We started off with our flight being late, but we had no problems at the Cuba airport, getting on our bus and checking into our room. I got exactly what I requested when I booked, a 2nd floor room facing the pool. We were on the Carisol side. Which didn't matter to us. Most people prefered the Corales side. The room was big and clean. We did have some small ants, but not a big deal. Air was great, bathroom was fine and yes the beds are hard. We used the extra blankets under our heads and I always bring an extra pillow. This is a 3* resort. We paid $1729.00 for 3 of us and we got what we expected for that price with the bonous of the beautiful countryside all around us. We walked back and forth the each side to use every thing between the 2 resorts. Yes there is more to offer at Carales, as far as slushie drinks during the day till 5ish, yummy and the 24 hr bar. It takes a couple of mins to walk down the path, but your walking through a field and we enjoyed seeing the mountains around you, the horses, goats and some times piggy's. It was good to have that walk a couple of times a day to get you off your butt. It was a short walk to the beach and the beach is beautiful. It's so nice to take a walk down both directions. If you go down past Corales ( it's just a few mins.) there's a cove, cross the road and there's a beautiful garden to walk through. We met a local there who walked around with us and then we set up a horse back tour. For 3 of us it cost 40 pesos. We were alittle nervous being this is our first time doing any thing with a local, but we heard it was safe and we have been to Cuba 5 times now, different areas. What a wonderful time we had with this trip. We met across the street from the resort and he took us to the Lagoon where we stopped and had a great lobster lunch then continued around the hills for 4 hours coming back to the front of the resort. What a great deal!
The snorkeling is great off the beach. There's lots of shady spots under trees and a cute beach bar. Yes, there is dogs all around, but we didn't find they bothered us. They will follow you around abit and then lay down. We have a daughter who would play with them, but she knows not to touch them. Some of them are in bad shape, sores all over them.
Some bugs were biting people like crazy. I never seen so many people with terrible bites all over them. It was nasty. We sprayed ourselves every night and used Off cream on our legs. We only had a few bites. Beware! This was the worst for bugs. On a happy note we never seen one cockroach on the resort.
We did the boat tour to Santiago Bay. Great trip! Nice snorkeling at Daiquiri bay. The views along the ride were amazing. Mountains all along the coast. We had lunch at the marina then took a bus into Santiago. We did a walking tour through town then bused back to the resort.
We did the Jeep Safari. A must trip for us every where we go. It's the best way to see where you are. Take in the culture and usually have a great lunch. We visited the Botanical garden, drove up the mountain, AMAZING views and climbed the Big Rock! Breathtaking! It's a nice hike up. 400 and some steps. Then went to a coffee plantation. It was educational, interesting story about the family who was there. Don't want to give it all away!! Had the best food we ate all week for lunch at a ranch. Every one on the tour was happy. Then went to a Prehistorical park with life size dinosours. It was really neat. Again another nice walk around. We managed to squeeze in the car museum on the way back for a peso per person. We love old cars and I had knew about this. It was a nice surprise for my husband. It was a great day. We really enjoyed it. Our 10 yr had a great time!
We also went to Baconao Park. We lucked out with this one. No else booked the tour which was a bus tour. So because it was only us we got a horse and buggy ride for the tour. We had a boat tour around the Lagoon then went to the Baconao Aquarium. My daughter and I were the only ones swimming with the dolphins. It was nice. Our personal time! Then we watched the show, checked out the museum and headed back to the resort. It was great.
The food, well, yap not much selection for breakfast or lunch at the buffets. Supper's were better. The pizza's were ok. The Oriental stir fry at lunch was very good! La carte's, the " Grill" was good, the " Cuban" was good and the Italian was terrible, no app. crappy noodles and no dessert! The worst of it was the birds pooping all over the table which turned us off to start with. We sat down at our table to see fresh poop all over the plates. The waiter took them away and felt bad. We were afraid to take our eyes off our plates when we got them. My husband got pooped on the shoulder. It was not a good experience and the food was plain! The one night at the Carisol buffet the birds were crazy flying around. Beware and watch your food. It's open so what can you expect! The drinks were good. Don't ask for any thing fancy because they won't make it. Stick to the basics and you will get plently. I enjoyed cherry licor with cola, " cherry coke" and a few other drinks. The orange slushies with rum is very nice!
Final words, we had a great trip! No thing went wrong. The resort is a nice 3* resort. It was clean, beautiful area, you can find enough to eat, we weren't hungry, service was great, friendly staff, big room, great beach, oh if you go to the disco after 11 the drinks are 1 peso, that was not a big deal to us, however, if you're up for alittle walk you walk over to the 24hr bar load up your mug and come back, we would party till about 2:30am there. We felt very safe walking around off the resort. We liked it here and may come back again. Remember, it's all in what you make it! Don't expect much and you won't be disappointed!

This was our 6th trip to Los Corales and will probably be our last. As mentioned in earlier reviews, this location has gone down hill so badly and as a result, we are not prepared to suffer through another stay.

The food is the same every day with no variety. Cabbage, cabbage and more cabbage. Bones in the soup, bones in the hamburger, bones in the pasta, bones in just about anything you eat. You must be careful. There is little selection of fruit and they no longer have orange juice. Cereal is a choice of one when we left. It's a little thing but it is just one of the many areas that that are deteriorating.

