Beaches Turks & Caicos - I walk you through everything you need to know

I know if you're planning a Beaches vacation, it is not cheap. I want to give you my top 15 things to do while you're planning your Beaches vacation, things to do before you get there, and the must-dos when you're at your Beaches Resort. Now, the first thing I want to do right off the bat, if you haven't booked, I want to tell you the way to get the best room at the lowest possible price. So if you're looking for kind of the entry-level Beaches rooms There are 4, some would say 5 villages at Beaches. This is at Turks and Caicos. So Beaches Turks and Caicos, your entry-level rooms are going to be in the French Village and also the Caribbean Village. There's 2 halves to the Caribbean Village, so that's why some people call— say there's 5 villages instead of 4. But the French and the Caribbean Village, I have individual videos here on this channel that are going to show you those actual rooms, some room walkthroughs. Um, but those are going to be the kind of the entry price points for Beaches Turks and Caicos. Now, at Beaches Turks and Caicos, unlike other all-inclusive resorts, you can stay in any room category, and that gets you access to all the amenities on the property. So it's not like you have to book a butler suite on the water with a private pool to get certain drink packages or certain meals. You can stay in the French Village get the same access to that everyone else gets who's staying over at Beaches Turks and Caicos. Now if you have a large group, a large family, or just looking to splurge, Beaches Turks and Caicos does have amazing luxury accommodations. I would say my favorite two are over at the Old Key West. Uh, this is when you're facing the resort, it's off to the right when you're facing the beach. Um, it's kind of a newer section that used to be owned by another company Beaches bought it a few years back, so it has very large accommodations. They have some of those rooms over there have washers and dryers. So if you have kids, you want to do some laundry, you've got a washer and dryer in some of those units. Some of them are all— are actually little private, like, houses or villas right on the beach with a private swimming pool, with a butler, multiple floors. Uh, they sleep up to 11, and I've got another video here on the channel that goes through some of those private villas. They are amazing. My favorite section, every time I go— I've been 3 or 4 times, uh, just got back last week— Italian Village. It's centrally located, it's got the pool that everybody wants to be at. It's got the pool with a great pool bar. There's music, there's activities right on the beach. It's next to everything. So Italian Village also has butler suites in there. I've got a room, uh, a tour on this channel also, so you can see what the rooms look like over in the Italian Village. Also, another tip before you go to get your kids and family 100% involved in the trip is have everyone kind of pick a thing that they want to do to be part of their Beaches Turks and Caicos vacation. So if the kids want to go snorkeling, you know, they can pick that. If they want to go on a Hobie Cat if there's a certain dinner reservation or dining restaurant you want to go to, if there's a certain spa treatment. So if everybody kind of takes a look at the Beaches website, I've got a link in the description, uh, you can go ahead and kind of pick your favorite things. Now with it being all-inclusive, there are things like snorkeling, uh, there's scuba diving as long as you're certified, and if you're not, you can take classes there. Those are additional. We can go over that in a scuba diving video, but there's— everything's included. So take a look at the Beaches website in the description and have each family member pick an activity that they want to do so they can kind of plan ahead and kind of build the excitement for the vacation. All right, my next step is really basic but really important, and it's going to cost you a lot of money if you forget. So make sure you have a packing list. I will also put one together and create a video on one, but high level right now, right here. Sunscreen. Beaches, Turks and Caicos, oh my gosh. I actually put sunscreen on on my last trip, uh, a little while ago, and I got so fried even with sunscreen because I didn't reapply. So make sure you bring sunscreen. You can buy it there, but it's so much more expensive because everything in Turks and Caicos is brought in. So go to Walmart, go to Target, go somewhere before you actually travel buy a lot of sunscreen and bring that. The other thing is, if you're going to go scuba diving, a good tip, if you can, if you can, uh, have room in your luggage, is bring a wetsuit. If you want to bring a wetsuit, you can rent them there, but that's another thing that's not included that most