Occidental Arenas Blancas

My family just returned from Arenas Blanca’s and we had a wonderful time and are planning our next visit. The location of this resort is perfect you are foot steps away from down town with many things to see and do. The rooms are clean with very comfortable beds. The staff is extremely friendly and helpful. The entertainment team is excellent and keep you entertained and engaged all day long! Shout out to Régala and Alex for their amazing work. The evening shows are great the performers all do a superbe job!!

This is Cuba, if you are expecting 5 star North America cuisine you are in the wrong country all together, however we packed knowing where we were travelling too and brought the essential condiments out family needed for the week and some favourite snacks of the kids. The food was plentiful and traditional Cuban cuisine. Fresh breads and pastries were amazing lots of variety of veggies, rices, and meats daily. My 2 picky eater kids did not go hungry and always had full plates and every meal.

The wait staff and bartenders are great quick and accommodating. Grounds were well kept and we got to enjoy 24/7 good and drinks and beautiful ocean and beach and clean large pool. Plus we had access to the sister resort amenities as well if we wanted to change it up a little! So we enjoyed the Friday foam party and Thursday night aquatic show.

I would recommend visiting this resort if you’re looking for a conveniently located resort with lots of entertainment, shows, multiple bars, restaurants, pools, beach areas, a spacious beautiful grounds, and amazing staff interactions!

Great place for families and adults alike!!

I just came back from Occidental Arenas. I spent 7 days with those wonderful people.Had an amazing experience Room huge bed comfy 😌 then breakfast delicious. Lunch and dinner delicious so many choices. Not to mentioned drinks and coffee all day long. Thank you 😊 to Neyis,Yalenis, Jose and Arien at the buffet you're the most kind people I ever met. I'll return to Arenas for sure.Thank you.

No issues with the room, good food and incredible beach! People working there are so nice!

Very nice place good location. Only problem i have is the disrespectful and ignorant tourists not everyone but most of them. putting there hands in the food just no respect for others. Cuba is very nice and the people are awsome i will be back

Reading the reviews when I left were all over for Cuba. I was there july 29- august 5.

There was no food shortages, Cuba has never had amazing food but definitely had tons of variety and always restocking trays in the buffet. Typical meats chicken, pork and fish for sides potatoes, rice, pastas etc.

The rooms are clean, the maids are great id suggest going to Dollarama and picking up nylons for the maids along with other feminine hygiene products you’ll end up with better service as they want to share something with you as a thank you. There’s little ants where ever you leave food or anything sweet out, not a big deal I’m not into bugs and we managed. The rooms are a little run down, but what place in Cuba couldn’t use a little update.

The resort itself is gorgeous, well maintained. The beach is easy to get to and super close, snack bar on the beach two a la cartes also on the beach.

The town is always alive, tons to see, they’ve updated the little centre st (calle 62) little places to eat everywhere, places to have drinks/ beer really nice little area.

Renting scooters is not really a thing anymore, there’s new rules and the place by Palma real (near barcello soylomar) only had one, the guy said they’re switching them to electric so there’s not many gas ones around. They also made it so you have to pay 100 on a visa and 26 cash (renting for a week) and even the electric scooters they rent them for 4 hours 15 on visa and 20 cash, maybe that’s normal to some people but it’s weird to me as I used to always pay cash.

Taxis are in full force I would be mindful the horse buggy’s are 10USD EACH person going for the ride, we got swindled into a ride thinking it would be 10 dollars to the market and then getting off he told us that was each not total. If your doing it for the experience then it’s worth it I guess, we were using it to get places and it’s crazy as we paid one of those lemon cabs $5 and they were happy to take us all the way to the of the peninsula way more realistic.

If you’re going to enjoy the beach and the weather Cuba is your best and most affordable choice, this hotel is a great place to stay.

A wonderful week in a wonderful place!!
Just came back from the most wonderful week in Varadero. The reviews are incredibly misleading, Occidental arenas Blancas is a WONDERFUL place to stay. Went for a week on a girls trip and made so many tremendous memories. People coming to cuba must understand the position the economy is in, and that they are going to a country without a whole lot of resources. The food was SO much better than the reviews described. Everything was tasty, fresh vegetables and fruit available every day. You cannot come to cuba expecting a North American experience, but you can expect to meet amazing people and create amazing memories. The workers are some of the loveliest people I have had the pleasure to meet. Peter, Adrian, Christian, and Daliana went out of their way to make our stay special. The rooms are comfortable, and the front desk staff were always there to help us when we had an issue. Seriously everyone we met there was so kind and gracious towards us. If you are coming to stay at arenas Blancas, you must understand that you as a tourist are given more than many Cubans will see in a lifetime, and not only that but they are happy to give it to you. I hope to return there to see the friends we made on the resort, in the meantime I cannot recommend this lovely place enough. Truly a great place to stay if you are looking to experience cuba and escape the Canadian cold. Occidental Arenas Blancas gave us the week of a lifetime, and I would return in a heartbeat.

