08/14/2024
🇯🇲Review of Sandals Dunn River. 🇯🇲
🇯🇲We have been fortunate to have visited all of the Sandals and Beaches Resorts on the island of Jamaica, we love this product so much, and even got engaged at Sandals Royal Caribbean. We hadn’t been to Ocho Rios since the Sandals Dunn’s River had its makeover and decided to choose this resort for our 7th wedding anniversary vacation. The resort is located near Ocho Rios, approx. an hour and a half from Montego Bay Airport, we considered trying the new air service into the Ian Fleming International Airport in Ocho Rios, but opted for Montego Bay as it had nonstop flights. Kingston’s Norman Manley International Airport is also an option, an approx. 75-minute ride.
🇯🇲A little about this area ~ Many of the islands’ premiere excursions are within easy reach. You can enjoy everything from nature with activities that include hiking through the forest, visiting the Blue Hole, river tubing, ziplining, exploring old plantations by horseback, finishing off riding in the pristine Caribbean waters, Bob Marley’s Nine Mile, Mystic Mountain, Dunns River Falls and so much more. If you enjoy being active, this part of the island is the perfect location to go to.
🇯🇲Sandals Dunn’s River Resort Highlights
When reflecting about our time at Sandals Dunn’s River, the highlights for us were the food, pools, piano sing-along at night and the great service. The beach is nice, just not that big, but we knew that going in.
We loved the Rum Bar and the unique cocktails at all the resort bars and lounges, the bar tenders are highly creative. There are two pools, which is perfect depending on what mood you are in! Maybe the best thing for us was the feeling of community, the warmth of the staff, and the overall vibe.
🇯🇲Arrival at Montego Bay Airport.
Quick Note: If you want to zip through customs and make it to your transportation sooner, we recommend checking out Club Mobay at the Montego Bay airport. The packages costs are more than reasonable. Once our plane lands, the last thing we want to do is wait in lines. Club Mobay will assign you a personal es**rt to skip immigration, the customs line, grab your bags, and direct you to either the Club Mobay lounge where you can enjoy complimentary cocktails while you wait or if you opt not to use this package, Sandals do have a nice lounge for you to wait as well! We found that they keep the buses going around the clock, so we only had to wait about 15/20 minutes or so. This is where you check in and get your bags tagged. There are also restrooms, snacks & drinks, and comfortable seats.
🇯🇲Another step to get you through the airport a bit quicker is to complete the C5 form online, we suggest approx. 7 days before you depart, otherwise they will guide you to the appropriate kiosk to have you complete it upon arrival, but if you want to save time, do it prior to arrival. Remember, the service to fill out the customs form is free and if a website asks you for payment, it is not a legitimate site. To make it easy for you, this is the correct link to the online customs form you should use https://enterjamaica.com/. Make sure you fill it out 7 days prior to your intended arrival date in Jamaica.
🇯🇲Arrival at the resort
When our bus pulled up to the open-air lobby, they had a team playing music, singing, handing out hot towels and taking our bags, I hadn’t experienced the singing at other Sandals Resorts, so it was a nice touch.
The lobby area is just so peaceful and serene, even when it’s busy with guests checking in and checking out.
Luxury level accommodations will proceed to check in here. Club level accommodation will be taken to the concierge lounge for personalized check-in and tour. We always do the online check-in and put a credit card on file so that we are not wasting time doing that once we get to resort.
🇯🇲Buildings at Sandals Dunn’s River
There are three buildings you will stay in, and each will have a different feel. The Mammee Bay building has been around the longest and it has many rooms with an ocean view from the balcony. Guests seemed to like the Mammee Bay building, as it was closer to the ocean. Still, all the rooms at Sandals Dunn’s River are luxurious and it is a relatively small property, so easy to navigate.
Next is the Travertine main building where the lobby is. It has been extensively remodeled and houses several room categories. Some of the rooms do not have an ocean view, but these are also some of the quietest rooms on the resort since they hear less of the evening entertainment.
New to Sandals Dunn’s River are the first-ever Coyaba Sky Rondovals. They have the Rondoval suites we have seen at other Sandals Resorts, but the Coyaba Sky Rondovals have a terrace that takes up the entire roof.
Last are the Tufa buildings which are completely new and have swim up suites and rooms with infinity pools.
🇯🇲Restaurants
As always, food is a huge part of our vacation. Sandals Dunn’s River hosts 12 on-site restaurants. If you’re staying a full week, this gives you the perfect chance to sample everything at least once.
