Barceló Aruba

Average high rise, horrible food

I stayed at the occidental for my honeymoon. I was married at a different hotel (Manchebo) right before this stay and then moved over to the occidental for the honeymoon. The pool was wonderful. The water was warm, swim up bar had very friendly staff and the drinks never ended. The beach is very close to the hotel and if you didn't plan on leaving the hotel, it was a perfect distance. There was also a bad on the beach within feet from the water which was very useful. They let you rent these rafts to float on ( which very very relaxing) however they needed to be returned by 4pm or they charged you 76 dollars???

I didn't like the hotel as an overall. The beach front view was a partial view (they all are) unless you paid for a suite. That was a huge bummer for me. I paid the extra money to see the beach but had to look OVER the palm trees to see some ocean. The food was HORRIBLE. So bad that on my last night I left the hotel to pay for dinner because I was so sick and tired of th horrible food. For an all inclusive, this is a huge let down. There are much better hotels on ththe island with much better food than the occidental. Wifi: their "free wifi" is only in the lobby and you only get one hour. I had 30 people staying at various hotels and I desperately needed to communicate with all of them to arrange tours etc so I ended up paying an extra 70 dollars to have wifi in my room for the week. Then, it was spotty at best. I had to restart my phone over and over again just to get it to work. (I have an iPhone 6plus, not an old phone by any means) When we checked in, they gave me and my husband honeymoon t shirts, but then gave us a room with two twin beds. This is after they went to check on the room! This is my honeymoon, and you knew it was, but you put is in different beds??? So we had to switch rooms To an even worse view. It was frustrating. The Riu next door was so much better last year. Better food and better views. Same money. I would stay there over occidental any day.