Windward Passage Resort: Ardent Sunsets…read more Fifty-five years ago, as young educators, my wife and I selected Ft. Meyers beach as a holiday destination during the Christmas break. We enjoyed the Christmas holidays with our parents and relatives and drove south to Ft. Meyers Beach Holiday Inn for a week of sun, and the salty beaches and the Gulf of Mexico. I recall that we made this excursion in our new 1968 Camaro that did not have power steering, power anything, airbags, or a GPS system. And we endured/enjoyed the drive. What were we thinking? Holiday Inn and a road-trip to Florida? This was to be the last holiday taken in this fashion. We soon realized that our lifestyle provided plenty of holiday time, and we have the resources to fly to U.S. and world-wide destination. Holidays Inns are a vague and very distance memory. I tend to be a linear thinker concerning attendance at national conferences and in terms of planning holidays. We seem to have a queue of airline tickets and timeshare reservations. The vital holiday planning is for spring break. Within weeks of the last spring break, we are trading for next year's spring break, and we are finding airline tickets as soon as the airlines post the routes. There are too many reasons to purchase a two-bedroom condo, and our stable is filled with ten two-bedroom timeshares. However, we traded years ago into Windward Passage Resort (418 Estero Boulevard Fort Myers Beach, FL 33931 239-463-1194) on the quiet north section of Ft. Meyers Beach. Ft. Meyers Beach is not Sanibel and Captiva, but for a small fraction of the price, we purchased two weeks of one-bedroom units. There are very few two-bedroom units at this property, and very few two-bedroom units appear on the secondary market. I believe that location is vital; that timeshare ownership should be in geographic areas that one will re-visit; and that timeshare ownership is not an economic investment, but rather a lifestyle investment. Windward Passage Resort also turned out to be an economic investment. We sold the two properties at a profit. Windward Passage Resort is a resort that we greatly enjoyed for several years; all 52 weeks are flex ownership, and we always scheduled the very same unit for two consecutive weeks. Timeshare owners know the advantage of making these arrangements: no refrigerator transfer of food, no kitchen transfer, no bathroom transfers, and no clothing or luggage transfer. Windward Passage Resort has a great swimming pool on the south side; we always arranged to reserve our units on the north side with a beach view rather than a view of children playing about the pool. Some years, we found profit in renting the unit, and these ocean and beach front one-bedroom units traded into five star and two-bedroom units with a degree of ease. All 53 week are red weeks at Windward Passage Resort. My wife and I are avid tennis fans, and Windward Passage Resort, and the tennis courts are one story high on the roof of the parking lot. This is a unique and clever arrangement, and one which discourages ball retrieval. The photographs (while limited) on the Interval international Website do not provide justice to this gem of a property. Ft. Meyers is the archetypical Florida "snowbird city." The hordes come in November and depart in April. This means that often the bridge from Ft. Meyers to Ft. Meyers Beach is in gridlock. This is not the case in the summer months. We fly to the Ft. Meyers airport, pick up a Hertz number 1 automobile and drive the 18-22 miles to Windward Passage Resort in about 30 minutes. During the "snowbird months" allow at least an hour for the same trip. I posted this review on the Web several years ago: "Outstanding small resort located between city pier and city park. Although small rooms, the veranda provides an outstanding Gulf view. Summers are hot and humid, and good vacation times. Winters can generate fierce traffic problems. Hurricanes have done their worst to this property, and it has always bounced back. Ideal for small families. Great staff." The following post is representative as a summary of Many Web posts: "A unique, intimate Resort in a great beach location. Socials include Ice Cream Day, Pancake Day, Hot Dog, Burger Day & free coffee any day. A user-friendly quiet Resort with heated pool and complimentary beach chairs. Bring your own beach towels as they are not supplied and minimum toilet tissue or you can purchase additional rolls. Not far near the end of N. Ft. Myers Beach is the fabulous Pine Shell Resort for a tropical drink or meal and several quality island restaurants." The absolute best part of the day is at sunset. People flock to the beach in an almost religious manner to silently observe the ardent red ball of sun "descend into the ocean" or into a thin layer of clouds that provide a hue of red and pink for a 30-minute afterglow following sunset.

