TripAdvisor Traveler Rating

My family of four just returned from 6 days and 6 nights at Marina El Cid. I have to comment on the excellent staff everywhere. They were so friendly and accommodating. They were all working so very hard. We arrived on a Tuesday. The only drawback was that we could not get a dinner reservation until Thursday. You can book two nights at a time. Nothing was available Tuesday or Wednesday at any restaurant. The buffet ended up being ok, especially for our 17 and 14 year old. We did get reservations for Kobo and the Fusion restaurant. On Wednesday morning, we booked dinner for Saturday and Sunday nights at the Italian restaurant and the Mexican restaurant. The hours printed online are different than what the actual hours are for El Mercado. You can get coffee and pastries at Aromas each morning. El Mercado is open from 12-5pm (ish) so this is not a dinner option. The breakfast buffets had lots of options and were well stocked. Our teens enjoyed many, many shirley temples and strawberry banana smoothies at the pool bar and dinners. My husband and I enjoyed the open bar. There are only two beer options which was fine for us. We booked our room through Costco so two WiFi connections were included. The kids used the connections and my husband and I were able to check texts, etc. when we were outside and had LTE service. The service in the room was 3G so we really had no access. Costco also had their partner company BD, on-site so we booked excursions through BD. They were located in the Convention Center. We booked two days of excursions. The timing was perfect for our family and we lucked out with perfect weather. We spent Tuesday afternoon on the beach under umbrellas resting. We spent Wednesday at the main pool. We had an excursion to Selvatica where we ziplined, did a roller coaster, cenote and ATV. We spent Friday at the pool and then took another excursion to Isla Mujeres (HIGHLY RECOMMEND) on Saturday. We then spent all day Saturday at the pool. Oh, and we got massages on the beach. Highly recommend this too! We did not get any high pressure timeshare sales that I have read about. We had booked a family room so when we checked in, we were offered a discount to upgrade to a one bedroom suite that included two bathrooms and balconies. This was well worth the upgrade cost!! The map makes Marina El Cid and Ventus El Cid seem so spread out but everything is very close and walkable. Ventus Ha' is a walk across the street, but again, very walkable. My husband and I went to the Ruf bar one night and it was gorgeous, but this property seemed to cater more to adults. Finally, the nightly shows were fun! The actors and singers were very talented and it was a fun activity! This was well worth the trip!

Booking through Travelocity not recommended. Wifi not included and was an extra $60/person. Transportation to and from hotel also not included. Was and extra $200US. Typically the booking company covers these costs. They are also impossible to get in touch with regarding concerns. The virtual chat only allowed one comment and they only responded by emailing me back my booking information. Had to pay $50 hotel tax immediately upon arrival as well, which not all trips require. As well, most vacation companies have a representative providing tour information, there was none of that either. Hotel was nice but not worth the unexpected extra costs.

Pros: great food, great pools, nice shows, good rooms, room service and mini bar drinks included everyday. The French sit down restaurant, El Mercado de Dolores food court and the bakery next to it were our favorites by far. Baked goods are phenomenal everywhere in the hotel. The high jump in the main pool was the most fun for us. The wildlife in the hotel is pretty awesome too. Cons: the beach is unusable, the Sargassum problem is like nothing I've seen in my last 4 trips to the Caribbean (also I am Venezuelan and I was born and raised 50 miles from the Caribbean sea). They put enormous resources into picking it up everyday but it is an impossible task. Even when they manage to clear some beach space, you end up in a smelly brown Sargassum "tea". The smell is pretty heavy when you are close to the beach, I felt bad for people paying extra to have beach-view rooms. You can take a cab from the hotel to the next door town (Puerto Morelos) for less that $10 and there the beach is a lot better. But when you are paying for an "all-inclusive" it sucks to have to keep on paying for extra things. In that line of thought, WiFi IS NOT INCLUDED, and they will charge you $60 PER DEVISE for a week very poor signal. This to us was one of the biggest cons. Also the resort lost power twice in one morning, one time for about 30 minutes and a second time for about 10 minutes (think about this when taking the elevators). Towards the end of our one week stay the hotel was getting pretty packed and it was getting harder to sit at the restaurants or find a spot at the pool. Also, the last couple of days the TV signal was so bad you could not watch anything period. Tips: if you are interested in snorkeling, don't but the package from the "La Marina" they are actually not part of the hotel, they were charging us $57/person, the hotel gave us the same trip for $39/person, and the last day we took a cab into town and took another longer snorkel trip for $16/person (this last one was completely negotiated in Spanish).

I've been to several all inclusive resorts in Cancun and around the Cancun area. This resort has by far provided the best overall service to my family and myself. 100% happy with this resort We had the 3 bedroom suite and were celebrating birthdays the week of our vacation. Resort staff went out of their way to make sure that my family was well taken care of and even provided a birthday cake for my child on the day of their birthday. There was a different activity happening every day at the pool to entertain the whole family. Great experience and very happy with this Resort.

The place was gorgeous. We stayed at the Marina. Dinner at the A'Akant was phenomenal. The French restaurant was atrocious. Honestly, the worst food I had had in years. The reason for the average review is that the resort was great, but the business practice was not. I bought an all inclusive package, but felt like I was being milked by the hotel. We were to be charged for WIFI which no other resort was doing. They even sold me old dried out Cuban cigars in the Lobby. The place was nice, but hotel tactics were not nice. We had to go to specific bars and restaurants to get good drinks and food. Most of the poolside drink mixes were disgusting. They all had a nasty aspartame taste to them. The lobby drinks were good. One day at the dinner buffet, we received recycled lunch food that we already mixed in a different dish (seafood from near the Marina pool restaurant). You can tell they are trying to recoup costs, but just charge me up front and don't do underhanded things.