people don't know about because it can get a little chilly, uh, when you're scuba diving. So those are, I think, $25 to rent, but if you bring your own, then you don't have to worry about renting it. Another tip: book what you can afford. So whatever your family budget is. We— I kind of touched on this when we started the video by talking about the French Village and the Caribbean Village. So take a look at all the different suites, all the different family rooms, all the different dates, time frames, packages, flights. Figure out what's going to work. There's a link to all the latest deals in this video description, and it'll get you set up with all that. And then go ahead and book what's affordable and works for your family budget. Because again, it's all-inclusive. It doesn't matter if you're in an entry-level category or if you're at the top category. They get a butler, but you still get all the amenities at every single category. So all the restaurants, the drinks, the water park, all of that, the transfers to and from the airport at Turks and Caicos is all included no matter what category you book. Another tip, if you have kids that are teens like mine are, you probably are not aware, but, uh, here in the US the drinking age is 21. It is not 21 in Jamaica, where two of the Beaches Resorts are, and then the other Beaches Resort, Turks and Caicos, uh, also it's 18 to drink, uh, in Jamaica or Turks and Caicos. So just to be aware that it might be your first time that your kids are going to be able to drink. So as long as they're with you you can kind of guide them through it. You maybe get some wine at dinner, you maybe get a specialty drink with them, uh, because at 18 is when they can drink over at Beaches Turks and Caicos. I want to touch on allergies because Beaches does an amazing job, uh, with all their menus, all their chefs. Uh, we have copies of the menu, so if you'd like to see those, um, we also have some of the chef's contact information as well as the general manager's. At the different Beaches Resorts. They are phenomenal at taking care of you. So if it's a seafood allergy, a peanut allergy, if you just don't like something that you don't want to eat, they are happy to accommodate you. Uh, contact information is also still in the description. I'm happy to help. I've got a whole team of people that just book Beaches and Sandals, so we know everybody over there. We're happy to give you inside tips on any food allergies or any concerns you have there. Now, Beaches has 20, over 20 dining locations over in Turks and Caicos. That is a lot. I'm going to go over all the different restaurants, but if you have a butler, one of the advantages is that they can book any of those dining locations that you want. So when you first meet with them, usually like every day, you can say, hey, here's what I'd like to try to eat, here's about what time I'd like to eat, and they will go ahead and set that up for you. Or if you have a concierge-level room, you can go to the concierge lounge, or you can call them from your room phone and go ahead and book what you want. Uh, back to the butler— if you have a butler, they will actually pick you up and escort you to the restaurant, get your drinks, set you down at your table, uh, and kind of kick off that whole process. So we did that, uh, on one of my last trips which was nice if the restaurant was a ways away. And Turks and Caicos is spread out, so they bring a golf cart and drive you and your family over there. Um, after a few days, I was like, oh, I know the resort, I think we're good, just let me know what time. You don't have to pick us up, we'll head up, we'll head on over. So it's up to you on what you want to do with that. A little inside tip, I would say over by the Old Key West Village which is kind of off to the right-hand side if you're facing the beach, over by the water, has some really good restaurants. Not to say that all the restaurants aren't great, but some of my favorites are over on the water, over by Old Key West. The first one is Sky. Now, Sky is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. For dinner, it is adults only. I think it's 16 and up for dinner, but you can have kids there for breakfast or for lunch. It is on the top level of a building overlooking the ocean. It is beautiful. In the morning for breakfast, it can get a little toasty. I was there super early. There are umbrellas, but it's still a little, little toasty, a little hot. Amazing breakfast. If you don't want a buffet, there's a lot of buffet areas also that are really good. But if you want like eggs Benedict or a really unique French toast, uh, or some unique breakfast items, uh, brought right to your table, that's what I would recommend, at least for one of your breakfasts or dinners, is Sky. Okay, so Back to the 20+ places to eat. When you arrive, they're going