We had a blast during our week-long stay on Jekyll Island. I'm not sure what the island is like during "normal" times, but we were there during the COVID-19 pandemic (mid-July). Several restaurants were closed, but we were able to find plenty of places to have a nice beach-side drink/meal during our stay. Anyway, I'd highly recommend visiting the island in general.
Now, the Great Dunes cottage...FYI, we had the full 10 people allowed with mostly adults and 3 children (8 - 12 yr old).
Pros
- Excellent location (~ 10 min walk to beach, quiet neighborhood, close to golf courses, easy drive to anywhere else)
- Really nice space (plenty of sleeping spots, nice covered outdoor space, nice sized pool, lots of fridge space, plenty of indoor seating)
- Three full bathrooms
- Nice sized pool = easily allowed 8 - 10 of us to lounge around at the same time...sun hits the pool in the morning, but by mid-day there are spots of shade and sun, so everyone is satisfied
Cons
- The decorations and furniture are definitely dated/old. We have no complaints of discomfort while sleeping so the beds and couches are good! It's just aesthetically not that pleasing. Whatever, easy to look past.
- The showers are really small. Like, I'm 6' tall and was knocking elbows at every turn and I'm not uncoordinated or anything.
- The bathrooms are small in general and old, too. Which is fine, they're functional, but they definitely are starting to look a bit worn and probably need updating soon.
- THAT DECK IS NOT SAFE. I mean, it will probably stay up if you have a couple adults up there sitting or standing for a couple of hours, but you can definitely feel the boards bowing as you walk around. The supports are not correct. As in, there aren't enough of them. And the newer piece of support is really not doing much at all...weird, like it was thrown in to make you think they fixed something. Anyway, we just didn't use the deck - there isn't much of a view of anything anyway, but it would have been nice to sit up there at night.
We would definitely stay here again. We'd love to see some updates if we came next year, but wouldn't be necessary. I would highly suggest fixing that deck!
Thanks for having us,
Nate & Family
