Maui Sands Resort & Indoor Waterpark

This so called resort is TERRIBLE! The checking in and checking out are done by paper not computer. So it takes way too long. Also after all the extra fees they charge you, you really are not getting any deal. If there is an issue with your bill you are stuck with it. The rooms and the whole place smells of mold and mildew. Everything is dirty. Not all rooms have access to elevators. Our room looked out into an old banquet hall which look like some thing from the Bates Motel or the Shinning. Our room was hot, smelly and dirty. Do not stay at this place.

We had many issues at this place. First, I booked two rooms and called twice to make sure the rooms would be joined, when we arrived they were not. They didn’t have any joining rooms left except for the second floor and we had brought 6 kids and 3 adults worth of stuff to our rooms already. I even asked when checking in that the rooms were joined and the lady said YES. They have no elevator, so the thought of relocating was too much. We asked if someone from the front desk could help, they refused. Also, we had reserved a pack n play and when we arrived, they did not have one for us available. We had to go to Walmart and waste an hour of our time getting one. BUT the worst was that Friday morning my sister woke up to a mouse in her room! When we told management about all these issues, they didn’t care and told us that since we booked through Groupon that they weren’t going to do anything about the issues.
The hotel rooms are dingy and smell bad. Our rooms had no windows and we felt like we were in a dungeon. Our ice bucket hadn’t been cleaned out and when we got there it had ice and stuff in it! We will never go back and will advise others against this place.

We bought a groupon so we could do something fun for my 30^th birthday. For the value, we still had a good time. Only a few minutes from Cedar Point, the lounge was nice and the bartender was very friendly!
The waterpark itself was really fun both times we used it! We went both in the morning when it was quiet and chill– there were just a few families and no one was really using the waterslides and in the evening when it was insane– tubes were everywhere in the lazy river, there were not enough lifegaurds that they had to double team the slides etc. But the life gaurds really hustled and were very good at their jobs! The slides are really fun and the lazy river was nice to use to relax. This part was totally worth the money!
Our room on the other hand was pretty terrible. The lampshade was busted and the vanity in the bathroom had a big hole in it. When we went to put waters in the mini fridge there was still a frozen dinner in there from the previous patron– ew! Unless they have stopped filling hotel shampoos to the top, the just reused the last persons free toiletries and wrapped them up neatly in the handtowels and also the last patron’s dirty soap in the shower. Also we stayed there 3 days and no one serviced the room so we almost ran out of toilet paper and had to reuse our towels. But the sheets and bed were in good condition and rhe cable tv worked fine.
All in all, if you want a fun waterpark, I recommend. But I do suggest staying at a different hotel.

This was my FIRST and LAST visit there. I thought I would give them a shot due to a deal I found on groupon but the price was better than the experience. The lifeguards didn’t care to be there to the point where a child yelled for help be use she was stuck in a deep end and the lifeguard looked at her and looked away. Not to mention the COCKROACHES found in the 104degree hot tub! I’m disgusted, disappointed and mortified. I was hoping this would have been a great experience for my fiancé and I while celebrating his birthday but I guess I was wrong. Never again!!!

We bought a Groupon for a 1 Night Stay. We got there a little before 6 pm for check in and the line was 2 hours long to check in. They knew how many guests had reservations (and it was spring break) so why they didn’t have more staff. It shows poor management and makes me feel like they won’t last. I left my hubby to stand in line and I took the kids to the van to change into swim suits and took them into the waterpark. We didn’t have our wristbands yet (hadn’t officially checked in yet) and was ready to give an earful to anyone who approached me but no one ever said a word to us about not having wristbands. The 3 kids and I played for 2 hours while daddy stood in line. By the time he got to us he had less than an hour to enjoy the park before it closed at 9. That was disappointing.
WATERPARK:
It’s about what we expected. It was fun for the kids. My kids are to young/​scared to do the big slides but I’m sure older kids would love them.
The rules are NOT enforced inside the waterpark. (We are used to going to some other indoor waterparks where rules are strictly enforced.) For example, the signs say no outside food or drink but people had brought in boxes of capri suns, large bags of chips, all sorts of snack food and had it out in the open and nobody ever said anything. Also, it says you have to be in a tube in the lazy river but the majority of people were not in a tube.
I like that they have a bumpy thin sheet at the zero entry opening that makes it not so slippery.
ROOMS:
Because we are a family of 5 we had to get the room with one queen and 2 sets of bunks. The room is very tiny and cramped. I think the basic Lily room (max occ of 4) would have been more spacious. I’m sure the rooms are the same size but they built a room where the second bed would be and stuck bunks in there and I feel like the walls of that room really close in the space and make the room feel cramped. I wish we just had the 2 queens. My kids are small enough still that we could have easily fit all 5 of us between 2 queens and the room wouldn’t have felt so closed in.
HOTEL:
The parking lot/​location is kind of shady. My hubby isn’t overprotective of me usually but he didn’t want me going out to the car alone to fetch a waterbottle my son had left in the car.
It’s seriously a maze and so hard to find your way around the hotel. I usually brag that I have an internal compass and am good at navigating new cities and such but I was so turned around in this place!
USEFUL: There is an Applebee’s in the same parking lot that you can walk to.
At the price I paid ($ 115 for 1 night hotel stay plus 5 waterpark tickets) I would probably go back for a quick one night getaway especially if it was a getaway I didn’t want to spend alot of money on and was willing to suffer some inconvenience and lower quality. For the quality of the stay I don’t feel like I’d pay much more than that as there are other choices that are better. If it was a special occassion or our only vacation of the year or something I wouldn’t want to risk being disappointed by choosing this place.
I’ll include pics of the different areas of the waterpark. There will be pics of:
1. A lazy river
2. A regular ‘pool’ with some basketball hoops
3. A splash zone/​bucket drop play area
4. A large hot tub (not relaxing– full of kids splashing) so really it’s another pool that happens to be a little warmer.
5. A kiddie area
6. The large slides
There is a bar connected to the waterpark too but I forgot to get a pic.

