Riu Palace Costa Mujeres

Enrique was a great waiter. He was super friendly and appreciated is being here. He provided great service and drinks.

Enrique was very nice all the time and gave us great service. We felt very appreciated to be here at the resort because of him. He always had a smile on his face.

TRIP REPORT Service: scale of 8/10 (Restaurant staff was only negative) • Front desk staff was quick and efficient. • Bartenders were friendly, and never had to wait more than a few seconds to be acknowledged. And, high quality liquor (Patron, Jack Daniels, Titos/Absolute vodka, Bombay Sapphire gin, Aperol) at all bars, even beach bar. Excellent drinks! • Room service was pretty good, although often later in the day. Room fridge wasn’t stocked daily, but we never lacked. • Service at the specialty restaurants was an issue; we felt forgotten for 20-30 minutes several times during dinner, and courses were delayed. Buffet staff/table waiters were great. Property: scale of 8/10 (Location is only potential negative – far from excursions) • The place seemed much smaller than we expected, as compared to other RIUs we have stayed at, which was a pleasant surprise. You can walk from the beach to your room to the lobby in a few minutes. • Property layout is very different from other RIU’s we have visits (6-7 times), and overall, we agree it’s a huge improvement. The restaurants, “Lobby” Bar and main stage (for shows) are all by the beach (instead of closer to lobby/front of resort. And, the stage faced outward towards the water. This meant the rooms were extremely quiet – our room was 1/3 back from the beach, physically close to the show area, but we never heard music or anything in the evenings. (As compared to RIU Palace Costa Rica where show is tucked into the front corner and had to deal with LOUD party sounds until 10:30-11pm every night.) • The location, Costa/Playa Mujeres, is north of Cancun, very quiet and far from most area excursions (they are closer to PDC area). So, if you want to get off the resort to see interesting sites/ruins/destinations (Xcaret, Xel-Ha) it’s a 2 hour ride at least. We took a catamaran tour/snorkeling trip to Isla Mujeres for a day, which was a nice break from the resort. (We weren’t impressed with Isla Mujeres, but that may just be not our “thing”.) • The beach was wonderful; you could walk ½ mile north, and several miles south. We walked the beach down to RIU Latina, around nearly 2 miles, for a cocktail and lunch. The only negative is we was quite windy for most of our stay, yellow/red flags every day. • Pools (4) were laid out well, perhaps a bit too close together. Only one was “adults only”, which was pretty active. There were many kids there of all ages (which surprised us as it wasn’t Spring Break, but they didn’t scream/cause scenes for the most part. Rooms: scale of 9/10 • We upgraded to an ocean view room, which was nice when chilling on the balcony. Overall, the layout was good, a huge shower and lots of hot water all day every day. Perhaps due to newness of the report (5 yrs?), everything worked perfectly and we had no complaints. The free-standing soaking tub in the middle of the room was weird – we never used it once. They should have exchanged that for more counter space in sink area. • Beds and pillows were some of the best we’ve had at an AI resort. A/C worked great the entire time. Food: scale of 7-10 • Buffet was al way good, and had good selection. Would have gotten bored if we stayed 2+ weeks, but for 7-8 days we always found new things to try. Generally speaking, we thought the food was a good value. RIU’s get a great deal of negative criticism about bad food, but we think that is undeserving. For the price (of RIU) we think the food is solid. Would you pay $1000 or more extra per person for better food? Maybe for a special anniversary trip. But, for annual winter beach trips from the frozen mid-western US, we thoroughly enjoy RIU resorts, especially the Palace properties. • The specialty restaurants were disappointing. Although you could not reserve a table, only FCFS, we were able to try them all. A few comments on each: o Roma (Italian) – Always seating available, food and service were good, but not great. o Zarape (Mexican) – had horrible service for our dinner, left us alone several times for 15+ minutes. Got up twice to grab wine, at which time someone stopped me and refilled us. Main course took forever to be served. o Japan (Asian) – nice variety, and pretty good service. o Krystal (fusion) – went only to try the short ribs, which were quite good. o Steakhouse – next to buffet area, not completely “separate”. Steaks were “okay”, I felt the flavor of some steak items on the buffet had better flavor. o Pool bar/food – pretty limited (hamburgers/ hot dogs, chips, fries). Convenient, but only ate once. Fortunately, the main buffet was close by. Final Thoughts • Probably one of the best RIU resorts we have visited (among DR, Jamaica & Mexico). • Location a bit boring/too far from excursions. • Rooms very comfortable and maintained. • Will not visit again, mainly due to location. But this trip reinforced RIU as a good choice for us. (Really baffled by the strong negative reviews…)

We spent 10 days at the Riu. Great resort. Clean with friendly hard working staff. Food was great so many choices at the buffet for every meal with theme nights. The pistachio desserts were my favorite. Had prime rib one night in the buffet very good. The servers at the buffet are all great sat somewhere different all the time. The FF at the pool were awesome along with burgers ribs and chicken. Pools were a nice temperature. Special shout out to the bartender at the “pink” bar. Miguel, Cruz, and Felipe. You ordered one drink and the next time they remember you. They also had a drink of the night. The piano player was awesome!! The beach was great they cleaned it every day. Teresa who kept the bathrooms at the pool clean and water free was awesome. Entertainment staff was good and very interactive. Enjoyed being able to walk to other resort.

Check-in was fast and easy. Room was large. Nice tub in living area with king bed and balcony. Bathroom had separate shower and double sinks. Stocked mini-fridge and several hard liquors in the room. Our room, 1070, was very quiet. The hotel is spotless. There are people cleaning everywhere. The restaurant staff were all nice and fulfilled any requests quickly. The non-buffet restaurants were ok, with the steakhouse being our favorite. The buffets were typically good with an amazingly wide selection. The massage at the spa was great. Get a towel and drop it on a chair by the pool early if you plan to lounge. The pools were not crowded. There were plenty of shaded areas to sit. The beach at this hotel is narrow, but the sand is very fine and nice to walk on.