Great bang for the buck. App $1000ca for a week all inclusive. Cant understand all the whining. Their is more than enough choice of food to find something you like. Excellent coffee and tasty rum. The pool was clean and the staff is a+. Most importantly the beach is amazing. No rocks at all. Just very clean white sand that stretches forever. I could spend all day in the ocean. My wife and I enjoyed taking long walks along the shore at sunset. Just awesome. Dollar for dollar Cuba is by far the best resort destination bar none.

I really loved it here. For the price you can't beat it! All you can eat and drink with a direct line to the beach and only a slightly smelly lobby bar to worry about.

Make sure to explore the whole resort! We missed a live local Cuban band performing nightly. You shouldn't.

It's also close the The Beatle Bar and another place to listen to the locals play. A really interesting way to get immersed in the culture.

I stayed at Occidental Arenas Blancas with a group of 10 people in an Oceanview room from Nov 21-28, 2019.
We absolutely loved our experience here. The staff was very accommodating (moving a few of us around to either get us a better view or get us one King bed instead of two twins). Whenever we had questions or needed money exchanged at the front desk, they were very friendly and helpful. The food was DELICIOUS. I came to Cuba 2 years ago and stayed at Grand Memories. The food there was fine, but nothing memorable. This time around, the food was amazing. We really enjoyed the food at the Mexican restaurant during one of our A La Carte meals. I also really loved the fresh options they had at the buffet everyday (even the snack bar) where you could get fresh sausage or pork chops etc. The serving staff in all of the restaurants and bars are exceptional. The performers and shows were very entertaining and offered so many options since you can use both the Occidental and Solymar facilities. The animation staff were a lot of fun and the games by the pool are worth while (since two people from our group won free bottles of rum). The layout of this resort is perfect, with only a 5 minute walk and you're directly at the Beach (which was PERFECTION). We knew this resort was downtown Varadero, but didn't realize how DOWNTOWN it really was. It's literally within a 5-10 minute walk from amazing restaurants, markets, shops, and nightlife. We had dinner at La Fondue (HIGHLY recommend), and saw the live entertainment at Caille 62 and The Beatles Club. For all of the bad reviews here (which I had read prior to leaving and went into this expecting the worst), you have to remember that it's an older resort. Sure there's faded paint and worn out rooms, but you're truly only ever in the room to sleep. Our maid went above and beyond leaving us notes and ALWAYS gave us new towels etc. To those who received bad service...maybe try tipping next time, because we had absolutely no issues.

I will definitely be staying here again in the near future.

Just a wonderful resort, older but very clean. All of the personnel were friendly, helpful and personable! Great selection of food. Pools and ocean beach were well maintained. Would recommend in a heartbeat! We were there Apr 11-18/18 and are now planning another visit in November
Leendert Spiering & Carol

Beautiful Resorts, all inclusive available.

Completely loved this place! I was there this last week Wednesday-Friday, the staff, the entertainment crew, the management I met on the beach on day also, were ALL phenomenal :). I will be back hopefully soon! Thankyou for allowing me to fall completely in love with the people of Cuba!

We really enjoyed our stay! Room was big and had everything we needed, giant pool, very close to the beach as well. 3 buffet meals a day, with wide variety of dishes.

Cuba will always have it's quirks in a resort, but this one won't let you down :)
Food is ok, service is ok, no wifi other than in the lobby just like all the other Cuban resorts but being close to town is a serious advantage. You won't regret it.

It was amazing, the staff was very friendly. This resort was at the very beginning of the Veradero strip that it was easy to walk into town. Would stay there again when we come back

Service is so good and all workers is very nice hotel is clean and and they doing best to make there guest happy and for internment they doing so many things stage show and much more all over I like it so much 😊

The rooms werent pretty but I mean its cuba so what do you expect but the cleaning people were pretty nice and did a great job and the hotel overall was nice

The fun staff or also known as the animadores are everyday makeing fun game up and are all fit. Best thing is location at the and of the city markets. In Varadero Cuba it's a must to be close to the markets for best prices/and Options....

We were there April 14to22/18 very clean staff so friendly very helpful feels like home nice clean pool easy
Excess to the beach one restaurant very close to beach we enjoyed our vacation thanks to friendly staff
5/5

Nice location, good food, good service, only need French fries.