Bought a Groupon to try this place out.
The room was standard but I did feel the bathroom was extremely small. You couldn’t shut the door if you were sitting on the toilet — it being your legs in the way.
The waterpark was fun. My kids enjoyed themselves. They managed to keep my kids entertained all weekend with multiple slides.
There was also an arcade in the hotel. Majority of the games cost $ 1 and they didn’t disperse tickets. The only way you won something was through the «claw».
My only real complaint was the Volcano Grill located inside the hotel. It’s the only place to order food and they were extremely slow. It seemed like only one person taking orders and making them. We waited 30−45mins for chicken tenders and fries. Also, their pizza taste like cardboard.
Overall, you get what you pay for. I personally don’t think we will come back but we will see.

I should have known when we pulled in and the driveway was one GIANT chuck-​hole… bought a night on Groupon to give it a try. You could not PAY me enough to stay here again. Building is very out dated, rooms are small– the floor plan is one big senseless maze… The water park is quaint, but half of the stuff was «closed for maintenance» and their response was to contact Groupon. (Um, groupon manages your water park rides??) No towels, no security measures for kids… Snack bar is cute, but right next to the bar (??) with the blaring inappropriate rap music. Giant arcade!!! And I thought this would be a saving grace– nope! The games sucked up the quarters and didn’t work or refund your quarter… we were supposed to spend the night and we left at 7pm instead of staying… not one positive thing I have to say. Sorry Maui Sands…

I’m really not sure what everyone is expecting here, surprised by such bad reviews.
Bought a Groupon for $ 140 for 4 tickets to the water park and a 1 night stay. Not bad.
Check in was easy, fast and they let us check in 3 hours early. We brought our bags in and stopped for a quick bite to eat before hitting the water park. The Applebee’s right next door was yummy. Not sure why they have better food than Michigan but they do, I ordered the same thing I always get haha the driveway is a little bit janky but just drive slow – I’m not sure how anyone could have a problem with check in. The registration office was in plain sight.
The room wasn’t anything fancy but it was clean and had everything we needed for dipping in and out between activities.
If you have children under the age of 10 they are going to have fun. My sister and I took my 4 year old nephew and he had a blast. I will admit there were some downfalls like the lazy river was closed (not sure why) and after going down the large slides 3 times with my nephew they realized he wasn’t tall enough (shift change – darn it!) but there was plenty of other things for him and us to do. The lifeguards were very attentive AND friendly.
It definitely has to be renovated but you get what you pay for and I would say it was a great deal. As always the amount of fun you have is always determined by your attitude.

The bottom line is that you get what you pay for. When we checked in, it took 30 minutes waiting in line. We were staying three nights. Our room was not cleaned efficiently, there was trash from the prior occupants, and you could tell from the layer of dust behind furniture that cleanliness was not important to the owner. The water park too reflected this fact. Everything was good enough, being that I knew I was saving $ 400 by coming to Ohio instead of frankenmuth. That’s about how much we saved by not going to GWL also. Then, on night 3, our room had yet to be serviced. After speaking with housekeeping during the day, we had to go to the front desk after calling twice requesting service. We waited over an hour and finally stopped a maintenance person in the hall, Chip, who was kind enough to instantly bring us linens, which we used to make our own beds. Very disappointed in the lack of service. It’s really just the fact that they haven’t hired enough people and many of the people they’ve hired aren’t quality people… We won’t be back.
Suresh-​read Good to Great. This place needs a great owner.

