The stay at the hotel was great....maybe the music at the pool was a little loud..but a great blend of music. The room was clean and service excellent....I will return

Please don't read my review if you are one of these weird people that are trying to criticize everything, and want to be treated as kings at hotels, needing attention, and hospital environment.
After spending some time looking at maps and reading reviews about hotels in Ft. L. my wife and I chose to stay for 10 days in Bahia Mar. Good, I found what I needed: 1. within walking distance nice restaurants, 2. bus transportation, (for a few days I rented a car at the airport, by the way, so I am not cheap, bus was just a convenience and fun), 3. Water taxi, 4. Nice staff: the most important for me was that NOBODY WAS BOTHERING ME, perfect! The staff ware just enough helpful as I needed, every time I got the attention and respect that I needed at the desk, pool, concierge, the 2 stores, and other services. I hate pushy people, there are NO pushy people at Bahia Mar, there were just nice and HELPFUL. They are trying to do green, good. The beach was convenient, and not overcrowded. There are exercise platforms on the beach, and the fithess at the pool. Just go from one to the other, a dream. And a good surprise when we arrived was that they did not have the room that we reserved, so we got an ocean front view for the same price. Thanks, we are coming back for our next vacation.

In the past we stayed across the street at the Sheraton Yankee Clipper, (which is great with a private beach) so wanted to try something different and read all the great reviews on this website. Boy were we sorry. When we arrived the front desk people were soooo slow we had to leave and come back later. They looked unhappy, bored and tired. If you want to go to the beach, good luck, you're on your own. They do not have a private beach, you need to go to the public beach and rent lounges and umbrellas which took us back $35.00. But the worst part of it all was NO HOT WATER!!! I couldn't take a shower after spending the day on the beach, unless you don't mind cold showers. This happened everyday for our 3 days stay. We complained and they sent up some guy who said that everyone in the hotel was taking a shower at the same time before dinner so they run out of hot water. We have never run into this at even a 2 star hotel. To top it all off when we received our bill, they made an error and charged us an extra $66.00 for some else's bar charges at the pool. So if you go please check your bill before you leave. With all the hotels in Ft. Lauderdale, there's no reason to stay at the Bahia Mar. It really needs some refurbishing.

I booked a room directly with the bahia mar & requested a room in the main tower block with views if possible & thats exactly what i got -floor 15 with great views of the ocean & marina.very large room with all facilities required for short stay.i would say that the decor & furnishings are tired & dated but everything was clean.
the hotel is in a fantastic position with direct access to the beach & boardwalk.Plenty of good restaurants within a 5 /10 min walk.Im afraid our only regret is that we had only booked for one night on our way to south beach.As our time was limited & we wanted to see as much as possible we decided to take the yellow water taxi which is available 2 minutes from the hotel.This is a cross between a taxi & city tour and was really excellent.We stayed on the taxi for all the stops which took approx 11/2 hrs .They give you all the info about attractions at each stop & city sites in between- all for around $10 each .Arrived back at our starting point and ate at an excellent restaurant right beside the taki rank on the waterThe location of the bahia mar is excellent & i would loved to have spent a full week there.
The only negative is the parking charge for residents -a little excessive considering the large size of the hotel car park.