La Perla Beach Resort, Zanzibar - Your Beachfront Private Haven

We stayed for two days and two nights at La Perla Resort, and the beach point was our favorite part. The food was delicious and high quality, and the atmosphere was wonderful. Everyone was friendly, and the place felt like home. My wife and I had an excellent visit and would love to come back.

I don't like posting negative reviews, and usually only do it when there's no other way to make an issue heard. We run a small boutique agency and booked seven rooms at La Perla for the first few days of our Tanzania trip. When I arrived, I discovered construction right on the beach, with noise and smells reaching the hotel. I believe we should have been told in advance. I understand the construction was outside management's control, so I'll leave that aside, but I had to apologize to my tourists, who couldn't relax and had to put up with it. The noise continued much of the time, including New Year's Eve and 7:30 am on Jan 1st. The main reason for writing this long review is the manager's attitude. After a sleepless first night, I spent half the day trying to get my AC issue resolved and repeatedly went with him to check the room on the second floor. At one point he slammed the door, as if he'd had enough of making those trips. I also had to check that AC was working properly in every room assigned to my group. Despite his change in attitude, he did help me with that. We then discussed New Year's Eve, and he tried to convince me everyone would go to sleep early and that we had to celebrate New Year early. At 23:40 that night, our group was asked to move a table because they needed it for breakfast, just 20 minutes before New Year. Later, the manager started avoiding me, so I had to ask other staff to get things done. I've never faced such unprofessional behavior from a manager. I travel to countries much poorer than Tanzania, and even in Madagascar people at least tried to help. Here, the manager's attitude was visible to all the tourists, who also told me my name was regularly being mentioned around. When we left, he didn't come out to say goodbye to the tourists. I'm not talking about myself in that case. He also tried to charge me for early check-in, saying it was just for the electricity used. I explained that this should have been communicated in advance, since I would have told the tourists about any charge. At some point, communication felt impossible, even though I've never had trouble communicating with people around the world. The breakfast selection was very poor, and if you stay more than a few days, you get tired of it. There were other things I don't want to mention, but as an agent I had to work hard to keep the group positive while the manager ignored me. I do want to thank the staff, who were very sweet and helpful. This was my third trip to Zanzibar and I'd stayed in several hotels there, but never had an experience like this. On the same trip, we stayed at a hotel of the same price with much better service and happier people. So I don't think the difficulties of doing business in Zanzibar, which the manager kept using as his main excuse, explain what happened. It came down to poor management.

There were seven of us in my family, and we had a lovely time here. We stayed for two days and found it hard to leave after spending so much time relaxing and enjoying ourselves. The staff were helpful and polite, and the food was excellent. It's a peaceful, pleasant place to unwind.

The staff were all so welcoming and friendly, and even offered to play volleyball with us. The chefs put so much care into every dish we tried, and the food was delicious. La Perla beach resort is right by the beach, making it easy to step out for sunrise or sunset. The rooms were clean and spacious, and the resort exceeded my expectations.