Apparently a lot of you saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall. After I posted about us
visiting Turtle Bay Resort to check out all the things from the movie, I got a whole bunch of questions from people who were wondering about the resort. Well I'm nothing if not helpful (actually I'm very rarely helpful), so I'm here to answer those questions. Except the ones about pineapple. I'm ignoring the questions about pineapple. And alcohol. I don't drink so I can't really tell you about the bar (plus they serve pineapple juice there). Let's skip the surfing questions too, as that's a bit of a sore spot. So let's see, that leaves....ummm....nope....*shuffle*....more pineapple....Ah! Here we go..."Did you see turtles?" Sounds like somebody wants to know about the room!
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| Two Queen add-on room for the Pikake Suite. |
I mentioned in the other post that the rooms from the movie looked fantastic. I'm sure they really are, but for our family they were either too small (the Beachfront Cottages) or too expensive (the Presidential Suite). We had to settle for a two bedroom Pikake Suite, which believe me, they didn't use to film anything for the movie.
Our Pikake suite was located at the end of the hall on the second floor. I should have thought twice about it when they told me the room would be on the second floor, but they assured me several times that the room had gorgeous views. They were kind of telling the truth, as if you looked to your left you could see out over the ocean. To enjoy the view straight out however, I would have had to chainsaw quite a few palm trees that were taller than our room, thus blocking most of the view. Somehow I'm thinking that might not have endeared me to management.
The two bedroom Pikake Suite is two separate rooms, one with two queen beds and the Pikake Suite itself which has a king bed and a huge sitting area with a couch and two chairs. The two queen room is just an add-on that makes it a two bedroom suite, and you can reserve just the Pikake suite side of the room. The two queen room was reasonably nice, and would compare to what you would find in most other mid-range hotels. The Pikake Suite itself, looked like they ran out of furniture budget before they got to the end of the hall. The room was really quite large, but there was a ton of empty space, and it looked kind of thrown together. For instance, while I appreciated having a little beer fridge, the fact that you had to bring in a side table to put it on up against the wall definitely makes it look like an afterthought. It also seemed a little strange that there was absolutely nothing on the wall, except for two small pictures over the bed. Essentially it resembled a college apartment - a couch, two chairs, a TV and a beer fridge - every morning I woke up and felt like I was late for class.
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| Our college dorm room...I mean Pikake Suite sitting area. |
The worst part about the room however, was the bathroom. The add-on room had a normal bathroom, a little small but decent enough. The Pikake suite however, had what I have to imagine was a handicapped washroom. It was huge, but felt like a college locker room, as everything was tiled and the sink, toilet and shower were separated only by a wall what was open to walk around. It was also in need of a good cleaning, as you could easily see grime and what looked like mold building up on the tiles.
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| King bed in the Pikake Suite. |
Of course once you got outside (and looked left), you could see what you were paying for. Our room may have had a limited view of the ocean, but the part it looked at was directly where the sun set each night. Better yet, it looked right over the main surfing spot for the resort. If you want to feel like you're away on a Hawaiian vacation, then sit on your balcony and watch surfers go in and out on some pretty sizeable waves. If you're done feeling like you're on a Hawaiian vacation, and you just want some entertainment, then watch the surfing school lessons. This is where the hotel is perfectly situated, as you have a great vantage point to watch the surfing novices, but you're just far enough away that you can't hear them. We went for a walk down in the area later, and believe me, huge wipeouts aren't followed by the phrase "Oh shoot!"
Overall, we were pretty disappointed with the room. This isn't a cheap resort to stay at, yet the rooms look like they haven't been updated in a long time. I suppose in all fairness their hands may have been tied, as the property was going through a bankruptcy procedure at the time of our stay, but they certainly weren't offering reduced rates because of it. It's a shame that a resort in such a beautiful location doesn't have fantastic rooms, but it did allow for a moment of connection with the movie that brought us here. When Jason Segel tried to check-in at the resort, only to be told that the only room available was $6,000 a night - that may have been as close to telling the truth as the movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall got.
Oh, and for the original question....the turtles were
here.
