we sat outside where it was very hot. No one ever sat at the inside tables and when we left for the night the inside tables were still empty. There was still no manager for us to talk to about this issue. The place is new and has fabulous potential and I hope that they work out their service...