After our month-long trip to Vietnam, our next stop on the South East Asia tour was Bali. For this impromptu trip, we’ve made all our hotel reservations using only points. We did not spend a single cent on hotels throughout the 3 weeks that we were in Bali.
The highlight of our trip has got to be our stay in W Bali, Seminyak.
W Bali – Booking
For a night at W Bali, the cheapest standard room currently costs about US$452 with taxes and fees. However, as M and I have unused free night certificates expiring by the end of the month, we’ve decided to use them here.
It cost us 50,400 points a night under the PointsSaver redemption which meant we only needed to top up an additional 400 Marriott points on top of the 50,000 free night certificate. This was a great deal in my books!
W Bali – Check in
For our stay, we rode our rental scooter into the property. We could not ride directly to the drop-off point and were told to park our scooter at the bike shed. It was quite a walk away, so we waited for the buggy to shuttle us.
W Bali has got to be the most generous Marriott property we’ve ever encountered. During check-in, the staff gave us the option of upgrading to a sea-view room or a free buffet breakfast for 2 the next morning. Naturally, we chose the buffet breakfast as we didn’t think a better view would have made for a substantially better experience.
Next, she then asked us for our expected checkout time. We told her we don’t have any plans for the next day and she told us we could check out at any time we wanted. We eventually settled for an extremely late check out at 6 pm.
W Bali – Wonderful Garden Escape Room with Balcony
As is typical of points redemptions, guests can only reserve the standard rooms and hope to be upgraded during check-in.
The Wonderful Garden Escape room is huge by any resort’s standards. It can even pull off as a suite in many other business hotels.
As you first step into the room, you’ll first walk through the large bathroom before entering the bedroom.
The decor of the room is a mix of W’s funk, coupled with a blast from the past. Many of the tech in the room are from the early 2000s and they were not updated.
W Bali provides complimentary coffee and tea packets in every room. However, almost everything else has to be paid, unlike what we’ve experienced at Regent Phu Quoc.
The coffee packets were really unique as they were plunger coffees instead of Nespresso machines. They function similarly to tea bags but taste like Nespresso coffee.
Our room had a balcony, but we never once used it. Even though the room was named “Garden view”, there wasn’t much of a garden or a view to speak of. It was mostly the backyards of local houses.
W Bali – Bathroom
The bathroom in the room is huge, with the bathing area separated from the toilet and basins.
Even within the bathing area, the bathtub and the rain shower are located on separate corners. This is the first time we actually felt there was too much space in the bathroom.
It was only towards the end of our stay that we realized that the bathroom roof could actually be opened, turning it into an outdoor bathroom.
The bathroom had a completely different feel as sunlight shone in. Not necessarily better, just different.
W Bali – Amenities
The biggest selling point of W Bali has got to be its iconic multi-terrace pool area. It also connects directly to the beach, though the area is public.
There are plenty of sunbeds and lounge chairs available throughout the pool. Guests of the hotel are free to use any sunbeds or cabanas they like. There is, on the other hand, a minimum spending requirement for the public.
W Bali – Breakfast
As Marriott Gold Elite members, we typically do not get free breakfasts during our stay at Marriott properties. However, at W Bali, the check-in staff gave us the option of a room upgrade or a free buffet breakfast. Without a doubt, we chose breakfast.
Breakfast is served at the Starfish Bloo restaurant.
There is quite a variety of food served here. It ranges from western classics like fried sausages to parfaits, yoghurts and traditional Balinese cuisines.
We initially thought that breakfast ends at 11 am. However, as it was Sunday, breakfast ends 30 minutes earlier than usual for the staff to prepare for their famous Sunday brunch.
If we’d had known earlier, we would have had our breakfast earlier and gone for the brunch session which was dubbed the best brunch in Bali by many publications.
W Bali – Conclusion
W Bali has got to be one of our favourite Marriott resorts thus far. It won its competition right at the start with its ultra-generous late check-out times and welcome amenities.
We’ve also felt nothing but the highest level of service standards from the staff we’ve interacted with. It is on similar levels with the recently opened and highly acclaimed Regent Phu Quoc that we stayed at just a month ago.
Although there are some parts of the resort which feel a little dated, overall it’s a resort we’ll highly recommend to anyone looking to pamper themselves in Bali.
