Stgermainparis

ILuvParis

It's pretty easy to put off excursions when you stay at this hotel. We never wanted to leave. Make sure you go to La Brocherie. It will be less than $10 person. Great rotisserie chicken and French desserts. A very inexpensive and tasty alternative to the club. The owner (Fabian) is delightful. We went for lunch one day and wanted Diet Coke. They serve Pepsi products. He sent one of his employees out for Diet Coke for us. We have been several times over several trips and he always remembers us.

Stgermainparis

Stgermainparis

ILuvParis

As a Globalist, received Grand Suite King twice. Once, halfway through our 8 night stay, we were offered an upgrade to the Executive Suite, but liked where we were (on the bridge) and declined. The beach club is more of an issue while at the pool. We always have booked the cheapest standard room, but if one has status anything less than Gloalist, I would definitely recommend a rate that includes club access. The food is excellent currently, particularly pastries and breads (not always the case in years past IMHO).

bostonpilot

Just to add to the recent comments - we just finished a six day family vacation here last week. We took the kids down for some thawing out in the sun from the New England winter over their February school break. All in all, great trip and nice property, but also some odd service misses.

I booked on points and used a TSU to get us into a Grand Suite King. The room worked well for us. Its got a bit of a cold, concrete decor, but the bathroom is big with a HUGE bath tub that the kids liked, as well a separate large shower and toilet room. In the living room, there was a pull out couch and a day bed next to it, which worked great for the kids (9 & 11 yrs old) so we didn't need to deal with roll aways, etc.

We were in suite #234 which is literally on top of the beach club - as in the balcony of this room is the ceiling of the beach club. On Sunday night when we arrived, I was concerned about the intensity of the bass in the evening making the room unbearable, but it shut down by roughly sunset, so it wasn't an issue at all.

The Grand Club was good. Staff was very nice, helpful, and welcoming. On the downside, the food was pretty repetitive, but generally good. We ended up making workable dinners there most nights as everyone was wiped out from long days in the sun and reasonably large lunches, so we enjoyed relaxing in the lounge instead of going out to find a restaurant. I'm not typically a big fan of tequila, but the margaritas that the made in the lounge at night were excellent and perfect for relaxing on the lounge balcony.

Uriel who worked the Grand Club lounge desk in the evenings was excellent and full of great logistics and attraction suggestions. I'm overdue in sending Hyatt an email to recognize him - he was terrific.

To be fair, we didn't take the time to have sit down dinners in the hotel's restaurants, opting instead for the lounge, poolside service during the day, and a couple of nights of room service, but I was pretty unimpressed with the food. The prices were actually less than I expected given the resort, but I didn't have anything that did much for me. But, given the positive comments above, it could be that we didn't give it a fair shot.

As far as the misses, it was honestly a bit baffling, Everyone there was very nice and did a great job trying to please, but there were a few minor issues that just made me think that things look good on the surface, but they fall apart fast when anything goes off script. When we arrived around noon on Sunday, our suite wasn't ready which is fine. They proactively offered us a temp room so that we could settle in after our flights, go to the pool, etc, which was great. The room they gave us though seemed like it had been sealed up for a long time, smelling extremely musty and seemed like it was only partially serviced, with barely any towels, etc. Not a big deal, but just seemed weird and an odd choice of places to put us. The suite ended up not being ready for us until 5pm which I would have been unhappy with if they hadn't found a room for us though.

Upon checkin, I asked about a late checkout as our van wasn't picking us up until 3pm for our flight home. The response was that because they are a resort, they don't honor the glob 4pm checkout - disappointing, but fair enough as that's the deal with the benefit. But, she told me to check on the morning of check out and they'd see what they could do, which I did. Response was that they were fully booked so no dice, which I didn't verify, but given that there were two good sized corporate events, plus a wedding going on while we were there isn't surprising. After some phone calls, her solution was that we could stay in our room until 1pm and then we should move our stuff to a room down in the spa that we could use until we left at 3pm. It seemed like an odd solution, but thanked her for her resourcefulness, and she told me that the bellman would meet us at our room at 1pm to help us move.

Well at 1pm nobody showed up, which wasn't a huge surprise, so we loaded our stuff up ourselves and carried it down to the spa. Once we got there, they showed us to the "room" which entailed us lugging all our stuff, including the two kids, through the spa, past numerous people lounging around trying to enjoy their wildly expensive spa day and they put us into a massage treatment room. We dropped off our stuff and were headed to the pool per the discussion earlier in the day that we could use the room until 3. As we were walking out the spa manager got very "exercised" that we were leaving our stuff saying that we needed to be out of that room in 30 min and that she only agreed to let us take a shower there.