Quick Note on Dress Code: At Dunn’s River, there are only two levels of dress code that you’ll find at restaurants. Only one restaurant (L’amande) requires resort evening attire. When packing for your trip, you may want to take a look at the dress code for each spot you plan to dine at. Here are the differences in dress code below, taken from the Sandals website:
Resort Evening Attire - Dress pants or jeans for men. Long or short sleeve dress shirts (with or without collar). Dress shoes or sandals. No shorts, t-shirts, sleeveless shirts, sneakers, flip flops, or slippers. No hats.
Resort Casual - Shorts or jeans. T-shirts or polo shirts. Swimwear must be covered. Shirts and footwear required.
Saltaire
A buffet-style restaurant that is open for breakfast and lunch. We mainly ate here for breakfast, but it is a favorite of ours, my husband loved the made to order egg station and as I have an egg allergy, breakfast is always a challenge, and the buffet allows me to select options that I can enjoy. They also have an excellent selection of pancakes, sides, fruits & pastries!
🇯🇲Edessa
This is their Greek themed restaurant. During breakfast hours, it serves a la carte menu items. For me it was all about the avocado toast, for my husband it was the salmon eggs benedict.
Dinner was equally as good. And while service at both meals was a little slower, in this restaurant, the food was well worth the wait!
🇯🇲Hanami
This is the sushi restaurant; you’ll find an array of different types of sushi to sample. There are also a few other things on the menu to sample if you want to stray away from sushi for the night. My husband loves sushi, so we tried this restaurant, I’m not a big fan of sushi so it was California rolls and edamame for me.
🇯🇲Pizzeria Isola
Three words: Jerk Chicken Pizza. This dish may have been our collective favorite at the resort. We came back for lunch most days. Additionally, there’s nothing like spending lunch on the beach with cocktails being brought to you as you peruse the menu.
🇯🇲Jerk Shack
The Jerk Shack is a bit more secluded, found off on the west end of the resort. However, the seating area has an incredible view of the ocean. We found the Jerk Chicken and Festival to be the perfect combination for a laid-back lunch by the ocean.
🇯🇲Cascata
Italian cuisine is always a favorite of ours, so we were excited about heading here for dinner. Because no reservations are required, we ate there on our second night. As always, everything was delicious. Pants or dresses with elastic waists recommended! Lol
🇯🇲L’Amande Restaurant
This is the French restaurant at the resort. I have been to several French restaurants at Sandals, and I feel this is, by far, the best one. It absolutely did not disappoint.
🇯🇲Zuka
This Latin fusion style dining we had heard so many good things about it from all the loyal Sandals fans, that we couldn’t wait to try it. Truly, it was probably one of the best meals ever!
You absolutely cannot go hungry from this resort! In case you do feel like a snack, the self-serve ice cream machine next to Galene, and Blum Cafe which serves lots of sweet treats can keep you going!
🇯🇲Dunn’s Rum Club
Dunn’s Rum Club was the one venue we ended up in every single evening. Most Sandals Resorts in Jamaica primarily use rum from the renowned Appleton Estate. Dunn’s Rum Club has an array of choices to sample, as well as a wide selection of cocktails. In addition to drinks, they also have a small snack menu. There was a room with two pool tables and the bartender was happy to bring drinks of choice in this add-on room. The Rum Club was busy most nights, great music, and lots of dancing. Perfect way to finish the night.
🇯🇲So Many Bars, So Little Time.
The resort features 9 bars hosted throughout different sections. You’ll find bars in the hotel lobby, main plaza, in the Mammee Bay building, by the beach, a swim-up bar in the west pool, and a rooftop bar in one of the Tufa buildings. We loved the cocktails that the staff created here, with it being a smaller resort, having more bars spread around the property made getting and waiting for a drink a breeze. We never waited long, and each place was absolutely unique.
Swim up bars is always a favorite of ours, and the bartenders were amazing. Elaine was the standout staff member here; she worked her tail off and made the best drinks ever!
🇯🇲Activities and Entertainment
This is definitely part of why we love staying at Sandals, Sandals Resorts takes “all-inclusive” to a whole new level. Most all-inclusive resorts typically include food and alcohol. Sandals include so much more.
🇯🇲Beach and Water Sports
Let’s start with the beach. We found that there was plenty of space to snag a pair of chairs near the water each day. (You may have to come out early if you don’t have a butler and want the front row though). There’s a nice pocket of the ocean that’s sectioned off for swimming and drifting around on the circular floats. One of my personal favorite things was the staff walking around the beach offering the drink of the day, always fun to hear about the drink and what its ingredients were.
