written by glenc on 20/04/2016
The Reunion Resort is a tricky one to review as most things were really great, but as someone that is a foodie the fact that the food was poor really let it down.
Firstly, the resort is massive if you take into account all the villas and apartments sprawled out. We stayed in the Grande Hotel which was lovely.
We had a privately rented apartment, but you didnt feel too much like a 'poor cousin' by not booking via the hotel direct.
The staff were very good indeed - from the restaurants, to the front of house to the guys on the front doors - all very chatty and helpful.
The actual hotel and facilities were good. It was a shame that the games room was permanently shut as we did have a few afternoons of heavy thunderstorms which would have been ideal times for the kids to have a play outside of the apartment.
The pools were good - we only managed to test out two; the roof top one and the Seven Eagles one. Both were good and it was nice having a bar next to the Seven Eagles.
The grounds were well kept and although I didnt play, the golf course looked good.
There was an outdoor wedding one night which went on quite late and was pretty noisy, but we were on the 6th floor so not a major issue, but I think on lower floors that may have been.
Now to the food. It wasn't horrific, don't get me wrong. Most was edible (with some exceptions). However, it is certainly not 'fine dining'. Definitely not. By any standards. One or two dishes were lovely - for example the calamari was really, really nice - the adults and kids really enjoyed this. However, most other dishes were somewhere between average and poor. We had kids pizzas that were always burnt on top and the bases were of the old style of horrible, heavy, doughy bases, not what most restaurants offer these days (and indeed what they offer in Italy...) of light, crisp and fresh.
The wife and I both had a chicken dish via room service, which was so horrific we had one or two bites each and left the rest. It didnt even look or taste of chicken - I have no idea what it was but looked like some sort of hybrid pork/turkey! Whatever it was, it was truly disgusting for us not to eat it despite being so hungry.
The other dishes we had were just 'OK'. The buffet breakfast was also 'OK' but not up to the standard you'd expect from a 5 star hotel by any means.
The kids menu was really uninspired and included just a handful of very mediocre choices. The wines we had were also not great. We tried two, having asked for something really dry, but they were just about drinkable (one we rejected) and certainly not an asset to the meal.
It's with a real heavy heart that I have to give Reunion Resort a 3star. If I wasn't a foodie I'd probably give it 4, but the fact that food is so important to me / us I can't give it any more than 3.
Nearly everything else about the resort works so well it's such a shame that the food has been overlooked in such a way.
If it was just one meal that wasn't great you can understand that - every place has an off day / off meal - but consistently the food was just average and on occasionals poor and on occasions dreadful.
We ended up eating elsewhere or cooking in the apartment in the end as we couldn't face the dissapointment of the food.
Sort out the food and this is a fantastic resort.