Spa and Beach Vacation Guru

Reviewed by Spa-Beach-Vacation.com

After 6 days of pure bliss in Sala Samui Resort, we were a little reluctant to move to Le Royal Meridien Baan Taling Ngam Beach Resort, located on Koh Samui’s secluded and tranquil western coast and a good 1 hour drive from Chaweng Beach. However, we were still pretty expectant about staying in Le Royal Meridien where we had heard of this beach resort's breathtaking views. As the resort was located on the cliff facing the sea, the road leading to Le Royal Meridien was steep and narrow. At all times, the beach resort’s security guard would be controlling the traffic flow as the road was single-laned and could accommodate only single directional traffic.

Check-in

We arrived at the Le Royal Meridien Baan Taling Ngam Beach Resort at about 10 am. We were immediately impressed by the breathtaking and spectacular views from the resort overlooking the Taling Ngam Bay and the Ang Thong National Marine Park. On arrival, we were greeted by Barbara, the front desk officer. She smiled and welcomed us to the resort, though her smile was a trifle superficial and cold. She led us to one of the sofas in the spacious lobby and gestured us to sit down. We handed her our passports and hotel voucher for checking in. While waiting for her to perform the check-in, we were each served with an ice cold coconut. The Food and Beverage manager of the resort, William, came over to welcome us. He was a lot friendlier and warmer than Barbara. He even gave my companion his name card. However, for some unknown reason, he failed to give me his name card. Perhaps, being petite in size, I looked too young to be taken seriously! How discriminating!

After 10 minutes, she returned and informed us that our room was ready. My companion queried whether the room that we were given had twin beds as we had specially requested for them during our booking with the agent. Her negative reply and unyielding attitude had us really unhappy. After persistent request from my companion, she finally agreed to check whether any twin bedded deluxe room was available. 5 minutes passed and she again returned with the reply that the hotel’s reservation department had informed our agent that there was no room with twin beds available and would provide a separate foldable bed instead.

We would have been less upset if the way the message was delivered was in a more apologetic manner instead of as-a-matter-of-fact. There wasn’t even the slightest hint of apology. This to us was totally unexpected and unacceptable especially when it came from a 5 star hotel in Thailand, the land of a thousand smiles!!! My companion was totally flabbergasted!

This was our last day in Koh Samui and we decided not to waste our time anymore with this staff. If any of the management of Le Royal Meridien Baan Taling Ngam happened to read this review, I would really like to suggest that the resort choose locals as their front desk officers, rather than foreigners. When visiting a country, we would like to meet the actual local as much as possible rather than foreigners, who would not be able to provide that cultural experience that a visitor wants.

Ms Barbara brought us to our room and all the way to our room, she tried to make conversation but there was a total lack of warm that we had been experiencing in Thailand. She led us into our room and we were expecting an introduction to the room features from her. However, she seemed to be totally at a loss for words. In the end, I had to ask her where the bathroom is to start the ball rolling. Finally, she completed the introduction and we couldn’t wait to be left alone. Before she left, she informed us that our luggage was on the way and the second bed would be sent to our room shortly. The luggage didn’t come and neither did the bed. We had to make a call to the hotel operator to make the requests again. When the luggage came, the porters did not even helped with placing them on the luggage stand, but instead left them on the floor and left the room. What bad service!

Room

At 65 square meters, the room was huge and spacious. The room came with a king-size bed, bathroom and balcony, TV, DVD player, a sofa, 1 cabinet, in-room safe, mini-bar. The room had parquet floor and there was simply ample space for even another king-size bed. The bathroom had a huge bathtub, a standing shower, 2 sink, a toilet and it wooden windows could be opened to look into the bedroom. The balcony was equipped with 2 deck chairs, a table and 2 chairs. Looking out from the balcony, we had a very beautiful view of the Taling Ngam bay as well as the coconut plantation. The room would have been perfect with the spectacular view if not for the worn-out, despaired look and feel of the in-room furnishings. It looked like they needed refurbishing urgently. Even the leather cushion on the 2 balcony deck chairs looks so worn-out the original white leather of the cushion had turned yellowish and there were already huge patches of yellows all over it.

Swimming Pool and Beach

Prior to having our lunch, we had a walk a tour around this beach resort. We first visited the main infinity pool at the main hotel. The view from the pool was simply stunning! However, we noticed that the deck chairs also looked a little worn-out, just like the ones in our room. As the beach is quite a long way from our room, we took a buggy ride to the resort’s beach. The sand at Le Royal Meridien’s beach cannot be considered as white nor is the sand powdery. The view though was stunning.

Restaurant

After a short tour of the resort, it was time for lunch and after looking at the menu at the Promenade Restaurant, we decided to have lunch at the Lom Talay instead.

At the Lom Talay restaurant, we were served by a waitress who though polite, looked rather tired and overworked. She took our order duck curry with rice and egg noodle curry. Both dishes were really tasty and delicious but a little bit spicy. Like the second bed and luggage, reminders were needed before our glasses of ice water were refilled. There were only 3 tables occupied and the waitresses seems unable to cope. In general, the Le Royal Meridien Baan Taling Ngam seem to be under-staffed.

Check-out

On the second day morning, we were due for a 9:30 am flight out of Samui and had to check out very early in the morning. After packing, we made a call to the operator to request for assistance in bringing the luggage down to the lobby. The porter came within 5 minutes. However, together with the porter was a lady who sole purpose was to check whether we had consumed anything from the mini-bar. We were shocked by this gesture on the part of Le Royal Meridien. We were both frequent travelers and had never encountered such behavior before. It was totally unprofessional with complete lack of tact and customer service. This should not be done while the guests were still in the room. All in all, our experience with Le Royal Meridien was totally unpleasant and we would definitely note want to be back again!

If you would like to see a list of other Koh Samui Hotels, click here.