Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020

Royal Sunset Resort on Atata Island - A Little Paradise worth having a look

Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea

We went to The Royal Sunset Island Resort just before Xmas and bit by accident as we did know much about Tonga and The Resort. We did not know what to expect. We were delighted with the stay at The Royal Sunset. Great Place, The Fales (Bungalows) are waterfront and very spacious. The Island has a Village and Plantation - Sunday Church is an experience. The Resort has lots of activities from Free Snorkeling - The Clam farm is great. Free Watersports from Windsurfing to Kneeboarding and Kayaks.
There was Live Entertainment and we had the chance to see 2 floor shows from the the Local Villagers.
Food was Good and at reasonable price - Fresh Fish caught daily by the local fisherman "Lilika" we comes every morning around 11am except sunday of course.
The Overall Experience was Good - Nothing like some of the Comments we had read - there is a New Management and There are doing a Good Job.
Some other Guests were Mad Divers - Diving Every Day - They told us that there are Fantastic Diving Spots.

ha, ha this post must have been written by the owner of the Royal Sunset Resort. We were there in October 2008 and it was pretty bad. The food was awful and radically over-priced, staff went into hiding whenever guests showed up, and the pool was half empty, green, and had a large, dead, bloated fish floating in it. We were day-trippers and I'd recommend it for the nice swimming beaches and the free windsurfers, and it only cost about US$30 for the return trip from Nukualofa with the very average lunch. The guests who had stayed overnight and longer were very dissapointed and an Australian couple who came over with us on the boat came back on the same boat that day and refused to stay overnight.

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