Crowne Plaza Phu Quoc Starbay by IHG

I went to Phu Quoc for a relaxing break during the May Day holiday and booked this Crowne Plaza. Although the hotel is a bit out of the way geographically, the environment is superb. It has a private beach, an outdoor pool complex, and you can swim in the sea, play in the sand, and collect seashells. The staff were all excellent. Two things left a deep impression on me: First, a gecko crawled into the bathroom. The front desk and staff were very responsible and helped me resolve the issue. Second, on the second night, I had their buffet dinner and wrote down some small suggestions. Personally, I found the salmon too salty. The chef immediately came over to explain why and then sent me a plate of mango. The next morning, when I saw him at breakfast, he sent me another plate of papaya and mango. This attitude and service are truly impeccable! Additionally, the hotel offers a complimentary airport shuttle service that you can book. I highly recommend this Crowne Plaza!

Full marks from me! The hotel is incredibly clean, and the pool is perfect for kids. It also has its own beautiful, pristine private beach. You could easily spend an entire day here with the little ones. The kids loved playing in the water, and I enjoyed relaxing on the sun loungers. The coconut juice sold at the hotel is also great value for money. The hotel provides a free air-conditioned shuttle bus to 'Da Shijie' (Big World). To get back from Da Shijie, you can either wait for the hotel's shuttle or take one of the external tour vehicles. These can fit up to 6 people and have a fixed price – I think it was 150,000 or 200,000, no need to haggle.

Overall, I'm very satisfied. The environment, breakfast, and service were all good. There were also many families with young children, and we participated in the Kid's Club activities. The beach was nice, with very fine sand, and it was suitable for swimming.

The hotel was a bit inflexible. I realized I booked the wrong dates nearly 10 days in advance and wanted to change them, but they charged a 100 RMB fee. I tried emailing them, but they never replied, so I had to go through Ctrip customer service to resolve it. The overall hotel environment is great. It's just a step away from the beach, and the sand there is incredibly soft. The hotel's swimming pool is also pretty good. However, there were a lot of mosquitoes and bugs on the sun loungers by the pool; even bug spray didn't help. There was an insane amount of chlorine in the pool water. If you're prone to hives, you really need to think twice about booking this hotel. After swimming, I broke out in hives all over my body, so severely that I couldn't sleep and eventually had to go to the hospital for an IV drip. (P.S. I swam at a hotel in Ho Chi Minh City a few days prior and had no issues whatsoever). The room was huge, very spacious, incredibly large. The breakfast was excellent. But I don't understand why there are no Chinese signs? Since they have Korean and English, why differentiate against Chinese guests?