Day 1-
Since we booked transfers in advance, we were greeted by Lomas tours just outside the terminal for our ride to the resort. Teal shirts and great signage made them easy to spot, and they had our names and reservation information ready. Fifteen minutes later we were seated in an air conditioned van. The ride took about 25 minutes at 11:30 AM.
First impressions are delightful. We never even entered the main lobby.
Our bags were whisked off for storage until the 3PM check-in time, and we were taken to the Casitas lounge where we were welcomed with a cold face cloth and a bottle of water, and, of course, paperwork. Our room was not ready, but we were escorted to the nearest restaurant for lunch: Kampai, an Asian restaurant.
This southern gal decided to challenge the taste buds and try new tastes during our week here. My prior experience with Asian food has been limited to habachi grill, spring rolls, and I’ve even tried a little sushi. (My sons-in-law can have it as far as I am concerned.)
They brought rice chips to the table. Light, crispy, interesting.
Vegetable samosas and fish dim sum. (The samosas are the puff pastries.) For the meal, I chose Pad Thai. All were pretty tasty.
They even had this cool stand for holding/hanging personal bags to keep them off the floor.
The room is ready and we are given our room keys. Yeah!! Ready to get on my shorts and walk along the beach. Umm, not yet. Our room cards don’t open the door. We are let in, and bags arrive, but after trips back and forth to the Casitas lounge, we find that it is not a problem with the key cards but with the door. (Maybe a battery?) Nope. Maintenance guy #1 checks and says they will need to replace the door. We unpack to kill time. Gotta unpack sometime, right?
The room is beautiful. Closet has a safe and hangers, and they offer to bring us more hangers if needed.
Comfy bed, a table with 2 chairs, love seat, 
garden tub, stocked mini-fridge, flat screened TV (with Fox, CNN, CBS, and info channels in English).
The bathroom has double sinks,
an indoor shower,
and an outdoor shower.
Maintenance guy #2 comes and replaces the lock (not the door) but does not notice that he leaves behind a red sticky mess in several spots on the floor. We think maybe he stepped in some kind of berry or transferred something in from the bottom of his tool kit without noticing.
We don’t really want to use their pretty white towels to clean it up, so we decide to report it to housekeeping during our visit to the personal concierge for dinner reservations. Julieta and Luis are friendly and very enjoyable to work with. My hubby has already researched the restaurants and has a plan, so we report the goo and discuss our options with Julieta. She makes our reservations for the next several days. We also get to select pillow styles for the bed and the fragrances we want in our room. Nice!
We return to our room, hopscotch around the sticky goo on the floor, debate about cleaning it up ourselves -but didn’t want housekeeping to search for reported goo that is no longer there, and head out our back door to figure out the lay of the land.
Yep. That’s our back porch for the week. An outdoor bed, a table and 2 chairs in the shade, two lounge chairs at the entrance of a lazy river that connects with a pool, a view of the ocean, and beach towels.
Before dinner, hubby wants to shower and shave. Ummmm…. no hot water. So …..cold shower and shave, and report the issue to our concierge.
Dinner: Italian. D’ Italia Casitas. About a five minute walk from our casita. Wonderful meal. Really enjoyed my clam chowder and pork tenderloin. Hubby had calamari battered in black ink. Interesting looking food. The only black food I’ve ever eaten was a well-done grilled hamburger. The chef shall remain anonymous.
Hubby said the beef tenderloin was very tasty. Sorry, no photos of dinner. I’ll do better next time.
We return to the room for an early bedtime as it has been a long time since our 3AM alarm. Housekeeping has been there to turn down the bed and leave a glass and bottle of water on each nightstand. Still no hot water, and goo is still on the floor. We use a bunch of tissues to get up as much as possible, but it is like paste, so we sacrifice one hand towel and wash the floor. I feel certain that our concierge reported the issue. Must have gotten lost somewhere between concierge to supervisor to housekeeper.
The last sermon we heard before taking this trip was on patience. Pretty glad this sermon is fresh on our minds!
It’s hard to stay frustrated about much while enjoying perfect, warm temperatures, a constant breeze, and the sounds of the ocean.
For day two, click here.