r/AllInclusiveResort

Our honeymoon was ruined by Royalton Riviera Cancun. Please read this before booking.
I’m honestly writing this because I wish I had seen a post like this before spending the money we did.
This was supposed to be our honeymoon and my husband’s birthday trip. We chose Royalton Riviera Cancun because we wanted a luxury experience, and we upgraded to Diamond specifically because we thought that would take the experience to another level.
Instead, it was one disappointment after another.
We booked an ocean-view suite with a jacuzzi on the balcony. When we arrived, we were given a suite facing the pool with no jacuzzi and only a tiny piece of ocean visible. I spoke with the Diamond manager and even offered to PAY MORE for a better room. He basically told me there was nothing available and showed absolutely no interest in trying to make the situation better.
This wasn’t just about getting the wrong room. It was our honeymoon. We expected someone to at least care.
Then came the sewage smell.
Our actual suite smelled like sewage. The bathroom was sometimes unbearable because that was all I could smell. I reported it to our butler. The buffet entrance also smelled strongly of sewage, and we noticed it around the Hunter restaurant entrance even when the restaurant wasn’t open.
We reported the sewage issue early in our stay and again at checkout. The response at checkout was basically, “Thank you for telling us.”
That’s it.
No apology. No explanation. No attempt to make it right.
The restaurants were also extremely disappointing.
Agave was tasteless. Grazie served gnocchi that was basically a runny soup. Hunter had small, cold appetizers, small portions, my order was wrong, and the waiter never came back to check on us. Taj was another disappointment because we expected the Indian restaurant to at least have some flavor.
Teppanyaki was the one restaurant where we actually enjoyed the food. Ironically, I ordered another drink there and it was conveniently forgotten.
The drinks throughout the resort were also incredibly watered down. I barely drink, and even after two drinks I could barely feel anything.
The spa was another issue. We weren’t given a locker or robe, and during the massage they asked if we wanted hot stones without telling us they would add $90 to the bill. We only found out when we were charged. A $90 add-on should be disclosed before you agree to it.
We were also given a $600 resort credit, but every time we went to Guest Services asking for the booklet/information needed to use it, we couldn’t get it. Instead, we were repeatedly asked what we wanted to do and offered more packages. We weren’t trying to buy anything. We were trying to use the credit we had already been promised.
The entertainment was mostly boring. The Michael Jackson show was actually good, so I’ll give them that.
The ice cream and coffee shop was also excellent.
But the biggest positive by far was Benny and Mauricio, our butlers.
These two were incredible. They genuinely went out of their way to help us and were kind and attentive throughout the stay.
Honestly, if it weren’t for Benny and Mauricio, we would have checked out early.
That’s how bad the overall experience was.
What makes me especially upset is that this wasn’t some random vacation. It was our honeymoon and my husband’s birthday. These are memories we don’t get to redo.
We paid extra for Diamond because we wanted luxury. Instead, we got a room that wasn’t what we booked, sewage in our suite and around the restaurants, disappointing food, watered-down drinks, poor service, an unexpected spa charge, difficulty using our resort credit, and a Diamond manager who couldn’t have seemed less interested in helping.
I know no resort is perfect. That’s not what I expected. I expected the resort to care when something went wrong.
A beautiful lobby doesn’t make a luxury resort.
If you’re considering Royalton Riviera Cancun for a honeymoon or another special occasion, please do your research before booking. I wish I had.
For us, the Diamond upgrade was absolutely not worth the money, and I would not book this resort again.

#Royalton #Cancun #Honeymoon #Travel #badresort
#terrible

We stayed at the Hard Rock Riviera Maya for my brother’s destination wedding. Thought I’d drop some info about it here. Hard Rock wouldn’t have been my personal first choice, but we did have fun.

- Stay near the blue lobby if you can. That lobby & its surrounds are MUCH nicer and less crowded than the red lobby. Unless you have younger kids: the pool near the red lobby is much larger and more kid-friendly.

- The property is an hour and a half shuttle ride from the airport and Cancun. If you want to go off-property, it’ll be a $100 cab fare. It’s also 1-1/2 hours from most excursions. They’ll say it’s an hour, but it’s not. There’s also no shopping anywhere near the resort, only the expensive hotel shops.

- The staff is extremely friendly & helpful. We got good service there. Tip: bring your Yeti-like tumbler and they’ll fill it up with your choice of beverage at the bar.

- Beforehand, I thought that more of the resort staff might speak at least a little English since 95% of the guests speak English. Obviously it’s a foreign country, so I’m not throwing shade, but it’s something to be aware of.

My very minimal Spanish skills and the translator on my iPhone came in very handy when I bit it hard on a difficult-to-see curb (painted black! Who does that?) at the front and messed up my knee. They have on-site paramedics (with whom the translator was necessary) to bandage you up, but if you need to see a doctor, they’ll charge you $200. That knee injury cost me 3 days of staying out of the water - bummer on a beach vacation.

- There are monkeys and tons of iguanas roaming the resort, which was unexpected and cool.

- The food at the buffets and at the shows is not very good, especially the meat. The food at the à la carte restaurants is better… if you can get in. Breakfast at Toro is really good. The pastries everywhere are terrific.

- There’s an iPad in the room that’s super helpful to figure out what to do. We were unaware ours was frozen the first 3 days, so we did miss out on some of the things they have going on.

- We didn’t use any of our resort credit. There’s no easy way to figure out how to redeem it. The telephone concierge for the Rock Royalty upgrade never answered the phone. Basically, a lot of the benefits they sold us on weren’t easy to figure out. (We were under the impression that they’d reserve beach chairs and get us into the restaurants, which is impossible to request if they don’t answer the phone.) We did get a nice small charcuterie board & a bottle of champagne in our room the first night, but we weren’t sure if that was for our status or because I hurt myself before even making it through the front door. We also had to call the front desk for the Rock Royalty beach bag.

- One final tip: You can take a tumbler filled with ice through the TSA in the US. You cannot take ice through the Mexican TSA equivalent.

To be honest, the first couple of days weren’t fun. It didn’t help that it really hurt to walk on my injured knee. Once we started to figure out the resort, what to avoid and where the more private spots were, we really enjoyed ourselves.

What else would you like to know?