My wife and I were on vacation via RCi and we booked this place because we love the Gulf. First…read moreoff, they stuck us in the back cottages without even offering us a place with an ocean view, which I knew there were tons of, because the place was not that full. The pool only had about 5 tables, which were filled by 7 AM every morning. Take away some lounge chairs and put in tables. Not difficult to remedy. All of the activities were volunteer based?!?! What!? I have been to 30 different timeshares, and this was a first. I asked if they had a place where we could donate our leftover, unopened food to a food shelf, and they looked at us like we were insane. They said the staff takes them. The ocean was nice and warm, but very murky, which wasn't their fault of course. The fan in the main room did not work and lots of vent slats were missing from the AC registers. Fort Myers Beach is a wonderful place, but I think I would stay somewhere else. They have taken themselves for granted.

It was a very nice place to stay, very close to the beach and other resteraunts. Calm and relaxing.read more

DO NOT STAY HERE if you are looking for a clean place with peace and quiet. 6 to 30 young adults…read morehang in the gardens 24/7 screaming and throwing trash. When talking to the office the answer was "they're kids". Trash sits there for days. Felt like a prisoner in my cabin.

Beautiful condo. Top floor corner ocean front 1 bedroom with pull out sofa. Perfect for our family…read moreof 4. Kitchen had everything one would need for a vacation rental. Pool wonderful Only negative parts... office lady who smokes is not the friendliest. She wasn't horrible just needs to improve the crab to friendly. People are spending thousands of dollars and deserve happy. Only 1 elevator in the entire resort. Need another for the front of the building. Hot tub was there but locked and never uncovered the entire trip. They need to remove it off of websites.

It was a nice place to stay but the hot tub did not work and the screened-in balcony ruins the…read moreviews of the sunset. I thought I was getting two double beds and a sofa bed but we had a king and a sofa bed. We made due with it but I did not say anything as it could have been my error in reserving the room. We enjoyed the pool and the hotel was clean. The WiFi signal could be better but it wasn't a big deal. I guess the big drawback was the screened in balcony. It cut off the ocean breeze and made it uncomfortably hot and with the high humidity it was not enjoyable to stay out on the balcony for long periods of time.

Very very happy with our stay here. We will definitely be…read moreback again. Gonna try to make it a yearly thing. We rented a 2 bedroom 1 bath apartment. The ac worked great. The apartment was very clean. Very pleased with it. Susan checked us in. She was very nice. Gave us a tour of the complex. The pool was nice. The court yard was nice as well. A great place to sit and just relax. Not to mention, we had a private place of the beach. I totally recommend this place if you wanna visit fort Myers beach.

Our room was a little dirty when we got there, so wasn't overly happy about that. The grounds,…read morepool, and tiki was very well taken care of and enjoyed it very much. The walk to the beach was very short and they also offer beach chairs, wagons, and coolers. Will go back again but hope the room is clean this time.

nicest lady in florida owns this place. Very clean. tidy. neat. Not upscale but the bed…read morewas very comfortable. terrific location. Pool was clean deck was clean. plenty of ice and fresh coffee every morning

This is a little gem very near the beach. Last minute trip to Fort Myers for the Sun and beach…read more Very clean and accommodating. Heated pool to wash the sand away. Let's face it, it's not a 5 star hotel but when at the beach, who stays in their room anyway? The owner and staff are very friendly. A short two minute walk to the Fort Myers beach. I will recommend this place to my friends and family. The beach had not been dragged so lots of seaweed on the shore which made it unattractive.

