Best Wing of Kea Lani
 

If anyone is familiar with the Fairmont Kea Lani property, please advise which wing of the hotel may be preferable. I hesitate to ask which "rooms" per se, because we are not springing for ocean view. We actually booked something called a "one bedroom moderate suite" (whatever that is) through Expedia as part of a package. It's the cheapest, but I'm not sure if that means garden view, mountain view, or parking lot view. It's the parking lot view that worries me. I would dearly love to upgrade and will if I'm able to do it for free or cheaply either before or after arrive. DH, the money man, doesn't think it's necessary since we won't be in our room much, but I'm a bit more aesthetic if you know what I mean. I would like to at least be armed with some knowledge of the grounds to avoid the worst of the lot (pun intended). We won't be arriving until well after dark on a Thursday in June and am concerned that only the worst rooms may be left if I don't ask for anything specific ahead of time.

Also, does anyone have any experience with making room requests through Expedia? Is it possible to make specific requests? I think I'm supposed to go through them instead of the hotel unless I wait until I arrive. I know when we upgraded our car rental, we had to go through them instead of Alamo. Thanks so much for any help you can provide! -- Shar

I checked again. A "moderate" suite is definitely a view of the driveway or side of the hotel. Has anyone stayed in one of these rooms? How bad is it? Should I try to get an upgrade? Worst case scenario, I suppose the lowest grade rooms at the Kea Lani are still pretty darn good, considering the pools and other amenities. Still, any tips or comments would be appreciated to help me calm those pre-vacation jitters caused by jumping into sights unseen. -- Shar

Sap, I understand that you don't want to look at the parking lot, but you know, if you book the cheapest room in a hotel, those include the parking lot views (Believe me, I've looked at a few!), and somebody will be put in them. Being at the Kea Lani in itself should be a neat experience, as you say.... but once, at one of our favorite resorts, we booked the garden view (to save $30 night), got there and missed our usual ocean view SO MUCH! We would have changed to an OV except the hotel was fully booked so we had to live with our first choice. ALL WEEK I wished I had opted for an oceanview to begin with, even though the garden view wasn't really bad. Sounds to me like you really don't want to look at a parking lot......... maybe you need to let the money man know how much you'd like an oceanview! I have never been lucky at getting free upgrades myself, so I wouldn't count on that happening. Good luck...... I'm sure you'll have a wonderful time at the Kea Lani!

sap - My family stayed at the KL 2 yrs
ago. We were in a oean view room - which really overlooked the pool and grounds. Lovely! My in-laws were in
a garden view room. They were on the
lobby floor with a patio that looked at
a grass area - and yes - part of the parking lot to one side. But during
our stay when I went to the arcade room
with my son, I saw another lower level
hallway with rooms. It was very dark
and seemed almost below ground. You did
step down a step or two. I would say
that garden view is great - but the level below that I found creepy. Hope
this helps.
PS- You will love the KL. It's a great
place.

We were in the wing above where they fired up the kiawe wood stove to cook pizza's and I was choking from the smoke. The smell permiated through our room and into all our clothes. This sounds far fetched, but it's the honest to God's truth. It's the wing right above the adult pool. We did not care for the Kea Lani because it was all screaming kids and conventions. Somehow we fell through the cracks there and couldn't even get housekeeping to clean our room before the afternoon, even after we spoke to them about it. Room service knocked on our door 45 min after we started our meal to take our dishes away. We were not even done with our wine, but he insisted on taking away what we were done with. If you want turndown there you need to call housekeeping to request it. We did not do this for our first night as we were jet lagged, but they came into our room, turned on the lights, yelled housekeeping and then realized that we were in bed sleeping! She left a pile of towels on the tub, left the lights blaring and was not quiet about shutting the door on her way out. They tried to charge us much more than they were supposed to for our room and it took a good long time to make management understand our arrangements. (too long to explain)

I know most people love the place, but we call it "The White Nightmare". Even the iron leaked black stuff on our clothes. They rectified this by getting us a new iron, but geez, how many things can go wrong within a 24 hour peroid of time to one couple? We are very easy going and were very nice about explaining all that happen to us to management, but the woman we spoke to was very snotty about it. She really didn't care because they had a full house full of conventioneers and their families. Never Again!

Fivestar, you should not have had such an experience, especially in a resort where you pay what you do there. At any resort, things may not be perfect but the management should make things right pronto when they realize there's a problem. I don't think I've heard anything that negative about KL before. Don't think it was like that when it first opened..........

Thank you all for your comments and advice. I finally talked DH into at least looking into an upgrade, only to find that all rooms are totally booked now for those dates. I'll keep trying during the next few weeks, even if we can only get an upgrade for a few of the nights when other rooms are available. As I said before, though, worse case scenario I'll just close the curtains, forget the lanai and concentrate on enjoying the hotel grounds and exploring the island. -- Shar

sap -- if you aren't successful getting an upgrade in advance, be sure to ask when you get there. My experience with the Kea Lani isn't very recent, but we arrived there very late one evening after a long, long flight and delay -- 10-hr. flight from Chicago, plus three hour delay, plus two hours for an unscheduled stop in LA to fix a mechanical problem. We'd booked a garden view room through American Airlines Vacations, but were greeted with some of my favorite words: "We've got a complimentary upgrade to an oceanview room for you...." And that was during spring break busy season.

And re: the upgrade, keep checking back regularly right up until your travel date. If they have a convention in during that time, there may be a room block in place right now, pending confirmations. That should get adjusted closer to the date.

It's a great hotel. You will love it.

Interesting to read all this about the Kea Lani since I just booked us there for our anniversary.
We are in a Moderate Suite, so does anyone know what might be the best way to avoid being "below ground" as jenn mentioned or to avoid being in the wing above the pizza cooking?? I booked through Costco, but would I call them or the hotel directly? Thanks.

I just talked to my friend who stayed in the Kea Lani and she said you definitely DO NOT want to stay in a suite that is near or overlooking a parking lot.
Just an FYI.

I'm resurrecting this thread to ask the same question 3 years later. We booked the moderate suite at the Fairmont Kea Lani (which has a parking lot/limited view) because the difference between that price and a limited ocean view room is $175! Should we be concerned? Of course, I'd much prefer a room with a view, but if it's dark or below-ground then there's no way I want to stay there. Has anyone stayed in any of these suites lately?

We're also looking into a condo at the Polo Beach Club and Makena Surf, but the availability is pretty limited in August.

I'd love any comments about the Kea Lani moderate suites or the condos mentioned above to help us decide. Thanks!

Join the Fairmont President's Club. When we joined, we received a certificate that entitled us to a free upgrade. We used it at the Kea Lani, we booked a garden view and received a partial ov room which overlooked the pool mostly. The ocean was in the far distance.