Le Grand Courlan Spa Resort - Review Page 1
Reviewed by Steve & Jill Wooler in February 2004 and March 2008
The 4-star Le Grand Courlan Spa Resort opened in 1994, targeting a slightly more upscale market than adjacent sister-hotel, the Grafton Beach Resort. The hotel flourished, but then both hotels went all-inclusive and somehow seemed to lose their way.
Le Grand has always intrigued us because it clearly has a very firm base of loyal repeat customers – and you don’t get repeaters unless you have something to shout about. Over the years we have met quite a few. We have always been impressed by the very high esteem they bestow on Le Grand.
We conducted our first review of the hotel in 2004. The introduction noted “Boy, were we in for a surprise” and concluded “if our 2004 experiences were repeated, I would have to say that Le Grand would undoubtedly become our favourite hotel on Tobago.”
We therefore looked forward to our second visit with eager anticipation…
Location
The beach-side Grafton Beach Resort is located in Stone Haven Bay on Tobago’s Caribbean coast. The hotel is just a short 15-20 minute drive from the airport.
The mile or two of coastline between Mount Irvine and Stone Haven Bay represents an excellent balance in location terms. The area is just a short hop from the shops, restaurants and facilities of the flat and unattractive built-up sprawl of Crown Point. However, as you move up the north coast road, you start to experience the beauty of Tobago’s lush, hilly landscape.
The Crown Point beaches of Store Bay and Pigeon Point are attractive and popular, but have become over-commercialised and are regularly crowded. The beaches along the Caribbean coast are much quieter and more natural. Other than a few beach traders, these beaches are largely free from any form of commercialisation.
The Shirvan Road, which runs along the lower part of the Caribbean north coast road from its intersection with the Crown Point-Scarborough highway, has become Tobago’s restaurant strip. More than half dozen of Tobago’s most popular restaurants are housed along, or close to, the first few miles of this coast road; all within a 5-10 minute drive of the many hotels, guesthouses, apartments and villas located in the area.
When one combines these factors, Le Grand Courlan has arguably one of the best locations on the island. It is within 15-20 minutes drive of every location in the Crown Point-Plymouth-Scarborough triangle. It is away from the busy Crown Point-Scarborough belt and is ideally located for visits to Tobago’s beautiful northern coastline and rain forest.
Architecture
The hotel is set upon a fairly steep hillside, with the main Caribbean coast road to the front and Stone Haven Bay to the rear.
Your first view of the hotel is a long line of faded dusky-pink buildings, seen across tennis courts and through tall security fences, discretely shielded by bougainvillea and other colourful tropical shrubs. As you pause at the security barrier, you will probably comment on the huge satellite dishes that dominate the front aspect. Have you arrived at the NASA space centre? I still don’t know the purpose of these huge dishes, but at least they take the focus from the mass of building behind, and which comprise the Grafton Beach Resort.
Although the first impression is of low-level buildings, Le Grand is actually a collection of two and three-storey buildings. Being set on a relatively steep hillside, inevitably the impression at the top of the hill is very different from that at the bottom.
The buildings are essentially concrete and glass. However, more individuality of design has been granted to the architectural design than evident at the Grafton Beach. The dusky pink exterior colour with light green highlights is both unusual and pleasing. The buildings look quite “cosy”. The hotel initially appears to be a mass of walk ways, corridors and stairs. It takes a few days to really get your head around the layout, but when you do, you appreciate how much has been so successfully squeezed into a relatively small area.
The hotel is built on several different levels. The main entrance to the hotel is at the top of the hill; the access to the beach at the bottom. Everything else is in between the two. The Front Desk and 
Reception areas are located on the very top level of the main building, with the Pinnacle restaurant half a level down. The bar,lounge and Caribbean Bistro can be found on the next floor, with the main terrace and swimming pool another half-level lower. The spa and gymnasium are housed at the bottom of the building, in what might be described as the basement – until you look out of the gymnasium windows and realise how far up the hillside you still are.
This description may give the impression that guests are in for a lot of hard work. Yes, there are lots of stairs and no lifts (elevators), but they are all very short flights and no able-bodied visitor is likely to find this a problem or even a nuisance. Yes, the resort is not best suited to the elderly or the infirm, but there is a wide ramp leading from the upper Reception level all the way down to the pool level. This ramp provides wheelchair access to virtually every part of the hotel. One room has been specially furnished for the disabled, but the Spa and Gym would be inaccessible due to their ‘basement’ location.
Jill and I love buildings with twists and turns; where one can never see the entire building in its entirety. We like buildings that leave one wondering what is around the next corner. In this regard, we have always felt at home at Le Grand; although I admit that for the first few days I have to tie a long piece of string to Jill’s wrist to ensure that she can find her way back to our room.
Clientele
The Spa facilities at Le Grand Courlan help position the hotel toward the successful mid-40s-plus market. The hotel has operated a “no-under-16s” policy for the past five years, making it the only adults-only hotel on Tobago. I would go so far as to say that making it adults-only was possibly one of the best management decisions the hotel made in recent years. It undoubtedly gives the hotel a certain ‘edge’ over the other upscale hotels on the island.
The hotel was far from busy during our visit – in fact both hotels were seriously down compared to our previous stay in February 2004. Perversely, this made it more difficult to get an accurate handle on the guest demographics. However, I suspect that around 80% of the guests were British. I would also guess that the average age of guests was 45-50, although the mix included the usual range from young honeymoon couples through senior citizens.
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