Review: Marriott’s Waiohai Beach Club (Part 1)

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Out of Marriott’s Kauai properties, Marriott’s Waiohai Beach Club is my favourite. The Kauai Beach Club and Kauai Lagoons both offer different things and each has their own strong points but, as a package, Waiohai wins out for me.

Marriott’s Waiohai Beach Club is located on the South shore of Kauai occupying a prime position on Poipu beach. The bay, while not large, has good snorkeling and the waves in the afternoon make for some good body boarding. But all that is for another blog post. Today I’m going to concentrate on the rooms/villas at Waiohai.

Waiohai was built, more or less, as a large U shape with the mouth of the U opening up to the beach and the ocean. All villas at the resort are 2-bedroom non-lock-off villas so there is a lot of uniformity in the buildings. There are only two view categories at the resort – Ocean View and Island View – so it’s important to understand which views are found in which buildings.

The ocean view rooms are found primarily in buildings 1 and 8 with the remainder being found in building 2 above the lobby (the view from the these rooms is across the pools and bar towards the ocean). All villas in all the other buildings have an Island View designation.

As with all Marriott Vacation Club resorts, you need to get your room requests in early (as soon as you book your week) if you are to have any chance of getting your choice of room. Ocean View owners should, at the very least, request a room in either building 1 or building 8 to give themselves the best chance of a great view and Island view owners should specifically request a room that does not look out on to the car park (or the dumpsters!).

Marriott’s Waiohai Beach Club underwent its ten-year renovations at the end of 2014 and this gave the resort the opportunity to give the rooms and communal areas a much needed refresh (the resort had began to look a little bit dated in the last few years, especially when compared to the sequel buildings at the Maui Ocean Club).

I had seen the plans for the renovations when I visited the resort last August and I had seen the colour schemes that the resort planned to employ, but it was nice to finally see everything come together and to see what the completed project looked like.

Swatches and artist’s renderings for the Waiohai refurbishment

The floor plan of the villas at Waiohai will be familiar to anyone who’s visited a Marriott Vacation Club resort before (they like uniformity!). They’re simple but effective with the two bedrooms and their en suites kept apart by a kitchen and living area and a large balcony or patio overlooking the grounds.

Just like with the Aruba Surf Club renovations, Marriott has gone with a darker wood finish to the units at Waiohai, which I like. I’ve long thought that Starwood’s resorts in Hawaii have a more ‘expensive’ feel to them when compared to their Marriott counterparts and that, at least in part, has been down to the décor in the rooms. Moving to the darker wood finish has helped Marriott close that perception gap quite significantly.

The most obvious use of the dark wood comes in the master bedroom:

This is what the master bedroom used to look like:

Not only have the older fashioned pictures gone from the walls but the lamps, bedding and early-90’s alarm clocks have all been changed too.

And it’s not just the bed surround and nightstands that get the darker wood treatment. The desk and mirrors have been swapped out too.

The improvements in the bedrooms aren’t all cosmetic. The desperate search for somewhere to plug in your electronics has been made a thing of the past with the installation of power ports and USB outlets on the desk and next to the beds.

The bathroom fittings have been updated too with new vanity mirrors adding a more modern feel to the room.

The shower cubicle and the tub haven’t seen much change….but then again neither really need changing so it’s good to see the resort not wasting funds unnecessarily.

The part of the villas that most needed dragging into the 21st century was the kitchen and, there’s a big improvement here too. The cupboard doors may have a similar colour to before but, if you look closely, you’ll they they have been changed for ones with a more modern look. The most important changes has been with the appliances where the truly ancient white appliances have been replaced with ultra-modern-looking stainless steel appliances – and it makes all the difference.

This was the typical Waiohai kitchen up until late last year:

And this is what the kitchens look like now:

The improvements continue through into the dining area of the villas with the ghastly striped seats in the dining area making way for more dark wood and beige/brown seating. And the ‘island style’ lights have been replaced with a more contemporary fitting. The table top has also been changed with the wood replaced with a cleaner and more durable stone surface.

Before:

After:

The refresh continues into the living area where the changes are plentiful:

• The garish red/orange carpet has been replaced with a more modern light brown carpet
• As with the dining area, the lights have been updated.
• The sofa bed (which is surprisingly comfortable) seems to have stayed the same but the rattan/wicker armchairs have been replaced with sturdier, more contemporary chairs.
• The ceiling fan had been replaced ensure it fits in with its new surroundings.
• The television cabinet and tables have been replaced with darker and more modern versions.

Before:

After:

The view from the kitchen gives a good idea of the size of the living area as well as giving a good view of the changes the resort has made to the fixtures and fittings.

Before:

After:

The guest bedroom has also seen a few changes with the headboard, bedding, side tables, lights and TV cabinet all being replaced for newer, more elegant fittings.

The least obvious changes have taken place in the guest bathroom where the only real visible changes have been to the shower curtains and mirrors.

In case it isn’t obvious by now, I love the changes the the resort has made – they’ve breathed new life into the villas. The fittings in the old villas really had reached the end of their cycle and the resort was looking very dated. Anyone lucky enough to have visited the Maui Ocean Club only to then move on to Waiohai could have been forgiven for wondering if both resorts were really in the same vacation system – not any longer.

Just like with the Aruba Surf Club updates, it looks like Marriott and the resort’s directors have moved away from fitting out the villas with ‘island style’ fittings and gone with a cleaner more stylish look. And this is a good thing. I don’t need to see a light fitting designed to look like a palm tree to tell me I’m in Hawaii – I can just look out of my window if I forget where I am.

More importantly, from an owner’s perspective, I expect these villas to stand up to the test of time a lot better than their previous incarnations. The simple style the resort has gone with will not age and date as quickly at the fittings they replaced and that means less cost to owners going forward – I think thats something we can all be happy about.

While the changes to the villas were the major project in the Waiohai renovations, there were a few other changes around the resort too. I’ll take a look a these in part 2 of my review along as well as going over the amenities at the resort for anyone who hasn’t yet visited or who hasn’t visited for a while.

Link to part 2.