Disgusting. Terrible service. Pot hole filled parking lot. Can’t check in until 4 yet Park is insanely crowded with day pass guests who aren’t paying to spend the night. Hot tub is crawling with children. The food is fried and greasy. I would rather camp in a snowstorm or work a shitty job than to return to this place… And I’m being kind.

Bought a Groupon for the 4 of us to spend the day at the water park. It was so lame we left and paid full price to go to Castaway Bay. Maui Sands just plain sucked!
The employees, like the life guards, could not be less engaged. It was just lousy!

I stayed here for two night with my family and it was bad. The first day we arrived half the attractions in the water park were out of service. The rooms are tiny and out dated. The people staying next door to us where loud as hell and when I trying to call the front desk my phone didn’t work. The next day we went down to use the game room but the coin machines were out of order. I went to get a cup off coffee from their café but the girls refused to make me one. She claimed that it was to late to order coffee even though they still had 3hr before they closed. When I return to the front desk and asked for a manager I was told that there was no manager on duty. I am highly disappointed with this hotel.

The guests are ghetto as f***!!
How do I know? Because a loud mouthed woman who was swearing down the hall with her small child in hand told me. I gave her a disapproving look as I escorted my 3 year old down the hall… but, she doesn’t care that people give her those looks… because, again, she’s ghetto as f***. I’m so happy she told me that because I wouldn’t have guessed it by her language, giant leopard print bathing suit, super-​long fingernails, and again… her language.
I wish this was the only bad part about the stay, but sadly it was not. The water park is smaller, but adequate to entertain young children. However, there were not enough towels… ever. Also, the water and air got extremely cold at the end of the night. The bathrooms connected to the park had large puddles. I can only assume it was the mix of urine and chlorinated bathing suit drip. A little water is to be expected, but I was surprised by the size of the puddles. Thankfully, I was wearing sandals – no foot fungus or infection to report.
Then there was the «DJ» playing in the commons/​bar/​only spot to eat in the whole resort. His choice of music matched the woman mentioned above. I don’t know, maybe they aren’t going for the family-​friendly thing… at a waterpark with a kids area.
The little grille was the only food on the property. The pizza was okay, and the breakfast buffet in the morning served its purpose. A nice guy named Doc didn’t charge us for our two little kids, so $ 19 to feed four of us isn’t bad. We arrived downstairs toward the end of the buffet time, so that’s why he gave us a discount.
The rooms are dated, dingy, dusty, and dark. The walls are paper thin. We could hear our neighbors clearly.
You get what you pay for, and this is the truth when staying a Maui Sands… you pay less and you get less. There’s a reason you don’t see Kalahari or Great Wolf Lodge on Groupon. You pay more for a better experience. I went against my gut and other reviews about Maui Sands and. I took the gamble and lost in my opinion.
Disregard this review if you are «ghetto as f***!» You’ll love it.

Never Again. Over an hour wait to check in. No towels in the pool area (over a six hour span). 20 – 25 minute wait to get a mixed drink at the bar. No sitting room in the water park. Hot tub was not even hot and the water in all the pools looked cloudy. 40 people in line to get pizza. Only one food venue, if you want to call it that. Double rafts hard to come by in the water park. Place needs to be cleaned!!! Room had sliding divider doors that wouldn’t close. A TV remote that had no batteries and even when replaced wouldn’t work. Tried hard to find something positive to say…

We originally saw this «resort» on «Groupon» so we thought we would check it out! It was actually a better deal to book directly through Maui directly as we got «breakfast» included.
Word of caution… you get what you pay for. The resort is very DATED! And Renovations are required! Housekeeping is very minimal in the rooms and realistically the hallways are vacuumed one a week. The room needs a DEEP cleaning as there were dust in the corners (ceiling, floors, under sink, etc) the bathroom drain was very slow, the bathroom corners were very dirty and moldy! Yuck!
Now… The waterpark itself… The plus side is the amount of lifeguards! However, it wasn’t very clean… There was dirt and hair in the pool, the bathroom in the pool area was not kept up either it was dirty, only one shower worked! Ugh!
The staff was friendly which is why I’m giving it two stars instead of one star.

