Hedonism II All Inclusive Resort

April 15 to April 29 We have been to Hedo before, and each year there have been notable improvements. After last year’s fire in one of the guest blocks, there is much construction going on, on those 20 units. Currently the sound of the jackhammers is annoying if your room is in that vicinity (ours was), but they stop construction around 5 PM, and the quiet returns. Because we spend little time in our room, it wasn’t an issue. Rumor has it that they should be finished by the fall of 2024. The construction work can’t be heard from the nude beach/pool, but is annoying at the CO beach bar and the Flame grill during the day. The Disco is also under repair, and the venue has temporarily been moved to the courtyard, for an outdoor theme. The down side here is that there is now no place to have a quiet conversation with a group of friends. Presumably, all will return to normal when the disco construction is complete. Still on the disco theme, it was funny to watch the participants in the silent disco, dancing to THEIR tunes without me, the observer, hearing the music. Looked like a bunch of Zombies gyrating around on a very hot surface, LOL. When I put on the headphones all looked normal once I locked into the channel they were listening too. This is a great idea though, and there are multiple channels to listen too, so you and your friends can have your own music, in a disco (currently the courtyard) atmosphere. Food was better than last year and the breakfast bar even had warming trays for the cinnamon buns, and they were good. The filet mignon at Pastafari was excellent. The filet mignon at the Flame was as well. I would question the crab cakes at the Flame though. They tasted good but, having a fish allergy (BUT NOT a shell fish allergy) I had a slight reaction to the cake. Nothing of major note and it past in a few minutes. Service at both places was excellent and prompt. Harry San has been rebuilt, and is much better than it was. You can actually have a conversation now with the person next to you, without being drowned out by the stage show. Food was excellent, and they ask if anyone has allergies, and cook accordingly. Evening buffet dinner on the beach is nice on Tuesdays, but bring insect repellant. They also have a live mobile stage band playing as well. Nice mood lighting and ambiance. Fridays is the Gala buffet, with just about every type of food you can think of, it was excellent. All other venues are closed on Fridays. Casino night was fun, with the resort giving out free casino chips, for play at blackjack, roulette, craps and poker tables. No prizes to be won, but was fun to play. If you need to practice your gaming skills this is the place to do it. The grounds keepers were busy all day trying to keep up with the falling leaves, so the beach was quiet clean and neat. Smokers however, need to use ash trays more often. The beach was always clean and well groomed. Watch out for sea urchins, as one guest found out, they are active in the inner lagoon. The resort does try to clean them out though, but you can never be sure they got all of them, or that more haven’t moved in. Best to ware water shoes, and don’t walk in the sea grass areas. The resort seems to have stepped up security. While they still have the low-level security at the beach gates, I saw a couple of guards with body armor and military style boots, dressed all in black. They may have had side arms as well, but I did not get close enough to verify that. They tended to watch major group events (foam party at the CO pool for example) from the shadows while the regular guards sat at tables near the beach gates. Everyone had radios, and if anything went side ways the low level guards called in the heavy duty forces, and that happened twice that I saw. And speaking of security, the low level guards were right on top of the people who were wearing clothes on the nude side. You had about 5 minutes to get naked, or leave. These same guards also checked on people’s smart devices to ensure there was no picture taking, and provided a paper sticker to cover the camera lens. Remove the sticker as soon as you check out of the resort so it doesn’t become too attached to the lens, the adhesive is aggressive and mine was difficult to remove when I returned home. They also enforced (although not very well) the no smoking rule. It almost seemed that the rule was more of a suggestion, with guest openly disregarding it. I even saw smoking under the no smoking sign on the back of the stage, on the patio, right outside the main dining area. A table was moved to that location so smokers could socialize there. Each morning the table was returned to it’s normal spot elsewhere on the deck by staff. The resort has specific areas for smoking. The drug dealer who used to sit by the massage shack, is now more mobile, and has to actually