They have both motorized and non-motorized sports. On the right, you’ll find the Aqua Center behind the pier. This side of the resort is where you can sign up for motorized water sports (basically anything that includes a motorized boat).
The non-motorized water sports included kayaks, paddleboards, and glass bottom boats.
Here’s a list of all watersports included at Sandals Dunn’s River:
Hobie Cats
Kayaking
Knee boarding
Snorkeling
Wakeboarding
Paddleboards
Waterskiing
Scuba Diving
Quick Note: All of the above are included in the resort cost but may not all be out for use all of the time. Additionally, you will have to prove certification to go Scuba Diving. If you are not certified, they can provide a class in the pool for an additional fee. They will give you free lessons on the hobie cats, they let you take it out when you get the hang of it!
🇯🇲Land/pool Activities.
We did see the volleyball net set up by the beach, and there were a few people playing, they had bags set up also. Most of the guests seemed more content to lounge at the beach or pool with a drink. We did take part in pool volleyball, the daily trivia and bingo at the pool bar, which was always a lot of fun. They did also have water aerobics, we never seemed to make it down in time for that though.
Sandals Dunn’s River is also located near Upton Estate Golf & Country Club. Green fees and Transfers are included, but clubs and shoes can be rented for an additional charge.
🇯🇲Night Life and Entertainment.
We enjoyed all the nighttime activities as much as the daytime, but they did provide something to do every single night. When you travel to the Caribbean, Jamaica especially, there is nothing like listening to the sounds of the steel drums, and the In-house Calypso band’s vibrant rhythms certainly had people up dancing and moving like they were in their own world. Our favorite was the piano sing along near the main lobby, there were always plenty of staff members joining in and they all had amazing voices! The Silent Disco was also a blast, for those of you who don’t quite know what this is, basically you receive headphones and can pick between two different DJs and styles of music. The main entertainment in the evening takes place along the beach and boardwalk in front of Laughing Waters Bar, this consisted of a fire and dance show, game shows which of course included guests, word to the wise, if you don’t like to get involved, select a seat towards the back! They also had entertainment outside near the main lobby, during our stay we enjoyed the reggae band and the cabaret evening with plenty of dancing and costumes, again, if you don’t like to get involved, sit toward the back! Conrad was our favorite from the entertainment team, he was full of island vibes and hard not to love! lol.
Another nice touch was in the morning, typically when we were going to breakfast, they had someone playing the saxophone or violin to a track near the eastern pool. Around noon, the DJ takes his place at the booth near the beach and pumps out tracks for the afternoon.
While this resort maybe smaller, they have done an absolutely fantastic job with how it is laid out and how they use water features to tie everything together.
For those that may have mobility issues, this resort is flat and well-laid out. All buildings have elevators and many of the rooms are handicap accessible. There is also a beach wheelchair available, if needed.
🇯🇲Spa and Wellness Services
We didn’t get to experience the Red Lane Spa on this trip, but it is located on premises and open from 8:00 am to 7:00 pm daily. Here, you’ll find several treatments: massages, facial treatments, body treatments and more. Please keep in mind that, while Sandals is a “no-tipping” and “all-inclusive” resort, the spa doesn’t follow these guidelines. All treatments will be at an additional cost and tipping is recommended. We did see several couples getting massages near the pier, the sound of the ocean while getting a massage is the perfect early morning or late afternoon activity, we do suggest reserving in advance though.
🇯🇲Final Thoughts.
This is one of the newest Sandals Resorts, and it gets my vote for the BEST Sandals Resort in Jamaica. And that is saying a lot considering how much I love Sandals Royal Caribbean. Sandals Dunn’s River is a next level resort and is worth all the hype! You have the best of both worlds- fun and active, but not large or wild. In an age where luxury resorts are aplenty, Sandals Dunn's River offers something profoundly unique. It's not just a stay; it's a narrative, a journey of discovery, love, and authenticity, all set against the magnificent backdrop of Ocho Rios.
If this is your first time to a Sandals, Dunn’s River may be the perfect fit! While other Sandals resorts are known for either their beach, nightlife, or activities, Sandals Dunn’s River has a great combination of them all. They also boast the brand-new additions like Dunn’s Rum Club and Blum.
We felt a sense of community at this property, unlike anything we have seen experienced before. Everyone was extremely helpful, and all of the management seemed to be genuinely interested in the guests’ opinions, their transparency shined though.
Sandals Dunns River, You’ll Hate to Leave, I know we did!
🇯🇲Whether you’re planning a honeymoon, anniversary, or just a fun getaway, Destinations Travel Services is happy to help you ensure it’s the perfect experience!
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