to give you one of these. This will be in your room. This is very important. This little piece of paper is going to have every restaurant, as well as this chart on the back that's going to tell you what restaurant is open on what days. So if they're— if you're only there for 5 days and you want to eat at a specific restaurant, as soon as you get there, figure out when it's open so you don't miss it. Because you don't want to go, oh, we'll go there on our last day, and then realize that it might be closed on that day. So what I'll do is I will put together a link to a sheet similar to this, and I will link to all the menus at all the different resorts. Oh, at Beaches Resort Turks and Caicos, they have the same restaurants at the other— or almost the same restaurants at the other two Beaches Resorts Um, so let me go over some of my favorites first. Cricketer's Pub, late night, if you want fish and chips, you want a Guinness beer, you want to play some pool, the Cricketer's Pub's a good option. Mario's, if you're in the Italian Village, which is where I was the last couple times I was there, it's super convenient because it's a buffet. If you have kids, it's really easy for breakfast or lunch. Everybody could try what they want. It's open almost every day. Some nights for dinner it's a table service, and some nights is a buffet. I've been to, I've been to both. It's really good. Bombay for Indian food, amazing. But my family doesn't like Indian food, so I don't get to eat there very much. Dino's for pizza is the best Italian, like real Italian stone oven pizza. It takes a while. So what I do is if I'm hanging out by the pool, don't be like, man, I'm hungry, I want to go order pizza. Like beforehand, 30 minutes before, go over, put in your order, go back in the pool, and then go back in 30 minutes and see where you're at. Because it does take a while to make one of those pizzas. The Barefoot by the Sea, also close to the Italian Village, right on the beach. Kind of a hut feel. You've got picnic tables, you know, your shoes are off, you're in the sand. Really good breakfast and lunch the last time I was there. Amazing, great options there. Oh my gosh, so Bobby D's is kind of like a '50s diner, so your kids are going to love this. Hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken fingers, sundaes, milkshakes. And they're open like ridiculous hours. If nothing is open, they are like always open. They close at like 6 AM or so. It's, it's insane. I'll have to look and see. Oh, here we go. 11— they're open 11 AM to 6 AM. I was right, 11 AM to 6 AM. So if you're hungry at 5 AM, if you want to go eat some french fries, hot dog, or something, there you go. They are open. Café de Paris, my favorite spot to go get a cappuccino, uh, go get some desserts. Over there by the French Village as well. There's also another Italian restaurant I have not been to in a while. If you have been over there, let me know. The French restaurant, phenomenal. Go ahead and try to book that early. Make sure you— you don't have to have a suit and tie, but you definitely need a dress shirt if you're a guy, like some dress pants, some nice shoes. So bring some, you know, you don't need, um, a tie but you definitely can't go in in like shorts and a t-shirt. So French restaurant, really good. The surf and turf, I think I had that a couple weeks ago when I was there. Lobster, steak fillet, uh, amazing, amazing. Oh, they have these food trucks. Oh my gosh. So they announced this mac and cheese truck and I was like, it's just gonna be mac and cheese. Oh my gosh. It— and they have so many kinds of mac and cheese. Had pulled pork mac and cheese. Oh, so good. It was a meal. I couldn't even eat it all. It is huge. They've got tables out there, little food truck. They've got an ice cream truck too. Um, uh, someone else had like a chicken on top of the mac and cheese, like a chicken Parmesan. It was like a full chicken Parmesan on top of this amazing mac and cheese. It is so good. So if you're hungry, but then you're gonna miss dinner or lunch, but if you want a snack, and then you only eat a little bit of it. Oh, Kemonos. You got to get reservations for Kemonos. Like, I have been to a lot of these kind of Japanese, uh, hibachi, but they sing, they're amazing. It is a little toasty, it gets a little hot in there, so I would definitely dress comfortably. Because you got all those stovetops and you're in the Caribbean, uh, so it can get a little toasty in there. Amazing food. Basically, they give you everything that's on the menu. You just have to like maybe figure out if you want the specialty drink of the day. Uh, they have a couple different dessert options to choose from, but everything else is pretty much just comes if you, if you want it. If you don't want the fish or shrimp or whatever, you can let them know and they won't serve it to