My husband and I arrived at the Ocean Key Resort just as Katrina was making its way through Miami. We thought the location couldn't be beat, and loved out junior suite room. It had a view of Duval Street and if you stretched your neck, of the Ocean. I awoke at 4:00 am to the howling winds of Katrina, which was about 30 miles away. I thought that the staff was incredible. They were short-staffed that day, but everyone went out of their way to keep things running as smoothly as possible. We only lost power briefly and were lucky, some on the island had no power for 48+ hours. I would highly recommend this beautiful resort and would like to commend its hard-working staff.

Yes, the location of this hotel is unbeatable....BUT are you kidding me with the 4 diamond rating??

I must start off by stating the staff, aside from the exterminator (and yes I did meet the exterminator, I will get to that later) was extremely pleasant and helpful.

A few weeks ago, my husband and I along with 3 other couples checked into the Ocean Key "Resort". We arrived tired from the long drive and excited for what our vacation had in store. Greeted by a friendly face, we were whisked off to our 2 bedroom 2 bathroom suite and junior oceanview suite. We were not impressed with the room at all. It seemed to be clean, until you looked closer and saw dust everywhere! We were excited to see we had a full kitchen, not that I would be cooking on vacation, yet still a nice addition to the room. A not so nice addition to the room were the hundreds of ants all over the kitchen. I called the front desk and they sent up the exterminator immediately. He outright said it was our fault there were ants in the kitchen because we opened a beer. Can you believe that?? I saw him the next day too because there was a roach in our bedroom...yeah yeah I know a palmetto bug. I live in NY, it's a roach.

This is not a luxury resort/hotel for so many reasons and for $600/night I want to stay in luxury. I don't know if there are any real resorts in Key West. We had stayed in several other hotels on the island previously and had high hopes for Ocean Key. I cannot reccommend this hotel to anyone for the price.

Now I get to the billing portion of our stay. Yes, I did travel with 3 other couples and there were 4 credit cards on the 2 rooms. But I was told everything was under control...until I checked my credit card statement. I was charged for another couples room. It was resolved rather quickly and painlessly, crediting me for the charges immediately. Then I discovered that they had charged another couple in our party incorrectly for this same room. It still is not completely resolved and we have been home for almost 2 weeks.

Don't skip your trip to Key West, but definitely skip staying here.

Oh and I almost forgot, no air conditioning in the elevators! Doesn't sound so bad but once you experience it, you'll never want to again.

My husband and I spent our anniversary here and were definitely not disappointed. We had been to Key West back in 97, but just for the afternoon. The end of Duval, we decided, would be the best place to stay. At Zero Duval, the Ocean Key's location can't be beat. We were able to leave our car in the garage every day except for the time we made an excursion to Bahia Honda State Park. Lots of breakfast, lunch and dinner spots all within walking distance. We especially liked walking along the boardwalk at the end of Greene Streeet to the historic seaport, where there are several good restaurants (including Turtle Kraals--yummy breakfast and then in the evening we were there for their turtle race competition) and a spot where many of the sunset cruises and other excursions take off (we liked the stargazer cruise...something different). The marina right at Ocean Key also has lots of adventure....we did the speed boat tour of the island (leave your hat and sunglasses at the hotel!) from there.

We ate at Hot Tin Roof just once...for breakfast our last morning. It was really good, better than most hotel restaurants.

I second the other reviewer's comments about the blue tiles surrounding the pool being too hot. Granted, it was summer so you would expect them to be hot. But even emerging from the pool with wet feet, I got burned walking back to my lounge chair. I would suggest leaving your sandals next to the pool.

As for the room itself, we loved it. We chose a junior oceanview (not oceanfront) suite, which overlooked Mallory Square, in my opinion a much better view than you'd get overlooking Duval. We went downstairs for the sunset celebration a few nights (can't beat seeing the street performers up close), and other nights just watched all the action from our balcony. Even though you can't see as much, you get taken into the scene with the live music and atmosphere. We were on the fifth floor and found the balcony to be very private (we could see people on one fourth floor balcony but none others). More than once we would hear someone below remarking that they wished they were staying at our hotel so they could see everything from the balcony.

Interestingly, we did find that the Mallory Square action shuts down completely around 10. I guess everybody is heading to the bars on Duval by then. Since we don't drink, we found that our night pretty much ended early, once Mallory died down. You can't even get an ice cream anyplace if it's past 10. I believe 9:30 is when room service shuts down...I would have liked it if we could order something later than that so we could continue enjoying the balcony.

One heads up for those staying in Key West during the summer: From Mallory Square, the sun doesn't set over the ocean but behind Sunset Key, a nearby island. So actually the views weren't quite as spectacular as we thought. Definite reason to do a sunset cruise at least one night.

Back to the room: I agree with others that the island decor was beautiful. Bed was very comfortable, jacuzzi tub a nice touch. As a couple staying there, we could have done without the front room, which had a pullout couch, table and fridge. Obviously that fridge came in handy, but the room just had a tiny window overlooking the inner courtyard and walkways. So we found it rather dark in there, not really an inviting place to sit. Although I guess it provided a nice buffer so that we didn't hear any noise from other guests along the walkway as they came in each night or left each morning.
We found the service to be very good at Ocean Key. The conceirge desk was a little too busy once or twice when we might have used it, but they did help us to select a restaurant and, right upon check in, helped me to surprise my husband with a room service meal (I arranged this in advance). The turndown service was good; also liked the seashells left for us. The bellhop staff was extremely friendly. And when we needed to get our car, the vallet service was quick.

All in all, we loved the location and room at this place...and I think we'll be back one day. If only Key West were a little closer to home...

This was our first trip to Key West and after doing much research, I chose the Ocean Key due to the location and ocean view. Our original room was for a city view but since we were planning on extending our stay, the hotel upgraded us for a fee to an Ocean View Suite! Wow...we walked in to the sleigh bed, jacuzzi tub that is also a shower that has glass doors and shutters on one side that can be opened to view the ocean outside. We went to the balcony and had the view of Mallory Square, the ocean and the pool. We were able to watch the sunset right from our balcony as well as all of the events that occurred in Mallory Square. The next morning I woke up to go write my kids a letter (they are at overnight camp) and was blown away by the view of this large cruise ship that was outside my window. It was absolutely amazing. The pictures we took of the sunset by the pool were incredible. The customer service and staff were incredible. Anything we requested they were right on top of our request. We wanted to go to eat at a restaurant, the operator called and got us immediate reservations. We were running late so as we were asking for directions, the hotel receptionist was already dialing a cab for us. It was amazing. On our way home, they gave us 4 ice cold bottles of water for our car ride home. The only negative was the male pool waiter on one of the days who needed training on how to managed a busy pool. He kept making excuses for why he couldn't get our drinks. The other pool waitresses were great, he was the only negative. I highly recommend this hotel. It was amazing!