A couple of years ago spent a week on Maui for our anniversary. We split our time between the Courtyard Maui Kahului Airport and the Wailea Beach Marriott Resort. We chose to split our time between the two properties as a way to save money, while also saving points. As I’ve said before, the Courtyard Maui has a central location that’s great for treks to Haleakala and Hana. The Wailea Beach Marriott, on the other hand, is in the luxurious Wailea Resort. So our thought was to use the Courtyard for exploring and the Marriott for relaxing.
In the weeks leading up to out trip, the Wailea Beach Marriott actually impressed me. Their team was in-touch with me to get details about my trip. An associate e-mailed me requesting flight & companion info, purpose, and to confirm my Platinum Elite amenity. They also confirmed stay & payment details, and offered tips and planning assistance.
Unfortunately, things didn’t remain so positive once we arrived on property. The first issue arose when we parked our car. The parking garage at the Wailea Beach Marriott is two stories. The stalls were really tiny, so it was common to see others parking between two stalls. The upper deck also had no elevator access, so parking up there wasn’t really an option for arrival or departure. Half of the ground floor parking spaces are reserved for valet parking, further constraining available stalls.
Once we eventually found a stall and parked, we headed over to the Wailea Beach Marriott’s large, open-air lobby. We stood in the Elite member line and were promptly helped by a friendly associate. When I originally made our reservations I had booked us into an ocean view room. During our check-in process, however, I was informed that we were upgraded to an ocean front room. Ultimately we were assigned room 7321, which was on the 3rd floor of Hale 7. We were then offered assistance to our room, which I declined. BIG MISTAKE.
The resort itself is VERY spread out. The lobby is located in Building 1, so the trek to Hale 7 was pretty far. Not only that, but many of the Hales don’t have elevators, number 7 included. This meant that we had to drag our bags up the stairs. Near death, we finally made it to our room.
The room was a decent size, with a closet located immediately to the right of the door.
The closet contained an iron, ironing board, and a safe large enough to hold a 15″ laptop. Directly across from the closet was the bathroom, which was partitioned off between the vanity and the shower/tub + toilet.
The shower/tub wasn’t large, but was a decent size. Toiletries were Marriott’s standard issue Thann orange ginger products.
The rest of the room contained the king bed, love seat, coffee table, sitting chair, and integrated dresser + desk with HDTV.
Interestingly, the room’s flooring was tile rather than carpeting. This presented some issues in terms of cleanliness, as the tile often felt dusty/dirty.
The bed itself was decently comfortable, but not among the best we’ve had at Marriott hotels.
The love seat located next to the bed was pretty awful. While it looks comfortable, the cushions sank all the way to the bottom when you sat on them. So in actuality, you ended up sitting on what felt like a wooden plank.
Across from the love seat was the dresser and chair.
The dresser is where the mini fridge, coffee maker, and TV were also located.
To the right of the dresser was an area to use as a world desk, along with another wooden chair.
As you may have noticed from the above pictures, technology is not a strong point at the Wailea Beach Marriott. The phones, alarm clock, and even a/v connection panel were all really dated. The air conditioner didn’t work all that well either. It couldn’t really cool the room effectively, and was fairly loud.
Now about that view… Like I said before, I paid for an ocean view room. Our actual room was an upgraded ocean front room, which is a category up. If our view had a premium view, though, I’d hate to see what the view from the ocean view rooms look like.
While we could see the ocean, it was largely obstructed by trees. Better yet, the grassy area next to our room was home to the Wailea Beach Marriott’s luau.
The noise from the luau was quite loud. Luckily we had dinner reservations elsewhere during the luau.
Besides the noise, mediocre view, lousy furniture, and dated technology, our room had one more issue.
Yup, that’s right, our room had mold in it. Not only is that a potential safety hazard, but it made the room smelly.
In terms of amenities, the Wailea Beach Marriott has a fitness center, a small pool, and a spa.
The pool with it’s cabanas seems to be one of the the property’s top selling point, but I found the area underwhelming. There isn’t any direct beach access either, as the Wailea Beach Marriott sits on a rocky outcropping and not on the beach. The beach isn’t far from the hotel, but it isn’t as convenient.
The last straw for us came at the end of our stay, and was the only service mishap we had. When we were ready to check-out, we called down to the front desk to request assistance. Thirty minutes later no one showed up to assist us with our bags, so we decided to lug our bags down the stairs ourselves. After a tiring trek across the resort once again, we loaded up our rental car and headed back to Kahului for our flight home.
To their credit, when the Wailea Beach Marriott received my Marriott survey response, they did reach out to me. They also awarded me 30,000 points as an apology for my subpar stay. Despite this, I had vowed never to return to this property… Until recently.
I recently learned that the Wailea Beach Marriott is undergoing a top-to-bottom renovation. Not only are the existing public spaces and rooms being refreshed, but the restaurants are being overhauled and new amenities are being added.
The number of pools on the property are being increased, the resort’s single restaurants are now becoming two, etc. I doubt much will physically change with the Hales, but on my next stay, I’d likely request to be assigned a room in the Haleakala Hale, adjacent to the lobby. Renovations wrap up at the end of this year, so we’ll see how they turn out! This is a property I really wanted to love when we stay and was sorely disappointed. But the coming changes look promising, so I’m willing to give the resort a second chance.