The number of dogs running through and around the dining area is bad. The dogs frequently fight. Guests do not understand that these dogs are filled with worms and covered in fleas as well as a few having horrible open and infected wounds. And some people actually feed them and pet them!!! And some wonder why they have stomach ailments.

No soap or toilet paper in the general washrooms. The stagnant pool at the front of the hotel a breeding ground for wee biting bugs. If you didn't use your bug spray, one is covered in bug bits while sitting at the lobby bar and elsewhere at night.

I have long list of issues regarding our stay and will be addressing this to Cubancan. The rudeness of management is top of the list except for the Public Relations person. She continues to apologize for all the problems of the other departments yet her hands are tied in trying to resolve issues.

Too bad. I would not recommend this place to anyone. This is the resort that Cuba Tourism forgot. Only good thing is the weather.

I travelled to Carisol Los Corales with my snorkel buddy and her husband. We had visited Bucanero last January, so we knew in advance the weather would be perfect, and we were not disappointed. Wonderful, warm sunshine every single day! The bus ride to the hotel was picturesque, and check in went smoothly. We stayed at the Los Corales side and began our week in the 500 block, which we found somewhat noisy at night. The next day we changed our rooms to the 100 block, which was much quieter.The rooms were very nice, although I found the beds a bit hard for my comfort, a usual problem for me in Cuba. Other than that, everything about the room was good. The A/C worked well, although it was a bit noisy but since "white noise" helps to cover exterior noises, I didn't find it objectionable. The shower always had great water pressure and lots of hot water. One minor problem was the transference of noise between bathrooms. You didn't have much doubt about what your neighbour was doing next door, which was esthetically displeasing, since it is a good bet he had the same information about you!

A nice advantage of having two hotels to choose from is using the facilities of both. We alternated between the buffets, and had lunch at the pizza/pasta restaurant at Carisol most days. Good pizza! We skipped the beach restaurant except for a couple of orders of banana fries, since they only had hamburgers and hotdogs on offer, plus a small salad bar.

The buffets were typical for a Cuban 3 star resort. I am primarily vegetarian, and I found enough to eat. Disappointingly, the bread and buns were sometimes stale. Freshly cooked omelets were great at breakfast, however, and ice cream was available most nights. We did the "Grill" a la carte one evening, and it was wonderful! Our other a la carte reservation got mixed up, leaving us looking for an empty table at the buffet an hour after it opened, a task which proved almost impossible. Other than this one glitch, things went pretty smoothly and I was satisfied with the restaurants and service. The coffee bar and the lobby bars were both good and appreciated.

The beach. Nice white sand, if a bit coarse and shelly. Not a swimmer's beach, but very good for snorkelling. The reef protects the beach very well, so even when the ocean is rough it is possible to get in for a swim or snorkel without difficulty. There is a small sandy area where you can take a dip without encountering sea grass, but the rest is mostly grassy and shallow. In the mornings it was usually calm enough to venture outside the reef to snorkel, although we were cautioned about current in the channel on an outgoing tide, since people sometimes run into difficulty with this. It was definitely there, but posed no problem for us, although I would not have wanted to venture outside without fins. The snorkelling was quite good off the beach, and there is the option of going out with the dive boat or the Hobie, or of course with a paddle boat as well. Sailing was excellent, since it was possible to get out on very windy days. We had several memorable sails on the windy afternoons.

We did a walking excursion that included a short boat ride and a visit to a crocodile farm and lunch at the restaurant there. This was quite enjoyable. The walk took us up through the pass behind the resort and down to the lagoon for the boat ride.

I enjoyed my week at Los Corales, and I will be returning to this resort. It is a good option in this area of Cuba.

Well, much to our disappointment Los Corales has gone downhill since our last visit in January of 2011. Very sad indeed. It appears the Cuban government isn't investing money into this resort and it shows. The place is in need of repair. There isn't one 'big' thing that requires repair, it's all the small things that add up.

There has been a lot of staff changes and removal of staff without replacing. We noticed there were not as many security guards looking after the place. There used to be one per block, not sure how many they have now, but not that.

We don't got to Cuba for the food, period, but I have to say, this year it was atrocious. So many people at the resort had stomach/intestinal ailments. Personally, I ended up with food poisoning two nights before we were leaving. It was so bad, the doctor had to be called to give me antibiotics, electrolyte powder, homeopathic remedies, anti-nausea medication and hours before boarding the plane, he put an IV in to replenish my system. It was not pleasant. The doctor and the nurses were fantastic. It put the doctor in a new light for me. There really was a purpose for him. I wasn't the only one needing to have an IV treatment...at least three others that we were aware of. The doctor wasn't aware of the other members of our party having intestinal issues because they were dealing with it themselves with the medication they brought so I can imagine how many more there were that he wasn't aware of. It seems there is a 'don't talk, don't tell' policy about anything negative around the resort.

The beach is still lovely and the pool great.

The room had ants all over the bathroom which was really gross sharing the floor with the ants are the food poisoning made its way through me.

Suggested to the Sunwing representative that at the aiport pick up they need to be better organized. There were three buses wth great confusion what bus we were to take to get to Los Corales. This was at 2:30 a.m. and we're flipping between buses. I also suggested he take into consideration that not everyone on the bus speaks French and that the representative on the bus speak in English and French to explain what's going on. Seeing as we've done this upwards of 7 times, I knew, but there were others who didn't.

Sigh...not sure if we'll be returning, which is sad. We'll miss our Cuban families outside the resort since this is THE only hotel so close to Baccano Village.