pleasant stay overall until check-out when the cashier insisted on charging me two nights for a one night stay. finally ironed things out with the assistance of an english speaking russian employee.

good:
facilities are clean and well-kept.
lots of pools and nice room
beach was nice enough -- not spectacular but ok.
the chinese restaurant serves good food but due to insufficient fans, was hot and humid

bad:
most of the employees have not learnt the art of smiling
breakfast buffet will SHUT DOWN at 8:30am sharp. lights+fan OFF and food gets cleared immediately; i saw guests chasing down carts of food trying to get some morsels of food.

when leaving the hotel to catch my train, i was literally stuck in my taxi for 15mins cause no one bothered to manage the traffic in the drop-off area, right in front of the lobby. taxis, limos, vans, vip's cars, -- all squeezing for space there with one lane left to move and that was used for customers unloading their bags! utter chaos and employees were rude when i requested their assistance to manage the mess.

nice place but poorly trained staff makes it an average stay, at best. go with patience.

This is a large resort hotel on the beach in Sanya. I am not really a fan of big properties but this place was well run and maintained, the service was prompt and helpful, and the room was a good size with a mini-bar, flat-sceen TV, free via cable Internet, and sliding glass doors onto a deck. The restaurants and food were really good. The fitness center is a real gym and there are plenty of on-site activities.

After looking at several places in Sanya on the net Howard Johnson was exactly what it stated. I went with my partner and a friend, we had a twin room which we swapped no problems when we got there as there was construction over the road.
The grounds are beautiful and the staff where fairly helpful. (we didnt speak to them much).
Very easy access to the beach and great beach bar.
We stayed in both nights we where there and ate the four seasons cafe.
For westerners I thought it was really good and quiet well priced for the quality of the food, (I wouldn't recommend the soup, very small portion).
The bar was great, (weren't cocktails as I know them BUT they kept trying till they got them right).
All in all I would stay there again :)

The hotel is perfect, great, spacious and clean rooms. Beautifull pools, easy access to the beach (tunnel), several restaurants etc etc. But we wanted more than that, so we were not completely satisfied.
We had some issues with our reservations. At first there was a misunderstanding about the roomrate (our fault), but the staff was a bit irritated by that.
We booked 6 nights, but decided to leave after 4. It took a few calls before they agreed that we could check-out early. The reason we left early was that Sanya city center had not much to offer and to visit the sights on the island would cost a lot of time (km) and money (negotiating with the taxi).

There are a lot of foreign visitors (Korean, Russian) in the hotel, breakfast was also a mix of western, Chinese and other cultures. We had dinner in the western restaurant. If you're not in a hurry, you'll get rewarded by good food. Across the street at the entrance there is a small shop where you can buy drinks and snacks. There is also a bus (line 8) going into town (2 RMB).

If you want to relax, enjoy the pool and the beach and nothing more, than i recommand this hotel. If you also want to do some sightseeing do cultural activities than I would advise to go to another place. Also we liked the HBO movie channel.