Jumeirah group hotel - Club extra (sundowners??)

[Deangtv]

We are off to Dubai next week, staying at the Jumeirah Zabeel Saray.

At the weekend we were with a group of friends and one mentioned that the Jumeirah group offer some sort of happy hour on drinks for a set daily amount at the start of the holiday. I believe it maybe called sundowners or club lounge.

I was wondering if anyone on here has been before and could tell me a little more about it. Costs?? advantage etc

[K50 DEL]

Can't speak to the Zabeel Saray specifically but the normal deal with the club lounges is that you pay extra for a "club level" room which then gives you access to the club lounge throughout your stay.
The lounge normally has breakfast, snacks and coffee throughout the day, a lunch offering and then an afternoon tea finished off with free alcoholic drinks for a period (normally about 3hrs)

Whether it's worth doing normally depends on how much time you intend spending in the hotel and how much you drink of an evening....
I used to do it on most of Middle East staycations at Crowne Plaza properties as it wasn't much extra and just a coffee, cake and a couple of evening drinks made it value.

You can either book a club level room in advance (looks like about £90 a night more than a normal room) or enquire at check-in, if the hotel is nearing capacity you can sometimes get a really good deal (I think I paid under £10 a night extra in the Crowne Plaza Muscat)

Bearing in mind that there is already a 2-4-1 happy hour daily (4-7pm I think) at that hotel and drinks will be likely about £10 a go

If you have any kind of suite booked rather than a room they normally automatically come with the club lounge access

[The G Kid]

I have stayed at the Zabeel Saray a few times, and on most occasions have had club access (either because we were in a suite that came with access or because we upgraded at check in and got them to add club access). It's a nice lounge, fairly small but with a nice terrace (although it's possibly too hot to eat outside now). We mainly used it for the free lunch, although the menu is quite limited, We also used it for the afternoon cakes and soft drinks. Having free soft drinks for the kids saves quite a bit of cash! I think we did the free drinks and nibbles in the evening a couple of times before dinner, but we generally had our sundowners by the pool bar as prefer to have them coming straight from the pool or beach. You have to be fairly smartly dressed in the lounge, and not dressed as you would be coming straight from the pool.

When we go to Dubai we usually pick up booze at the airport duty free (similar prices to UK) and drink that on the balcony in the evenings.

It's a great hotel, and probably our kids favourite in Dubai (they prefer it to Atlantis, even though there is no water park attached). We really enjoyed the Rib Room last time we went, which was our favourite restaurant in the hotel. It is a bit of a trek coming off the Palm to go to other parts of Dubai, but that never really bothered us much.