you. But Komodo's Great time, especially if you're there with the kids. So get a reservation. You got to get it as soon as you get there. Get a reservation for one of the days for Kimono's. The other thing is, if you like sushi, Soy is right next to Kimono's. It's outside. Great sushi. You can do that before. Maybe you do that before, get a little sushi, then go to Kimono's, or split it up. So Schooners is kind of Sandals Beaches a fish restaurant. They have it at most of their Sandals and Beaches locations. Anything seafood, go to Schooner's, great option. Neptune's, same thing. Neptune's right on the water, uh, as well. Steak and seafood, uh, over at Neptune's. Let me see what else we have. Sapodillas for dinner, absolutely amazing Caribbean cuisine. I had some watermelon salad Sounds awful. It was absolutely amazing. Oh my gosh, one of my favorite, favorite things, the Jerk Shack. A year ago I was there, Beaches, Turks and Caicos. I was there for Hurricane Fiona. I ate at the Jerk Shack, then the hurricane came, and then the next day no more Jerk Shack. Went back this year Almost a year to the day, almost exactly a year to the day, went back. Jerk Shack gone. They have a Jerk Truck right on the beach. It is amazing. When I was there, they were building these little, like, little kind of tent little things so you can sit on the beach in the shade. You get your food from the Jerk Truck. Oh, it's so good. Much better, much better. The shack was way down the beach, like at the end of, like, you, some people didn't even know that, that this resort went that far. It went way down into the pine trees. Now it's right kind of centrally located off the Caribbean Village, right on the water. Jerk Truck, you gotta try it. Jerk chicken, jerk pork, fish festival. They don't have Red Stripe. If you go to the one in Jamaica, they have Red Stripe, uh, or they have the— or if you ask, if you have a butler or a concierge room, they'll put Red Stripe beer in your if you ask nicely. So let's see, I think— oh my gosh, there's even more. Oh, so I think I talked about Sky in the beginning. The only thing with Sky is, again, for dinner, adults only. And, uh, Bayside is the restaurant right under Sky, which is a buffet, which I think is one of the better morning buffets, and it's right on the water, so it's kind of interesting there. Oh, steak. If you want steak at Sandals Beaches Turks and Caicos, Arizona's— I've been several times— great steak, great fish, great sides, lots of cats. So my kids love the cats over at Arizona's because it's like covered, but it's open air and lots of little cats around that will help you finish your steak or fish dinner over at Arizona's. So that gives you a kind of a rundown. Again, very important to make sure you figure out which resort, uh, restaurant is open, when they are open, breakfast and lunch and dinner. And I will put this in the description, uh, and I'll put links to all the menus, uh, in there as well. If they change— hopefully they don't change very often— if they do change, let me know, I will update them. Leave a comment on your favorite restaurant over at Sandals or Beaches and, uh, let me know. Another tip, of course, it's with dining. If you want, because there's over 20 restaurants and you're like, oh man, I'm only here for 5 days or whatever, I want to try all of them, you can do it. You can go to one for an appetizer. We did it. You can go to one for dinner, the main course, and go somewhere else for dessert and coffee. So you can do it. It takes a little bit of time. So I'm not gonna lie. So if you're gonna do that, I would start early and I would kind of plan it out and see how it goes. And some of these restaurants are like a dining experience, so they're not kind of set up for that. But then some of them, sure, you can go have sushi over at Soy as your little appetizer, you can go somewhere for your main meal, and then you can maybe go get a coffee and dessert over at Café de Paris over in the French or you can go to Bobby D's and get some dessert over there. So you can kind of work it out, but it's kind of fun to try that for one of your nights. Okay, I think this is my last food tip. One more, because I love food over at Beaches. So if you want something quick, you got kids, or you just— you're gonna go do an activity and you just need something quick, I would hit one of the buffets. So Mario's over the Italian Village, I was there a lot just grab something quick. So that you can do that for breakfast or lunch. You can also go to like one of the trucks, so the mac and cheese truck, the Jerk Shack truck— Shack truck? Yeah, Jerk Shack truck. Uh, you can go to one of those and get something quick instead of just kind of, you know, going and ordering this full meal and kind of waiting for the whole table service. So that's what I would do. Buffet. This is cool if you