A Few Hours at the Caribe Hilton in San Juan, Puerto Rico

Yesterday's travel day was actually a breeze. We walked right through security at JFK, had a nice lunch at the new steakhouse in Terminal 8, and then relaxed in the Admiral's Club before heading to the gate. We lifted off right on time.

By 7:30pm we touched down in San Juan, Puerto Rico and were at our hotel, the Carib Hilton, by 8pm. Our king room overlooked a lagoon (in the direction of the Conrad). The room was hot so we turned on the AC and went to dinner at the Pina Colada Club. The mahi tacos were excellent!

By this time we were pretty tired and just wanted to go to bed. Alas, when we returned to the room we found it hadn't cooled off at all—the A/C was broken. So we called the front desk and they said they'd send something "right away." Well, that didn't happen and since we just wanted to get to sleep, we called the front desk again to ask for a new room. You'd think this sort of thing never happened before.

The clerk said he didn't have anything else. Hmm. Really. I found that hard to believe. Leonard explained they'd need to come up with a better solution and they finally moved us to a room at the Lagoon Villas next door.

That room was actually very nice. The same as our first king room, but with a full kitchen, sliding glass doors, and a veranda over looking the water.

While the hotel is okay, we're not very impressed with the service.

Service hiccups included...

• the A/C not working and us having to explain to the front desk what we'd consider a suitable solution (i.e., moving to another room, even if it was a higher room category than the one we booked)
  
  
• no direct dial button to the front desk on the in-room phones so you need to call the Concierge first in order to be re-routed
  
  
• the front desk phone ringing 30 times before someone answered is
  
  
• asking the front desk about restaurant options that were open upon our arrival and being told only the bar and Italian restaurant were open (that wasn't accurate)
  
  
• asking the concierge where we could get a meal and getting vastly different info from the front desk clerk
  
  
• no in-room minibar and the vending machine on our floor not working
  
  
• in the villa room, there was only a bedside table on one side of the bed (weird; no where to put my bottle of water)
  
  
• requesting and receiving late check-out only to have the maid knock on the door and look totally befuddled when I said we had been authorized for 1pm late check-out

Yes, these are all tiny things when taken separately but as a whole I believe it represents a management team that's not adequately training the hotel staff—at many levels.

Even with those pet peeves though, this may be the right hotel for some. It's in a good location, the restaurants are varied (and the one we tried was very good), the beach and pool are lovely, and if you're using Hilton HHonors points, you can't go wrong.

It's a large chain hotel so if you're looking for intimacy or something more boutique-ish, you'll need to look elsewhere. Next time we're staying in San Juan, we'll try to book earlier (we booked this room two weeks out and most hotels in and closer to Old San Juan were already sold out) and stay at the Hotel El Convento or the Sheraton Old San Juan (both are much closer to the cruise pier).

We're packing up our bags and will head to Pier 1 East to board SeaDream II at 2:00 pm. Check back later for photos of our morning in Old San Juan and boarding the yacht.

—Andrea M. Rotondo for LuxuryCruiseBible.com