Hi. We are a family of two adults with 6 and 10 yo boys (as at April 2012)
Cooks Bay Villas was recommended to us by a friend as a great place for a family looking for top quality accommodation where you can self cater (when you feel like it). The accommodation is high quality, clean, modern, and very well thought out.
What you don't get is room service, valet parking, or housemaids knocking on the door every day, which suited us perfectly.
There are five units, all positioned absolute beach front. I hesitate to call them units because they are all separate houses placed along the beach front, each staggered and separated by about 5 meters, with the design being such that you have excellent privacy from the other units (both sight and sound). The buildings are all identical and feature individually controlled air conditioning in the two bedrooms, as well as ceiling fans (I guess in case you don't like the the aircon!) I was impressed by the fact that each bedroom had it's own twin (his & hers) wash basins, shower and toilet.
In the main living area, there is no air conditioning, instead there are ceiling fans, which, because of the high ceiling and ventilation we never felt too hot whilst watching the large (maybe 42inch) LCD TV and DVD player. Kitchen has everything we needed like microwave, coffee plunger and a decent fridge/freezer. The only thing it didn't have was a dishwasher, but really do you want to spend your holiday in the kitchen?
Leading from the main living area, the whole front has sliding doors that open onto a covered patio area overlooking the lagoon, with a six seat dining suite - where we ate all our 'at home' meals, a lounger and a divan. This is the place we spent a lot of time relaxing, reading whilst watching the kids playing on the beach - it is that close to the water you can watch your children from the couch..
When you have had enough of the sea, the swimming pool is the place to go. There are some deck chairs to lounge on. There is a shallow built in area of the main pool for the little kids to play in. The pool was clean and you can have your eyes open under water without goggles without stinging (non chlorine treated?).
Within the home, there is an outdoor spa pool situated at the back of the house, along with an outdoor shower (hot and cold water) in a fully enclosed and completely private area, There is also a washing machine and washtub and washing line.
I think people who book here should understand that they are booking a superb holiday home in a very special location that affords space and privacy for a family, with good facilities like shops and restaurants nearby, but is not a full service hotel.
We really enjoyed our 9 days here.