Going to AC in late Jan. and staying at Portofino. Could I get a few people to list 2 or 3 of their favorite Bars and 3 or 4 Restaurants. Also if someonr can give me the "good and bad" about Portofino.---Thanks in advance

I can't help you with Portofino, we always stay in or very close to town.

Favorite bars would be BC's and Palapa Bar. Also Fido's, when there is good live music, Cannibal's is fun as well. We are never up late enough to hit the discos when they open.

I can honestly say we've never had a bad meal on Ambergris Caye. Favorites include Casa Picasso, Caramba, Blue Water Grill, Papi's, and I love Jam-Bel Jerk, but my husband doesn't love it like I do. Jean

Hi Birdie! We just stayed at Portofino beginning of November and LOVED it. The good things: the staff (in particular the chef, Mo the water taxi driver, Abi (?) the bartender, Dave one of the managers there, and the owners), the accomodations, the food (the quality not the price), and the free internet access. The annoyances(?), don't really want to call it bad because there wasn't anything that was bad: the fact that we had to tell them in the morning whether or not we were having dinner, the pricing of drinks and food, and the mosquitos. I'm sure they do the dinner thing for a reason but sometimes it's hard to know where you'll be that evening (in town, with friends you've met, or at Portofino), but we were able to work around it. This was our 5th anniversary so we splurged by staying at Portofino and were already aware of the prices for drinks and food so it wasn't that big of a shock, until you went into town. Let me know if you have any other questions that I can answer for you.

Oh, I also agree with the recommendations above. We never stayed out late enough to try any of the clubs but still had a blast. DEFINITELY try Papi's! Good food and great people. Oh, and Antojito's (sp?)! Very good! Oh and Elvi's! And Estelle's! Ok, we never had a bad meal either, just try everywhere!

Hammock House to catch the sunset, BC's or Coconuts for happy hour, and Crazy Cannucks for beach bar and conversation (or dancing some nights.)

Hey, Fuzzy_Navel--- What type of cabana did you stay in at Portofino? Any good Spa info?

We stayed in the Sunflower Suite, it's one of the ones up on stilts. From these suites the view is obstructed by the roof of the other cabanas and palm trees. We were a little disappointed by that but quickly found that it didn't bother us at all because we were rarely in the room. Can't help with the spa info. We ran out of time before I could get to that.

Fuzzy the piccies say we don't own them...how much dinero???

I would really like to see them if you can get it to work..

If you can't you can E-mail the pics to me and I can try to post them for you.

Let's see??? Airfare to Belize is running about $500, 7 nights hotel is... I think $1500 will about cover it !

I accidently put them in a private photo album and needed to move them to a public one. I will try to get more of them loaded. Currently working on day by day trip reports. Denny's right! This IS a full time job! I should be getting paid!

View from Sunflower Suite at Portofino

Beach Cabanas at Portofino

I stayed at Portofino in July. I would recommend only staying in rooms #1 or #2. You will be very dissapointed if you cannot wake up and see the ocean - you will only know this if it happens to you. From 1 and 2 all you have to do is lift up your head and open your eyes and the big beautiful ocean is there. VERY VERY worth it. Also, the rooms that are the cheapest are VERY small. We were in a small one....moved into #1.
The picture of the room you see on their website is not what your room will look like if you get the cheapest room.

We never told them if we were going to eat dinner there or not. We didn't know if we were going to be there. I guess this might have pissed them off, don't know, but if we got to drinking down on the south end of the island and decided to eat there, that is what we did. This is MY vacation....... let them figure it out.

The free internet right there in the bar was very handy.

Drinks: bring your own booze, go to the bar and get your mixer in the glass ("Leave room at the top please"), then return to the room and fill 'er up, then return to the bar - if that is where your party is.

Don't forget, they put a service charge on EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!

The cleaning ladies there are very nice; they do their job while talking and giggling and smiling. AT least they did when I was there in July. It was nice to see that.

Malibu

When you say " everything has a service charge" do you mean just the room has a 10% service charge or does all food & drink ordered on site also have a service charge? I was thinking just the room did !