Not a bad hotel with a good location, with access to the beach and within walking distance there is…read morea variety of restaurants, shops and entertainment The room is spacious and clean, but the bed is not very comfortable, short for an average height of a person and with an uncomfortable mattress and pillows, because in the morning my body ached, and I wanted the morning to come quickly Unfortunately, we were not ready to be settled immediately, supposedly the room was not ready. Given that the official check-in starts at 4pm, and we arrived at 5pm and booked a room at 11am My advice is to train the staff to distract the guest while the room is waiting. For example, offer drinks or show the beautiful Beauties of the territory, thereby the guest will relax and not notice the waiting time

My family comes to fort Myers almost every year so we book at least a couple rooms. This last visit…read morewas unfortunately ruined by the front desk being so incredibly unhelpful and just plain rude. The cereal in the front office is expired and our room keys don't work half the time. Then they charge you for everything possible. They only seem to make certain guest follow rules while others can do as they like. They say mask are required in the office but don't enforce it. Some guest can have visitors but others can't. It just depends if the front desk feels like enforcing certain rules to certain people. If you confront the front desk don't bother they could really care less. What a shame this place charges high prices and treats their guest like crap. I included a picture showing some people have to wear mask while others don't.

Unit 406 is amazing! Had everything we needed to enjoy our week long vacation. It is very coastal…read moreand beachy, exactly what everyone wants on a beach vacation!

Having stayed at Seaside in 2008, I thought I'd give it another shot. I called ahead of time to…read moreensure the heated pool was working and functional. I was assured by the manager (Monica) that it was. Unfortunately, for our 7 day trip, it was only working for 1 of the 7 days. All other days, it was frigid water, around 68-72 degrees, which made it completely un-swimmable. I spoke to other residents that were near the pool deck and all of them agreed that this was extremely cold and not tolerable. After calling to report this to the manager, she became extremely rude and snippy with me, even asking me, "Well, what did you come to Florida for... the pool or the beach? Did you really think your price for the resort includes a heated pool?" I couldn't believe how rude she was. Ok, let's talk about the resort itself... the check in process was quite frustrating as the manager was all over the place and kept giving me wrong information and didn't let me know how to access the pool gate, elevator, etc... When I went to check in, the room reeked of bleach as if the cleaning staff had doused it in the stuff. It took hours for the smell to dissipate. The rooms are very old and tiny/cramped. The shower frames are coming off the hinges and the master shower water doesn't even permit a hot temperature. The bathrooms are so small and tight that you can hardly fit in there. The room smelled musty as well. The master bed was like an old beat up cushion. It killed my back! The elevator to get up to the room (we were on the 3rd flood) was very old and rickety and took forever to go anywhere... if you tried to take the states, you would risk your health as they were extremely slippery and you had to nearly tip-tow down. When I called after our trip to report these frustrations, the manager continued to be very sarcastic and rude to me and then hung up. Having vacationed down in Ft. Myers Beach for 20 years, I know lots of places and I would never stay here again. Overpriced, doesn't deliver on promised amenities and is very old. Save your money and vacation and stay somewhere else!

I stayed there the place is full of cockroaches and spider.it smells of mold from being flooded out…read moreevery summer.they go in youre unit and go though you're stuff

Such a disappointment. Main reason for staying: location. Visiting family over Thanksgiving and…read morestayed 5 nights. Upon arrival, the space seemed fine for a family of 4. Our infant slept in a crib that fit at the foot of the bed....however...there was no dead bolt so he was constantly escaping out of the room. No curtains so the bright light outside made it hard to sleep. Had to make a curtain out of a towel to block some of the blinding light. Speaking of towels: there were just two and we tried to get more, we were unable to get a hold of anyone! The entire stay! No one was in the office and no one answered the phone or returned an email. Thank goodness there was no emergency but we had one trashcan liner and two small towels for the entire stay. Couldn't buy any detergent for laundry from the front desk. It was frustrating. Toilet kept running and was slow to flush. Bathroom door knob was barely screwed in. No iron/ironing board. If someone else flushes the toilet in another room, water will get boiling hot. TV had to be turned on and volume adjusted manually. One bed was hard as a rock. Pillows are flat and there are no extras. Silverware was missing and not discovered until after we warmed the food. Definitely a sub-par motel stay. Won't be back unless we can't find any rooms left in the area. UPDATE: Despite no communication (office presence, call back, email reply) during our stay, I was surprised with a note in the mail with my ID that I had lost in the room! They found it and sent it back. This was so kind for them to do. Those reading this need to know that though customer service was lacking, they did go above when it came to returning my property. They didn't have to do this and it is appreciated.