Palm Cay Marina, Resort & Spa

Best place for a great Bahamas boating experience, just beware of the sea gate 8am to 8pm

Our unit at Palm Cay was spacious and modern - three bedrooms and two bathrooms, and we really appreciated the laundry facilities. We also enjoyed the pool, gym and private beach. Our only complaint was the staff and their inconsistent application of "rules" around beach pier access. My adult son and his girlfriend (both age 21) were told that they couldn't access the pier one evening - for no apparent reason (they said it was "closed" - yet there was no signage). However, later that same evening my husband and I sat on the pier with no issue and we saw other "older" guests access the pier with no complaint. The next day, my younger son (age 17), who was sitting with us in the cabana on the pier was told that he had to leave as "children were not allowed". I remarked that the pool sign also states it is "Adults Only" - but includes in brackets (16+), which suggests that the resort considers age 16 and over to be adults. In both cases, we felt that staff unfairly targeted young people, and made our boys - including the 21 year old - feel unwelcome. With a price tag of >$600/night for our stay I expected a more friendly and welcoming environment.

Although this place has an amazing pool bar and beach area, it is pretty far from the condo we stayed in (and we were sold on being beach front/adjacent at minimum). It was a relatively good price for the island from what we gathered looking around, but further from downtown and activities ($100 airport ride when online it said $35-55 avg) and every cab to dinner or Atlantis was $45-55 each way. We had a new condo which was nice for the kids, but we couldn't use one bathroom because the ant problem was so bad. They were all over my daughter's toothbrush the next morning after checkin and we just closed it off after night one. It also smelled terribly upon checkin, as someone had smoked in it prior to our arrival. Housekeeping stopped by with an air freshener and sprayed it around, but we just opened all doors and air it out for several hours and it was much better. Not ideal for non smokers and kids though. All that out of the way, the condo was new and beautiful and having a washer/dryer and kitchen was great. There was a grocery store .75miles away so we walked that a few times and hiked back with stuff that saved us from eating every meal at the pool restaurant. It also had an amazing outdoor gym right outside of the condo, which was great. Nothing like an outdoor workout under the sun! The pools were on the beach at the beach club, and one was adults only (16 and over) but the resort was super family friendly and most of the people there were families. Overall a positive!

The property is well kept and maintained. However, the spa was not open the entire week we were there, they were always out of towels when at the beach, after a 25 hour trip our room was not ready until 7:30 p.m with no hot water to shower. Staff accommodated us with an upgrade, the next day, which we were happy with. Overall, very nice property, not great service from restaurant and beach staff, and far from any touristy things. Hope this helps.