Amanjiwo is located close to Borobudur. Its a wonderful retreat away from the city, as most Aman properties are. Unfortunately, beyond location, sadly Amanjiwo failed to impress.
Before I elaborate further, I'll qualify that we had a very short stay (3 days) and did not complain about anything till we were asked for our feedback. The GM, Ian, definitely helped to redress the dissatisfaction felt. I really appreciated that. I also need to back up to say that because of our amazing experience at Amankora, we did come to Amanjiwo with equally high expectations.
We arrived on Friday noon. At check in, we were informed that the previous guests have not left, so we would only get our room 2.5 hours later. That was completely understandable, so we walked around the property and had lunch at the restaurant. We did, however, expect the same consideration and reciprocity in this regard, and be offered a late check out in return, since we had already informed Aman of our flight details when the room was booked as well.
Unfortunately, this wasn't the case. On Saturday during dinner, we were informed that we had to vacate our room by 12pm on Sunday, because our room had been allocated to another guest. The lack of hospitality was unanticipated, but perhaps the bar had been set high by Amankora and other properties I've loved.
We did enjoy the hike up Menoreh Hills and the sunset tour to Borobudur. However, throughout our stay and interaction with staff at Amanjiwo (be it on the tours or at the restaurants), they did try to be professional, but lacked warmth and an attention to detail. For example, we noted inconsistency in service levels when dining at the pool and at the main restaurant area. For breakfast, we were not served a bread basket on our second morning, and the same fruit board that we ordered came with an empty pot on day two (it was supposed to contain Javanese honey). Minor details that I would have overlooked if we hadn't stayed at an Aman.
The room was quite dated as its an old property, but the upkeep was acceptable. Nonetheless, an old property also meant the lack of charging points and a few switches that weren't working.
The final gripe would really be the morning call at 4.15am that we never asked for on Sunday. I was slightly disorientated after the call, wondering for a moment if I had missed my flight. Of course, that wasn't possible as my flight was in the evening. It took me quite a while to fall back asleep.
Having said all of the above, all in all, one would still have a comfortable stay at Amanjiwo (hence my positive overall rating). But it probably isn't going to be the best Aman experience you would get. If it wasn't for Ian's intervention (he provided us with another temporary pool suite after we moved out of our room with our luggage packed), my rating would definitely have been 'average' instead.