Almare, a Luxury Collection Adult All-Inclusive Resort, Isla Mujeres

This is NOT a review for the Palace. It's a review of Cabanas Maria del Mar. That wasn't a review option, so I'm writing a review of that hotel here. At Cabanas Maria del Mar. You are trading price for quality. The beach and water are beautiful. However, it is the aspects you aren't told about in advance that count. When we arrived, after 15 travel hours there was no water...not in the sink tap, shower or toilet. That was rectified the next day. You cannot flush paper in the toilet. Soiled paper must be wrapped and put in the wastepaper basket for the maid. Drinking water is out in the hallway in an old style office water cooler. "Continental breakfast" is only a cup of coffee, glass of orange juice and two pieces of toast at a restaurant across the street. Anything more, you pay for. The pool is very small. You have to pay for beach chairs. The rooms are very basic, but clean; staff friendly but they have little to offer, no fault of theirs, and no staff on duty after 11; hotel locks at 11 and you get a key to enter through a gate. No phones to call the desk. TV only Spanish stations. Loud thumping music late at night from restaurant across the street. Given you have to eat and pay in restaurants, and the small town and its shops are dismal, you spend the same amount of $ as if at an all-inclusive top notch resort. It's not so much false advertising as incomplete information. So, as along as you know what you're buying into..... We won't return.

Visiting isla mujeres by your own Is the best way to explore the Island. This Is how we did It! My mom a 65 yrs old and I started our day taking the isla mujeres Ferry at puerto Morelos dock at 10 am . Avoid to take the Ferry in plaza los delfines becase Is More expence. Just take a ubber or a taxi to Puerto Morelos (from sunset royal hotel we spend usd5.00). Then we took the Ferry ultramar Is a trip of around 25 min each way. In Isla Mujeres infront the dock you will find several mini golf car rental the price for all day Is around 30-50 usd, don't forget to bring your license as I do. However this Time we prefferd something More special, we rent a taxi (infront the Ferry dock). We spend 35 usd and the driver gave us a complete tour aprox. 4 hours. We meet all the best spot (tortuga farm, the arqueological place, isla mujeres sky View, the Town, mercadito, church, all the Town and our trip ends at playa norte). So don't lose the chance of meet all the Island by your own with a local taxi, Is More cheaper and you Will meet More Places without the problems of a packed tour. Food: we ate at the mercadito, there are many local restaurante, with local food I highly recommend tacos al pastor and tacos of cochinita pixbill with 2 bottle of coca (price just usd 6.00). Spend the rest of the day in playa norte Is free To get back to the Ferry dock take a taxi (usd 5.00)

If you're staying in Cancun, I recommend to take the ferry to Isla Mujeres just across, departures every hour, saling is about 30 minutes, inexpensive trip it docks just few blocks from Playa del Norte, considered amongst the 10 most beautiful beaches on the Caribbean... Rent sunbeds and umbrella, enjoy a proffessional massage and fresh cold coconuts all this for under $100 US If you're hungry, just 3 blocks or so is Picus Mexican Restaurant, excellent food front of the fisherman's dock. Catering mainly Mexican people and some lucky tourists! Menu is in Spanish and English too. Fresh seafood and mexican fare at an unbeatable price!!

My husband and I have stayed at this property several times and each time we walk away with the best memories! The staff is phenomenal! Alejandra, the manager, is the best! She was always available and very helpful! Her front desk staff, Martha, Aylin, and Luis greeted us daily and were truly interested in making sure we were having a good time on vacation. The food experience was delicious! Some of our favorite memories of our trip include some of the servers! Macedonio, Christian, Wilma, Paulo, Arturo, and Julian took excellent care of us and made sure we had exactly what we wanted to eat at each meal. Hostesses Mitzi and Jessica always made sure we had a great table to enjoy the breath taking views. The pool bar and the lobby bar are also filled with wonderful people. Alejandro, Edy, Arley, Victor, Manuel, Martin, and Andy were very entertaining and quick to serve! Italian night is by far one of my favorites! The singer they have to come in is AMAZING! Between his performance, the food, and the decorations, it was a perfect evening! Rene also helped make the night special by helping us select a special bottle of wine! We also had supper out on the pier…what a treat!!!

Juan is the most amazing server! He served us in June and I went back with my niece last week and he hustlers all day! Although I am sad isla Mujeres palace is closing (very sad) I am happy Juan will be at Sun Palace! This man deserves a raise!

After an 11 hours flight from Sweden. Taxi from airport, boat and taxi again, we arrived at this 5 star hotell. We had booked and payed a mounth before arriwal and of course we had the reciept and booking printed out and with us. BUT, the receptionist didnt find it in there system. OK , things can get wrong, but its howe you deal with it that is important. So for us flying from Sweden ( for us 04 at night, mexico time 21) they didnt have a room for us. And they were not really interesed in solving this. No one really didnt care , they just said, over and over again, that they cant help because they dont have a booking in there system. Since we booked with Tui we asked them to call Tui, but they didnt have an number to call without office time. They were not interested at al in helping us out dispyte that we stood there with our booking and reciept of payment. They repeted several times that the only thing we could do, were to rent and pay for a new room that night ( i dont remember but i think it was about paying aound 5000 dollar ) And when this was sorted out we would get thoose money back. OK we have that money , but we already paid 14 nigths!!! in advance and have a receat. This was to much , they couldt even let us sleep without paying that night and the day after figuring out what went wrong. This went on for at least an hour, not what you expect from an 5 star in the middle of night. So at 04 for us at night, we didnt have a bed for the night, They refused to give us a room without paying . I satt in the sofa crying tired as i were and my husband countinued the argument at the desk. Finally he forsed her to countinue serching and she called someone and after an 15 minuits conversation with someone, we dont know who... THEY FOUND THE RESERVATION AND PAYMENT!!! of course, we said so and showed you. We dont know who she called but maybe it shoud have been done on her intiative and directly?! So now we can have a nights sleep without paying extra, but there is no room prepared for us, So we spent one nigt in a room with 2 seperate beds. The day after we waited until 5 pm to get a new room. We didnt unpack and just hang around since we didnt now when to get the new room. Not howe we wanted to spend our first day . For the discomfort we asked to be upgraded or at least something, but when the receptionist called the manager the day after, the manager disided that not! So we didnt even get an real excuse for this!!! This had a big impact on our romantic 2 weekend stay at the palace. NO excuse, no compensation. We arnt rich but we save for an exlusive , problem free waccation and this is the welcomming? We travel a lot both in buisness and for vaccation and i have never had an welcomming as bad as this, I have runned my own hotel in Florence Italy for 6 years and if this had happend there i had been running nuts to make it up for them, but here noone really cared... /Cecilia Anderson Woods