Maui Sands Resort is in need of majors renovations. The rooms are basic and still has old school peeling wallpaper! The rooms are a bit tight for four. We couldn’t pass up the $ 99 a night deal though.
I know they are trying hard to get things working though. We had a running toilet and no cable TV; however, they sent two different facility people over to fix it.
The water park was lots of fun! We hammered all four major water slides, the kiddie area, swam in the main pool and the lazy river. On the second day, the lazy river was closed so it got quite crowded in the main pool. It looks as though they updated air system in the pool area. They have many fans and air conditioner and heating ducts that all look new. That being said, there is rust on the stairway up to the big slides, rust on the railing posts around the pools, and a general need for deep cleaning on the floors.
I give it a 2.5 stars as the reps were all friendly and I know their effort helps. We probably won’t be back to this one. We may try one of the other water parks down the street.

I try to stay neutral in my reviews, but this place is filthy! FILTHY, with a Capitol FILTH! Checked in on XMas day, trying something new for the kids, and took a whole 2 hours before I went to the front desk and canceled out other nights. Thankfully a different water park in MI was able to accommodate us.
Where to start, out of towels at 2pm, now 8:30pm and still no towels, one of the life guards is wearing a tether, the carpet is strictly ‘Wear your socks at all times’, elevators smell like a urinal cake, the staff is RUDE!, the dry wall and ceiling is pealing off the walls, lazy river is closed, rope walk is closed, kiddie pool is closed, ATM out of order, ice machine out of order, the arcade (6 games) only three work. I could keep going, but I hope you get the idea.
I always have a ‘don’t judge based on other peoples petty complaints’ policy, but this place should be avoided. I know it’s cheep, but Splash Universe is the same nightly price, and WAY cleaner.
You have been warned

Believe the reviews. This place is a dump! It’s dirty, very worn, the staff is rude, and the clientele that thinks this place is ok have very low standards!
Check in took 45 minutes. Got a crummy room with bunk beds, comforters were filthy and the beds weren’t completely made. Carpet torn, things dusty, holes in furniture and tv stand, I itched the entire time. Freaked out if we had bedbugs! Arcade games were broken. Water park had no lockers available, and no towels available. Pool was over chlorinated. Moldy smell everywhere.
The hotel was very noisy and kids and drunks ran freely through the hallways late at night. Finally got to bed around midnight, to be wakened by the fire alarm going off around 1:30 am! Another guest saw 2 teenagers pull the alarm and run away laughing! The hotel blamed it on a helium balloon in front of the fire sensor, but I heard those teenage jerks running through the hall too! The staff did not know how to shut the alarm off. A guest had to help unarm the noise once the fd was called. Guests were told to evacuate, but not all rooms were reached. The fire alarm went off again around 2:30am. I couldn’t go back to sleep.
I complained about the horrible stay and was offered a late check out. I said I need to get out of here immediately! The manager Stephanie said she would call me back and I never got a call. Don’t waste your money on this dirty cess pool!

Purchased a Groupon for the Ohana Suite. The room was very nice, clean, even the kids area was nice.
Check in is strictly after 3, we had to wait till 4 but were able to use the pool until the room was ready.
The water park area was nice, bigger than Fort Rapids we went to last year. Great slides, lines move fairly quickly. The kiddie play area is great with three mini slides for little ones.
The bar is a waste. Ordered two drinks and not even a tiny buzz, lol. I’d bring your own.
Also bring bottled water, it’s over $ 2 in the snack shack. There is also a Walmart right across the street.
Plenty of life guards were on duty and towels were plentiful. They dump them into a giant bin near the baby pool.
The breakfast buffet was good, $ 9 over 12 and $ 4.50 under 12. Which isn’t bad, they have an omelet station, bacon, sausage, cold juice, coffee, etc.
We went to Applebee’s across the road for dinner.
Wifi is iffy, but my 4G worked fine. It’s also nonsmoking. There are several exits tho you can use near the park area.
Over all we had a great time and would come back again. I could tell the staff and hotel owners are really trying to get this place back together and it shows. In my opinion it’s better than Fort Rapids in Columbus for the price range.

My stay here was good, so I’m not sure if they just learned from the previous reviews or they were having a good few days. But nothing quite negative to say on my end.
Our room was clean and the bathroom was very spacious. Towels were clean along with the sheets. Can’t complain there! The staff was super friendly when we needed anything– there was no attitude given. The layout of the hotel is a little confusing. It reminded me of going through a maze of some sort.
Why the 4 stars? It’s hard to find the entrance to this place! We almost went into the freeway ramp trying to get to the entrance. So beware future guests! Also, no wifi! Who doesn’t have wifi these days at the hotel? That’s needs to be fixed because going to McDonald’s to use my phone was a nuisance.
Other then that, good stay on my end!