Jamaica: Our Amazing Resort

Hello friends! Hopefully you are not sick of hearing about Jamaica just yet, because I am not quite done talking about it. I still have a few things I would like to recap. Selfishly, I really want a record of our entire vacation.

So I already mentioned this, but we stayed at the Grand Palladium Lady Hamilton in Lucea, Jamaica (about 45 minutes from Montego Bay) our resort was beautiful. Really, really beautiful. Everyone did really say that it was the most beautiful resort they had been to. It was HUGE (almost too big, it took us about three days to figure out where everything was) and there were so many things to do.

When we pulled up on Thursday afternoon I’m pretty sure all of our mouths dropped open in shock because of our lobby.

This was pretty much our view as soon as we got off the bus (and the staff immediately greeted us with rum punch, yes yes). The reception is to the right of this photo, and there is a seating area to the left. The entire lobby is open concept, which definitely gave it the awe-factor, because you could look straight out to the ocean. I was in absolute AWE. Sherrie told me she wanted to videotape my reaction as I got off the bus because I was agog as two gogs.

The lobby served as the perfect meeting place for all of us throughout the trip.

Since you got to most of the a la carte restaurants, the buffets, the sports bar, and the disco from it.

And it had interesting things in it, such as a fake fancy dinner table…

There were no actual rooms in the lobby or main resort area, our rooms were all in separate villas, which had about 20 rooms each.

When you walked inside the villa, this is the sight that greeted you:

Beauty beauty, right?

I shared a room with Sherrie and Joanna, and here is what it looked like:

And we also had a pullout couch, since there was three of us.

I was the only one who slept on it though (It was extreeeeemely uncomfortable, so I only did it for one night and we rotated beds the rest of the time). And every room had its own balcony.

But we spent so little time in our room, so let’s talk beaches! Our resort had three beaches, and all of them had unique things that made them fun.

Here is beach number one:

We didn’t swim a lot here because we preferred the other beaches for swimming-purposes (or I did at least, because they had my very fave deep-water swimming), but this was the beach where Dawn and Mark were married. And it did have some good amenities. Like tree forts…

And palm trees!

I love a good palm tree.

It also had the most comfortable hammocks of all time.

I liked to wrap myself up in the hammock like a burrito.

Beach number two, the adult beach or Coral Beach, was probably my favourite, because it had the BEST swimming.

It was a bit tricky to get in and out of the water because there was a bit of a drop off, but once you were in there it was worth it.

We hung out in there for hours and hours. And it was close to the bar, so that was a plus.

(If you can spot Dawn and Emily in this photo, they are trying to get closer to the villa because there was a HUGE domestic happening on the balcony and it was pretty entertaining.)

Coral Beach was good for building inappropriate sand castles also.

And we saw some dynamite sunsets from there…

AND there was a coral reef to the side also, so the snorkeling was pretty good.

Beach number three, called Sunset Cove, was my second favourite, it was a good leisurely time over there.

And we made little crabby friends over on this beach.

This beach was where you could rent all the water stuff, like snorkel equipment, mini catamarans, paddle boats, and kayaks (for free!).

We made friends with some of the Jamaicans who hung out around the boat. They were funny.

The snorkeling was pretty good here also!

Lots o’ pretty fishies…

And scary sea urchins (Emily was screaming when she saw them, because she had a bad experience with one…)

Those are not a fun time if you happen to fall upon one.

The beaches weren’t miles long like Cuba beaches, but they were perfect for swimming and snorkeling, which I think is the most important, so I will take it.

We rented kayaks from this beach and went on a little adventure…

Which was extremely fun, except my kayak partner Blake was not the most sober during our excursion and tipped us over about four times. One time we landed on a patch of coral and I got a little bit cut up… But in his defense, we were in a one-person kayak, so it may have had something to do with that.

While we were out on the kayaks we stumbled across a little private rock beach, so we did some exploring…

I really loved that there were so many things to do and discover right at our resort! I still feel like we didn’t have enough time there.

Alright, pool time. I didn’t spend as much time in the pools as I did on the beach, because you can’t swim in the ocean just anywhere. But the main pool definitely lured me in with its gorgeousness…

The main pool was HUGE!

It was an infinity pool, so you had to kind of jump over a ledge to get to the main area…

And there was no graceful way to get over that thing, let me tell you. Especially not in your bathing suit. You had to kinda launch yourself onto it, and then just fall over to the other side. It was funny to watch people trying to navigate this.

This pool also lured me in with its swim-up bar…

The main pool also had a pretty happening bar off to the side of it that played upbeat music all day long. And a beach volleyball court! We definitely had a few games.

In addition to the main pool, there was the adult pool, right by the adult beach.

But I didn’t really go in that one at all, though it looked very nice.

And then the spa pool. 

(The ladies with Uncle Steve)

There were a ton of restaurants around the resort, including Mexican, Italian, Indian, a steakhouse, seafood, Carribbean, Asian, and several buffets. But I will save those for the food post.

And as for the night life, we had the sports bar, which was right off the lobby and where we would all usually meet after dinner until something else opened.

They had foosball tables, pool, and ping pong in there so it was a fun time. They also had unlimited nachos and popcorn all night long and the most amazing chicken quesadillas. Sometimes I would order them late at night and have a double dinner (so about those pants being snug…)

For dancing, the disco was definitely best.

And it was open until 7am, so pretty much a constant party in there.

Then there was the Infinity Bar, which turned into a club the night of Dawn’s wedding, but was usually more loungey.

With live music!

That pretty much covers the amenities, or at least our hangouts.

I highly recommend this resort! It is the only resort I’ve been to, true, so I can’t recommend any others, but I really loved ours! I will leave you with some other random pics from around there.

Go there!