Our family stayed at the Madrona for 3 nights in August. This was the first time that we visited Parksville and because it was a peak season, we chose the Madrona because the prices were within reason.
Location wise, the resort was quit accessible to downtown Parksville and there were plenty of places to eat and grocery shop within driving distance.
For the room itself, we stayed on the ridge level, one-bedroom ocean view which provided an excellent view of the water but was really quite the trek down long ramps to the beach with kids and equipment in tow (driving everything down to the beach worked out the best for us in the end). We had a full sized fridge, microwave, and 4 burner oven in our suite, but we were told this suite had a "larger kitchen" than the other units, so ask ahead of time if you want to do a lot of cooking or store cold foods. Oh, and there is no dish washing machine either so if you cook, be prepared to hand wash everything. Coin laundry was available at the front office.
There was no daily cleaning service either so you had to bring out your dirty towels by 10:30am to have them taken away and new ones returned to you (they actually didn't do this on one of the days and we had to bring the towels to the office ourselves to get...Our family stayed at the Madrona for 3 nights in August. This was the first time that we visited Parksville and because it was a peak season, we chose the Madrona because the prices were within reason.
Location wise, the resort was quit accessible to downtown Parksville and there were plenty of places to eat and grocery shop within driving distance.
For the room itself, we stayed on the ridge level, one-bedroom ocean view which provided an excellent view of the water but was really quite the trek down long ramps to the beach with kids and equipment in tow (driving everything down to the beach worked out the best for us in the end). We had a full sized fridge, microwave, and 4 burner oven in our suite, but we were told this suite had a "larger kitchen" than the other units, so ask ahead of time if you want to do a lot of cooking or store cold foods. Oh, and there is no dish washing machine either so if you cook, be prepared to hand wash everything. Coin laundry was available at the front office.
There was no daily cleaning service either so you had to bring out your dirty towels by 10:30am to have them taken away and new ones returned to you (they actually didn't do this on one of the days and we had to bring the towels to the office ourselves to get new ones). Needless to say, if you needed your sheets refreshed you had to contact the front office to get that done (I think they said if you stay longer than a week, your sheets get changed at the end of the week).
As far as noise level is concerned, it was tolerable up on the ridge for heavy sleepers. The temperature was in the high 20's so we left the windows open at night since there was no A/C. You could hear noise from people partying on the beach at night, but I imagine that the noise would be worse if you were in the beach level units. They also water the lawns at night somewhere between 12:30am-1:30am up on the ridge and the sprinklers near our suite must have been hitting some siding because that was very noisy.
Other than that, my kids enjoyed playing in the outdoor play areas and in their tennis courts where they had tennis as well as hockey equipment.
Overall, would we stay here again? We definitely enjoyed Parksville, and will return to the area in the future. We'll probably stay at a different resort next time however.More
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