TripAdvisor Traveler Rating

Service was really mixed (and we were regularly tipping staff!). Food at speciality restaurants was very good, but the buffet was not great- habit of trying to produce over complicated items with result th...at food tended to be low quality. Would encourage them to focus on quality produce and keeping things simple. Also if you are attending with teenage family I would avoid this hotel- it’s more for young families or the adult only areas for adults, lacks an in between experience.

They charged me double for my room due to confusion at the front desk. I thought I had resolved the issue when on site. But the refund wasn’t processed (about $1,400 USD) and now they will not respond to ...me to process my refund. I’ve tried emailing and calling them.

We just got home from 7 wonderful nights with our 6-year-old twin girls. Don’t let the negative reviews worry you.. if you want to enjoy yourself and have a good time you will!! We were originally only goi...ng to stay for 5 nights but were having such a great time we extended our trip for two nights! Sorry I think this is gonna be a little long but we had the best time and want to share some positivity. We arrived early in the morning. Booked a private transfer with Al trips Cancun and they were awesome. Communicated clearly on WhatsApp, affordable, and were on time both at arrival and departure. Check in was quick and easy. We changed into bathing suits and they held our luggage til our room was ready and we enjoyed a full day. We got a text when the room was ready and our luggage was delivered quickly. Every staff member was so nice. Everyone was so warm, friendly, and helpful. I didn’t walk past a single employee who didn’t immediately give me a warm smile and a big hello! They made the vacation awesome. We were room 2115. Loved the location to be close to everything in the evening. The room was big with plenty of storage space. It was cleaned immaculately each day. We had two double beds, the sofa pulled out into another double, and we also requested a cot. We pushed one of the beds to the side in the bedroom and rolled in the cot. We played musical beds each night but there was plenty of space to sleep. The mattress on the pull out couch was a little thin/firm but worked out fine. My kids loved taking a bath in the jacuzzi tub on the balcony each night. We loved eating breakfast at the lunch box each morning.. for us that alone made family concierge worth it. We enjoyed all of our meals.. we are not picky, but also enjoy good food. We were able to find things at every restaurant that we liked! The only meal we did not enjoy was the buffet one night for dinner. We missed our reservation and ended up there and really found it to be a small and odd selection. Other than that we ate at capella, hibachi, flora, blue agave, and Cielo. Hibachi and flora were our favorites! We had lunch food from celsius or the water park snack bar and thought everything was pretty good!! Just have realistic expectations about the food at an all inclusive resort and how much they are churning out each day and you won’t be disappointed. It is not 5 star dining, but it’s certainly decent with a few very tasty things ! We loved the tuna sashimi and bok choy soup from flora, chilequiles from lunch box, and fish tacos from celsius! We really loved getting ice cream each night after dinner! The iced coffee from lunch box was excellent too!! The only thing we didn’t love about this resort is the crazy early morning chair reserving. People are taking chairs at multiple pools, at the beach, etc which was a pain. If you head out at 9am there were literally no chairs and most just had a pair of goggles tossed on them and no one showed up for hours. We like to sleep in and enjoy a slow morning so we ended up booking a cabana at the pirate ship pool each day. We found it worth the money and was a very comfy place to spend the day - our kids spent 90% of thier time making friends in that pool. We loved our pool server Graciela- she was the best!! My kids also enjoyed the little whirlpool areas in the pools with the swim ups lining the resort. We didn’t spend any time in the FC pool. We went to the water park for an hour or so each day and we all had a great time on the slides! We spent a little time at the beach and could always get at least one chair. When we were there the beach was gorgeous with no seaweed! My girls got their hair braided on the beach- walk to the left just past the FC section and look for the blue tarp. My kids went to kids club most days from 3-5 for some indoor activities for a sun break. They loved it!! We had to line up around 2:45 to guarantee their spot. We got to spend a little time on the adult side during this time which was really fun! There was a lively bunch with activities at the main pool and also a quiet pool. I also went to yoga one morning which was a great class in a beautiful setting and went to the spa for the water ritual which was also really nice! We booked a snorkeling and cenote swimming excursion with tours with Mike. We loved it! We also walked down the beach one morning into playa del Carmen for breakfast and a little shopping. That was awesome and I’m so glad we did it. 5th avenue is awesome to experience! I felt completely safe.. actually probably safer than I feel at home in NY! Some helpful things we brought: insulated cups with extra straws, sound machine for sleeping, clothes line for drying wet clothes on the balcony, pool floats, garbage bags to use for dirty laundry, and zip lock bags- made a pb and j at the breakfast buffet for a filling snack for the kids during the day. No one said anything! Check out was also super quick and easy. We checked out the evening before bc we left early in the morning. Bags were picked up right on time and it was seamless. We had a wonderful time. The resort is so so family friendly.. we truly felt like ours kids could be kids and we could actually relax. The food was good, room was great, staff was amazing, and activities were great. We will return!!

