Arenas Del Mar Beachfront & Rainforest Resort Member of the Cayuga Collection

Beautiful location and for the most part the service was great. First the pluses ....beach is super and the staff down by the beach was friendly and welcoming and they do a great job of creating safety (lots of lifeguard drills it appeared!) and overall the sense of a lovely vacation feel. There are golf carts to take you everywhere on the property, which is pretty necessary as the property is steep and quite spread out. You just give a call and someone shows up in minutes. Many of the drivers have a great personality, just made it surprising when a few of them seemed not friendly--and for us there was no need to speak English--I was always happy to try my Spanish! Ditto for the staff in the main restaurant--some were friendly and welcoming and a few others were all business and not very welcoming or patient. On with the plus items...the beds are very comfortable, rooms are private and quiet, and the policy of free mini bar snacks (with free restocking) is wonderful! The monkeys and iguanas --and sloths--on the property are terrific. There is a dinner in the beach restaurant on Wednesdays, Sats and Suns and since we were only there for the Wed dinner, I wish that the staff at breakfast had reminded us of it and also, there could be a small guide in the room that would include the beach dinner evening schedule as well as a map of the nature trail --with distances. We wanted to walk it ourselves, without their guide, but didn't have a good sense of the overall length of the trail. There was a little sense that they wanted to encourage us to sign up for their guided (for a fee) walk. The food in the main restaurant was good, but not exceptional and the dinners are quite expensive. The breakfast has many choices and again, it's good but not exceptional--but nice that it's included in the room price. Overall, however, it's a lovely place, clearly the nicest place to stay in Manuel Antonio, but also quite pricey, which you know if you're reading this! Trip.com had the best price by far, at least for November.

We thoroughly enjoyed our 3 night stay at the hotel. The grounds are beautiful and you feel totally isolated. After long hot mornings out on tour it was wonderful to be able to relax at the beach and enjoy lunch on a chaise lounge. Prices for dinner are not cheap, but enjoyable. However after spending $38 on a main shrimp dish, to be charged $7 additionally for rice is something that seemed to be a little much. All of the staff are personable and kind and well trained. They know their guests by name and really aim to please. We enjoyed our ocean view premium suite with the wrap around balcony - to see the sunset there at night and sunrise in the morning soothed the soul!