Almond Beach Village, Heywoods, St. Peter, in the north of the island, was an all-inclusive 4 star hotel, built in 1975.
Located on 32 acres of a former sugar plantation, with a mile long sandy beach, it offered its guests 395 rooms, several restaurants, six interlocking pools, spa, gym and water sports, as well as other upscale amenities. A complete package....a real village that had everything. There was no need for the guests to leave the property...the all inclusive, great value for your money hotel.
It's main restaurant, The Horizon, even served a British-styled high tea every afternoon.
The hotel ran into financial difficulty a while ago, and it was closed on April 30, 2012, after huge losses and negative cash flows. Loan arrangements to help the property get back on its feet were canceled by the lending institution, and staff members were sent home. The hotel has sat there until now.
To this end, an auction sale was advertised for the sale of all the hotel's assets, in an attempt to recover some of its losses and satisfy the shareholders whose equity had gone to naught.
Saturday, being girls day out, we headed north to check out the sale.
What a big mistake!
Cars and vehicles parked higglety-pigglety on the highway.
This should have been our first indication of the utter confusion on the inside.
This should have been our first indication of the utter confusion on the inside.
Headed in
Boxes everywhere and TONS of people EVERYWHERE.
I have never ever seen so many people at an auction sale.
All manner of beach water sport equipment....hobie cats
Jet skis and speed boats
Comfy air-conditioned buses for airport pickup and drop-off, and perhaps a tour or two
Empty forlorn-looking fountains
Sad abandoned property
As we were leaving, we could hear the auctioneer raising bids for an air-conditioned container.
What was that? $42,000.00? Too rich for my blood.
The auctioneer is in there....somewhere
Usually, for these large hotel sales, the items are staged on different days.
Several days for the smaller items like housewares and linens, drapes, etc.
A separate day for the large items like cars, boats and buses. Sealed bids are also accepted for these items.
There are usually pre-sales, whereby the rooms and their contents are sold as one item.
What is not sold this way is then sold at an auction or a regular hotel sale, where the items have a pre-determined price. You walk in, select your items, pay for them and go.
Almond Beach Village in its glory days
Picture Perfect Postcard beach front hotel
http://www.expedia.co.uk/Barbados-Hotels-Almond-Beach-Village-All-Inclusive.h28620.Hotel-Reviews
This is so sad, that this hotel that once stood proud, and was responsible for increasing the airlift totals from the UK, is now on the brink of "no more."
Sad. I'm surprised you didn't bid for one of those boxes of Virginia. I don't think I've got any fine bone china named after me.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I would have bid on the Virginia Fine Bone China, considering its source.
DeleteYes, it's so sad about the hotel. Some investor will probably snatch it up for a song.
That's all rather sad in so many ways including the loss of employment. It certainly doesn't sound as though the best way of maximising the income from the sale was chosen.
ReplyDeleteThe loss of over 500 jobs was a critical talking point for a long while, but then it stretched into the airlift seats from the UK, which has dwindled since then.
DeleteI understand that the sale continued into Sunday as well, because it was totally impossible to auction off all those items in a single day.