TripAdvisor Traveler Rating

Love Gran Bahia Principe El Portillo, great location, beautiful and peaceful beach, great for family and couples. The resort is beautiful, rooms are clean, property is professionally maintained, they are always working so hard cleaning, gardening, entertaining. Staff is exceptional especially the entertaining team, always willing to make us have fun and enjoy all the activities. You will never get bored at the resort, great activities at all times. Special shoutout to BettyBoo, Victor, Rosa and Dj Carlos, thank you for making our stay so joyful. Food was very good at the buffet and the other restaurants we had dinner in. I highly recommend this resort.

I am staying at this resort right now, and the situation with the loungers is unacceptable. Guests wake up before 6 a.m. just to reserve a spot under an umbrella. Then around 8 a.m., an employee walks through the beach and removes towels and even personal belongings from loungers if the guest is not physically sitting there at that moment. People were simply walking, swimming, or having breakfast — not “abandoning” their chairs. If this is really the hotel’s policy, it makes no sense. Are we not allowed to take a short walk or go for a quick swim without losing our seats? The whole system is ridiculous and creates unnecessary stress instead of relaxation.

I will not go back until they renew the rooms. They are horrible, I love the beach and the food. This is well below North America standards. The food is good and the beach is to die for. The rest is horrible

We were here over March Break and the hotel was obviously at or close to capacity so it was very busy. However, even with it being busy we still found it a very relaxed stay and we generally able to move around from place to place through the to find the quiet. We had a Superior room in building 11 which was closer to the entrance of the hotel and pretty much as far away from the beach as you could get. It was very clean if a little worn. The taps in the shower were a little loose for instance and there was some rust on the glass supports, that kind of thing. It didn't bother us at all - everything worked fine but if you're the kind who is bothered by everything not being perfect and new this is an older property for sure. We had no issues with air conditioning; in fact with the ceiling fan on high we found we needed to turn the air nearly off. My husband was in LOVE with the super firm mattress; I'm just glad it wouldn't fit in our luggage. We appreciated the hotel policy of not letting people reserve chairs by just leaving stuff on them until after 8am. Overall we never had a big issue finding chairs but ones in the shade near the pool and on the beach were harder to find at peak times for sure. The buffet was pretty loud and busy but somewhat expected given how full the hotel was. The food was consistently good though and we never had any trouble finding something to eat. My husband has a number of foods he can't eat and my kid can be picky so we generally find buffets easier but we did try The Greek a la carte one evening and it was excellent. This is by far one of my favourite beaches, beautiful and very calm. We loved the coral right out front for snorkeling and walking down to watch the kite surfing or just walking to walk without massive hotels lining the whole beach is fantastic. If you have mobility issues there are these extra large golf carts being driven around all the time - you can flag them down like a taxi or call for someone to pick you up and take you from one end of the resort to the other. If you don't have issues walking everything is less than 10min from anywhere else. We had so many great interactions with staff in all parts of the hotel - so ready to help! We noticed that it seemed to be an older or maybe just quieter crowd in general compared to other places we've been. It seemed like less of a party spot, more relaxed and quiet. We loved that about it - we're a quiet group and not having so many loud drunks to navigate was a big plus for us. Also - they never had to close the pool once the whole week because someone puked in it. ;) We spent our days rotating between hanging out in the morning at the pool, snorkeling and beach walks in the afternoon and chilling near the sports bar in the evening. It worked for us but we don't need/use much in the way of organized activities. This is not a luxury property certainly but it's also not priced anything like a luxury property. I've realized I never use the pillow menu and haven't used room service since my kid was really young so there are things I just don't need to pay for. Overall the whole place was super clean and had everything we needed. We really thought this was an excellent value hotel and would return.

I just recently stayed at the hotel. Gabriel and Maria --Liz at the front desk are wery helpful. The other staff also, was friendly. I recommend this hotel. Butiful Beach. Good food. Brazilian and French restorants are proffesional management.