Overall, we were very pleased with Melia properties in Spain and tried the Paradisus for 9 nights/10 days. First and foremost, I will get a FAQ out of the way: Is the Family Concierge worth the upgrade? ...In my humble opinion, YES it was worth the upgrade. Our concierge, Eduardo Gamboa, takes care of your dining and experience reservations and is available via WhatsApp. Furthermore, they go out of their way to make the trip memorable for the kids with gifts and in room scavenger hunts, etc. This upgrade comes with a local cenote tour that would typically run $120+ per person and a dinner for the adults at the steakhouse that typically would be al la carte. Finally, the Family Concierge level gives access to a heated family pool with its own swim up bar and the Lunchbox Cafe - an al la carte restaurant that was of the highest quality for breakfast and lunch. So my recommendation is to splurge on the concierge level. Now about the rest of the property and amenities: PROS: The property is HUGE and mostly well maintained. The kids club is very clean with an attentive staff and low ratios. So low, that there is a first come first served queue for evening drop off with only 8 slots in the under 5 years old category. The resort is very family friendly with a lot of shows and activities. For the most part, the food is really good and higher quality than most regional all inclusive resorts (except for Spain where Meliá really impressed us). Highly recommend the taqueria and the Lunchbox (reserved for family concierge) restaurants. The Italian restaurant was great with wood fired pizzas and pasta, but saw some day-to-day inconsistency. The property also hosted a lot of pop up food booths and a big fiesta on the weekly basis (but not on the same day). The local wildlife, consisting of coati, turtles, koi, and cats, was an added bonus in entertaining us. Our concierge was exceptional and most of the staff was very friendly and polite. We got a full suite that was spacious and nicely decorated. The spa facility, located in the adults only “La Perla” side was very nice. The decor, art, and common spaces were well aligned with a 5-star resort rating. CONS: One of the big cons is the resort is set back from the ocean, meaning NONE of the rooms have an ocean view. The restaurant service staff was mixed in their attitudes and kindness and the quality of the food varied from day to day. The coffee is all based on Nespresso pods, which should assure patrons of some consistency; however, oddly this was not the case with some drinks being good but others not. Also, the show schedules sent by the concierge and shown in the app regularly differed from actual locations which was a reoccurring challenge and resulted in us being late or missing some of the shows. This is a gap that should be remedied. Finally, our room suffered intermittent power outages, mainly during the afternoon during peak air conditioning loads and also had a reoccurring scent of sewer gas. Maintenance came to address but did nothing to resolve it - likely a case of core infrastructure deficiency in venting or pee-traps to prevent it from coming in. These were small, but not insignificant things that make us rate it 4 out of 5 stars overall.

Amazing trip, amazing service! Special shout out to Eduardo Gamboa for taking care of us! He took the time to get to know our likes, dislikes and what we were looking for. He left sweet and personalized g...ifts for our kids in the room daily. Would definitely recommend Paradisus in Playa del Carmen if you’re looking for a great family vacation resort.