I won a trip from my church and decided to go to Bermuda. I wanted to visit an Island that was not as popular as people trying to go the the Bahamas, Jamaica, or Mexico. I took the trip during he first week in May '07'.
From all of the research that I did, the hotels are VERY! expensive and I found the guest houses to be a better deal. I found The Little Pomander and thought it would be a good choice for stay.
I read a previous review on Trip Advisor from a guy saying that they were placed in a completely different guest house and how horrible it was. This made me nervous, but I spoke to Pat the owner and let her know the review was out there. When I got to Bermuda, I did not experience that at all!
We were required by Pat to send the flight information at the time we booked the room. At first I thought it was because they wanted to make sure that we were comming. I admit to being a little leary about booking travel with a place that was not a huge establishment, plus the negative review on Trip Advisor. I came to find out that Pat was really asking for the flight information to make sure that someone would be at the guest house to greet you. I was getting nervous on the plane with the whole idea of someone not being at the house because of how late we got in.
Our flight did not get into Bermuda until around 7pm. After going thru customs, which was not bad, we did not get to the guest house until around 8:30. We were greeted by Pat and she was very friendly.
She imediately gave us a couple of maps and took us to Hamilton, that was all of five minutes drive away to take us to get something to eat and to get calling cards becuase our cell phone provider did not have the service available like they promised. Good old T-mobile. We had to have a relative in the states make a big fuss to get our phones on the next day.
The next morning, Pat called our room to make sure she was able to give us the instructions about how to get around in the city. She went over the bus routes and all of the activites that were open on that day. The bus is the cheapest route of transportation. Buy a pass at the airport if you can. You can get to each tip of the island by bus.
Anyway, I had traveled to Jamaica before and I knew not to have my expectations to high for island accomodations. They tend to not have the most up to date accomodations all the time. If you are not expecting the Ritz then you will be more than fine at the Little Pomander.
The house was small and older in style. We ended up with room number 6 I think. It is the room you have to go thru the kitchen to get to. The room had a horrible mildew smell to me. It was likely because it is so humid in Bermuda the circulation may not have been that great in that room for some reason.
There is one other huge suite in the main house that I believe was room number 10. It just so happened that the morning after we were there, the couple that was in that room left. We called Pat and asked for that room and got the better room at no additional charge. I am pretty sure that if we booked the same room with the king size bed initially, we would have spent a little more.You are also only one of two rooms in the main house so you feel like you have the whole house to yourself. All of the other rooms had to be accessed from the outside, rear of the house.
Either way, the room would be worth the upgrade. You get a king size bed, the look of a fireplace, a refrigerator (old but who cares it serves the purpose) and a beautiful view of the harbor.
Pat says you can't use the kitchen to cook because they don't have insurance for that. We cooked spagetti anyway. It can get expensive always eating out. The prices are comparable to eating out in the states. If you clean good enough they will never know. :) Besides if you end up in the house by yourself because the guest are not in the other room, who is going to tell?
The continental breakfast was beagals, juice,milk and coffee in the morning. You get the key to the main house so you really have access to the kitchen all night.
The hotel is close to the end of the harbor so it is the only reason that walking to Hamilton is an option if you don't take the bus. Pat also showed us the short cut to use to get to the nearest bus line. The walk to hamilton was about 15 minutes. We ended up doing this walk many times. We were there for 8 days.
The Island was beautiful, the stay at the Pomander was cool, and we had a great relaxing time. The people of the island are very friendly, so was the lady that cleans the Pomander. The islanders blow their horns and go out of their way to speak to you all the time.
Plan your activities ahead of time if you can for dolphin quest and any massages you try to get. The large hotels booked up pretty quickly for massages. I ended up going to this cool place in hamilton for a hot stone massage. Great experience. Can't wait to go back to Bermuda for another visit.
This review is the subjective opinion of a TripAdvisor member and not of TripAdvisor LLC