Clearly some sort of internal miscommunication, and if she had a treatment scheduled, it makes total sense why she wanted us out, but her attitude was that we were the problem and she got fairly rude over it rather than calling her colleague and trying to figure out what the miscommunication was or an alternative solution. To me it wasn't worth the hassle or argument, so we went back to the treatment room, grabbed all our stuff again, past all the same people trying to enjoy their spa day again, and then had to haul it back up the stairs and up to the lobby where I checked it with the bellmen. All in all, not a big deal, but it came across like a problem they created themselves and vapor locked without knowing how to navigate out of it. It just screamed internal management and communication issues to me. It would have been a much better guest experience to just say no they couldn't support us in the beginning.

Regarding the beach. The seaweed is definitely a big problem in Playa, but at the Hyatt they did a great job of cleaning it up every morning. One afternoon we made the walk south along the beach to Playacar (~30-45 min walk) past the ferry pier. There were some places along the walk that the seaweed mounds were enormous and there was essentially no beach in front of the hotels, just a rotting and stinking pile of seaweed. If I had a reservation in some of those hotels, I would have left it was so bad, but no issue at the Hyatt.

A few minor last suggestions. Three of the days we ventured out and requested a taxi from the bell desk, we ended up with the same driver. His name is Jimmy and he was terrific. Safe driver and a really nice guy - highly recommended. His asking price to wait for us and drive us back from places like Tulum or one of the Cenotes was substantially less than the hotel said it should cost. He also made a lot of suggestions of places to visit, and not visit, and things like which beach or cenote would be best for the kids. He doesn't speak much English, but between his google translate and my brushing 25+ years of dust from my high school Spanish, we made it work. He seems to be stationed at the Hyatt ready to go in the mornings, but if anyone wants his cell number to arrange transportation directly with him, feel free to send me a PM.

+1 on the X parks mentioned above. We did one day at Xcaret which was fun. Think a combo of an aquarium, beach, and theme park. If you buy tickets online at least 24 hrs before you visit, its a fair bit cheaper. The $27/person transportation option is definitely not worth it. A taxi there is 270 MXN and there is no issue getting one for the return. Also, the best suggestion we got was to get there fairly early (we got there ~9am) and head straight to the back of the park to the underground river. That way you beat all of the busses coming in with people who opted for the $27 ride. As a result, we had the river almost to ourselves. A hour or two later when we passed by again it was a whole lot busier.

Also, I got one day to myself and did a 3 hr private kite surfing lesson with PDC Kiteboarding which was a good deal. Very laid back guys and their rates are substantially cheaper than US schools. The teach at a beach in Cancun, but transportation is included.

Finally, I checked into the airport transfer companies mentioned in the wiki, but given their prices and the mixed reviews on TA, I ended up using these guys: https://www.privatetransportationrivieramaya.com which worked out well. $110 USD round trip and they were right on time with clean vans, safe drivers, and good service. A downside if you have kids is that their vans only have lap belts, vs shoulder belts, but I'm assuming that's the case with all the van companies vs a taxi.

All in all, the property was a great way to burn some points, but it was also a place that my wife and I agreed we didn't have a huge need to rush back to over an over again.

Stgermainparis

txhyattlvr

I think the seaweed problem is overblown... see my post above. You are more likely to get bored at the Westin. It's isolated with nothing around it. Grand Hyatt is surrounded by hundreds of shops and restaurants within walking distance (but in the resort itself, feels non-crowded and very relaxed).

Best snorkeling is on snorkeling tours where they take you out to reefs. Invest in one of those. Snorkeling at the X Parks doesn't involve coral where the best fish are....

Hard to get bored in Playa with so much to do. Do some TripAdvisor research for tons of ideas. If your kids like adventurous stuff, go to X-PLOR. Also check out XSENSES. Both are super close. XEL-HA is a long drive. These are extremely high quality attractions that will suck up most of two full days.... add in a snorkeling trip and you've just burned the three full days you'll have with 4 nights.

Grand Hyatt is a very special/very impressive hotel..... FAR more impressive than Westin. The spa there is also a treasure if you like that sort of thing (underground pools, etc.)

martinplas

Stgermainparis

lighthouse and martinplas, thanks for all that info! I've emailed a snorkel tour company to see about a reef and cenote tour. It would be fun to be on a boat, too.

I'm really now thinking we should just park it at the GH PDC. With the cost benefits of the club and access to town, it just makes more sense. I'd rather spend the extra money on the snorkel tour to reef than on breakfast and evening drinks at Westin. Plus, since our flight isn't until 1 PM, we will be able to get to CZM without getting up at an ungodly hour. I figure if we are on the 9 AM ferry, we should be fine.

Now to see what the spouse says...

Stgermainparis

I noticed that on revenue stays there is both a "svc contribution $25.00 USD" and "resort fee $10.00 USD" per night, effectively making the fee $35. There is only the $10 resort fee for award nights (on the room selection page, it is called a "destination fee" but the link clicks to another page where it is called a resort fee: https://www.hyatt.com/en-US/hotel/me...cunpc/policies

These feels like two resort fees to me.

txhyattlvr

Stgermainparis

gumercindo

txhyattlvr