Curtain Bluff - All Inclusive

We’re a little late writing this review, so we can’t vouch for changes since we visited (May 2023). The headline is this is a good but in no way a top notch resort. We’ve vacationed at nearly twenty resorts over the years (Caneel Bay, Little Dix, Jumby Bay, etc.) We wanted to save a bit of money on this vacation, so we took a shot at Curtain Bluff. You do get what you pay for. The good: The staff is generally friendly and efficient. The junior suites are spacious, comfortable, quiet (take the ground and not upper floor suite and enjoy the hammock five steps away on the beach). The beachside restaurant (when open) is terrific. Creative cuisine, good service for a Caribbean resort, and gorgeous water views. Tip: book it before you travel. Incredibly, even though you are a guest you will not eat there if you try to make a same day reservation—and there are just two restaurants. The water sports equipment is free and up to date. We enjoyed the snorkeling trip by boat, though you don’t see much sea life. The beach drink and food service is friendly and efficient. The bad: Like many resorts, if you want a front row umbrella and chairs you have to wake up early and plant your stuff to claim a good spot. The beach itself is clean and the water pristine (unless there is a sargassum seaweed event). The regular restaurant is barely passable. Breakfast there is good and sort of efficient. Since we couldn’t get a dinner reservation on 2 nights at the beach restaurant we ate at the inside resort restaurant. Dinner there is a joke. Tired, mediocre food that reminds you of the uncreative 1950s. It was so depressing that we took a taxi to pay for dinner at the next door resort, Carlisle Bay. Overall we’re glad we spent a week at Curtain Bluff, but we will not be retuning.

Clearly Curtain Bluff does a lot right as the high proportion of return guests testifies. The food is good and plentiful, if perhaps a little uninspired and monotonous. There is nightly entertainment which is good and would be even more enjoyable if there was a kids’ curfew as quite young over-tired children don’t add to the experience in a positive way. In my opinion, the included selection of wines is significantly inferior to those included in other similar places I have stayed and the selection of wines on the wine list is impressive but the mark up compared with typical prices is huge. As the resort is all inclusive it irked me to pay an additional ＞$850 to have a good wine with my meal on just 7 nights of our 10 day stay. The rooms are comfortable and well equipped but due for a renovation. Sound proofing is non existent and the constantly wailing toddlers in the adjoining room disturbed us at all hours, as well as the child bouncing a ball on the floor of the room above. We booked a beach front room opening onto the beach expecting to be able to walk out to swim in the sea …. Sadly it is not advisable to swim on this beach so it was essential to pack a bag of beach necessities, books, etc and walk over to the other beach. We observed several guests reserving loungers both on the beach and by the pool for the day, clearly they can only be in one place at a time and as there are only a few loungers by the pool this is rather selfish behaviour. Pool etiquette : it is great to see children confident to play in the water but for their own preservation they should be taught basic pool safety. Blindly water bombing into the pool without first looking to see if anyone is below you is very dangerous and I’m afraid a quick perfunctory ‘sorry’ for a very near miss that could have resulted in life changing injury doesn’t cut it. There is a small adult-only pool but sadly very little shade to be had around it making it impractical to spend any length of time there. This was our 6th visit to Antigua and I’m sure we will return there.

Not really a lot to say but having visited Antigua and a number of hotels on the Island this is so far the best (not including JB as we have not tried it yet) and requires a revisit to confirm that ! Great location, great staff, good food and comfy well located accommodation combined to make our visit memorable - thank you to all at CB.