have a butler. I have been to Beaches twice with a butler, um, and I'm not a butler person, but man, let me tell you, I can give you— and I'll tell you some of my favorite butlers. I'm not going to tell you here, but if you contact me or one of our pixies over at Pixie Vacations, we'll let you know some of our favorite butlers. But if you have a butler over at Beaches Turks and Caicos, favorite thing to do is have them reserve a cabana for you. It is included, so it's not extra. They will reserve one of the cabanas. We were in the Italian Village, literally the cabana by the pool, just looking down right there was our cabana. It's covered, it has a Yeti cooler that they will put all your favorite drinks in— beer, wines, water, sodas, whatever you want— uh, lounge chairs, table sitting chairs, towels. It's all set up for you and it's reserved. It's got your name on it, so you've got it right by the pool. It is phenomenal, and I'm usually not a pool person. So convenient. If you do not have a butler, I have in my notes that you need to get up at 10 o'clock to get seats, but I would say probably 8. So you got to go down to the pool and you got to kind of scout out your seats around 8 o'clock if you really want to get something that's either in the shade or in the sun, depending on what you're trying to jockey for. So I would get up early and kind of nail down your seats, especially the Italian pool, because the Italian pool is really the most popular one. There's also lounge chairs and umbrellas on the beach, but I've never really seen them full. So I don't think you— unless it's a really busy time of the year, um, you probably don't have to get up so early to get those. So at the cabana, the butler will also come by for lunch. They will take your lunch order so you can stay there. So they went to the Jerk Shack or the Jerk Truck, they went and got some pizzas, they go to the buffet for you, whatever you need. They will bring it back all wrapped up nicely, have it all laid out, bring everything for you. It is absolutely amazing if you're having a birthday for another celebration, they will set that up for you too. Another tip, another little-known insider Beach's secret: if you've been a few times, you will know that there is an activity center. And we were there for the hurricane on one of our previous trips. So what we did is we went to the activity center and we got a bunch of board games and movies on, uh, DVDs, like old-fashioned board games. They have tons of them, and you can check them out— card games, table board games— because if you're going to be held up in your room for at least a day, it kind of gives you something to do. And if you're not, it's, it's fun to have those anyways. So Activity Center over in Turks and Caicos is in the Caribbean Village, kind of centrally located, kind of by the kids club area. There is a building with a little window, and they've got all of that in there that you can rent. It's free of charge. You just sign it out and just make sure you bring it back. One of my best tips, you got to be able to save money on your beaches trip. I'm happy to help you free of charge. There's no cost at all. Uh, I work at Pixie Vacations. My wife and I own it, and we have a ton of Pixies who go to all the beaches resorts, all the Sandals resorts. We're there all the time. We know the general managers, we know the resort managers, We know some of the chefs, we know some of the bartenders. We go a lot. So we are happy to give you all the insider tips we have and also the latest deals. And that's kind of what all this is behind me. These are— let's see here— these are some of the awards from Beaches. So this one here, so this award here is one of them. This is, uh, from Beaches. This is top 10, uh, award for one of the top 10 travel agencies worldwide. I don't know if we're number 1 or number 10, but we're in the, in the top 10. Also, some of the other awards are the number 1 beaches award for the nation, so the United States and Canada, or the number 1 travel agency. We have that award as well as regional as well as Concierge Service and CRC and a bunch of other Beaches and Sandals awards. So we do a lot of Beaches, we know Beaches and Sandals, and we're happy to help you if you need anything at all. Just go into the description, you can book direct, or there's a link in there where it'll give us a quote request and we will— we can call you, we can do it via email. We're happy to help you kind of plan everything out. If you're doing a group or a wedding, we do those all the time at Beaches and Sandals as well. So have a fantastic time if you go to Beaches or Sandals. Again, feel free to reach out, use any of the links you want to get any of the resources, they're all free. And, uh, check out the other videos. We're trying to put together a whole library of everything beaches and sandals.