walk the beach to ply his trade. We did see one (non vendor / guest) local, removed from the beach by security, so for the most part, they are doing their job. For what it’s worth, Jamaican law states that the beach, up to the high tide mark, is a public place, as long as you are walking on the beach. You are not allowed to stop and set up a chair, unless you are a local and fishing. Presumably that also means people on the beach below the high tide mark can take pictures. We did see people from other resorts walk along the beach, but they were very discreet and did not look up much (no cameras either). The resort now has lifeguards at all the beaches, and safety equipment such as backboards for emergency use. Did not see any defibrillator though, but that doesn’t mean there are none, it just means I didn’t see any. Adjacent resorts still cruise by the lagoon, with guests, with cameras, to view the guests at the Zoo. Although this is not as common as it used to be, and those guests seem uninterested in the view. Bocce ball drew the maximum turnout every day, and made for a long event. The EC's eventually lowered the score for a win, to speed up the game. Couples playing bocce ball typically won 5 Hedo bucks, good for purchases at the resort boutique. Pool games were plentiful, and varied, depending which group was active at the time. In between group games, the EC’s filled in with their games and events. Everybody was welcomed to participate in all games, even if you were not in a given group. Most days the pool was packed to capacity. It would be difficult to do nothing, in the nude pool, during the afternoon. The nude pool was cooler this year than last, and much more comfortable. But the hot tub could have been hotter. Rooms were kept clean and spotless, although we only requested room service every 3rd day. The beds were comfortable for us as were the pillows. David Graham, the new GM was always around the resort, asking people what they thought of the resort, so that makes for good feedback. The stage shows were terrific with Winston doing a get job with the very energetic and nimble cast, but the sound level is excessively high for my liking. Mike in the piano bar is great, with many sign along songs, with Hedo lyrics, but again the volume level is really high. I now bring earplugs with me to lower the DB level and save whatever hearing I have left. Bar tenders are great too, with no cheaping out of the liquor, and yes, we checked the seals on a couple of bottles (with the bar tenders permission) and they were factory original, (it was a question that came up in a conversation at the resort). Red strip is the beer on tap, regular only, no light, and it's not my first choice. I prefer a good Ale or IPA, but it is wet and tastes better than water (slightly). Cold beer at the nude bar was rare. They seemed to have a problem with the chilling of the beer, and wasted a lot of it through foam, while trying to fill my mug. The pools are closed daily for cleaning and chemical balancing, and the nude pool is additionally filtered every morning with an external filter in addition to the regular filtration. Midnight pizza at the nude pool is great and the number of toppings has been increased since last year. One size only and that was about 8 inches. The bar is full service at this time as well, and the midnight nude pool and hot tub is a happening place. The nude pool at midnight now has a Lifeguard. That’s new. Lots of inflatable floats to choose from for just floating in the shallow (at 1 meter, or 39 inches) water of the beach lagoon. Doing our thing on the beach all day and I ended up with about 24 bites over our 2 week stay. They itch, and scratching doesn’t help, it only makes it worse. Next year I’m bring a quart of “AfterBite”, LOL We used a deet spray but it only worked moderately, and because we were in and out of the water, it probably got washed off. The insects are picky, not everyone was bitten, and some had no bites at all. Sadly, I’m a bug magnet, though I wish I was a chick magnet instead. The resort fogs for mosquitoes every night around 17:00 hours. We only ever saw one mosquito in the 14 days we were there. The front desk screwed up our reservation, and had to make a request to have us show up at the lobby desk with passport in hand to reregister, and this was into our second week. The desk staff however were very friendly and helpful, and smiled a lot. The registration form asks if we were celebrating any special occasion, to which we answered YES, 50 year wedding anniversary. We got nothing for that. In past years we got Champagne and a fruit basket, this year, nothing. It’s actually a mute point as you can have all the Champagne and fruit you want from the bar and the buffet, but still, it’s the principal and the gesture. This was visit number 13 for us, and we are already planning number 14.