TripAdvisor Traveler Rating

Relaxing stay with a very nice resort. Fairly small to what I'm used to but you do have the little town to walk around which has the marina and dolphins to watch. Food has been really good with quite good... choice especially bloved but this is with privilege package. Staff are really friendly and helpful. Housekeeping and resort in general is very clean and maintained. I would say the entertainment is more geared to families with children. But I have enjoyed the aqua fit most days. Still have a few days left and would say the only negatives are the food booking system. It worked fine when we arrived booked a few days then it just said no availability on anything at anytime. We tried to ask concierge and they just tried selling the exclusive members package, instead of trying to sort. Luckily we can use bloved without reservation (which is lovely) but not great system. We did also think they may have given a nice touch in our room for wedding anniversary as they had asked if here for special occasion, but nothing which was ABIT disappointing. But all in all has been good relaxing holiday, worth upgrading just so you get the beach without sargassam and bloved restaurant.

We were at the Catalonia for a week starting 5/06/2025. We have been there several times before and are never disappointed. The grounds are beautiful. The staff is amazing! We love seeing Ivan at the steak...house. Everyone is friendly and happy to help. We always book privileged to use the privileged beach area and eat at Beloved. The food seems to get better each time we go and we had no problem booking restaurant reservations although the food at the snack bar and the buffet were very good. We always book a privileged suite and our only con is the room could use a little refresher but it was always clean and had everything we needed. I saw a review indicating drinking water was hard to get. If you run out of water from the bottles the staff provides in your room, just call the front desk. They will happily bring more water to your room. Additionally water is always available at the Buffett and bars. No vacation will ever be perfect, but the staff at the Catalonia is what brings us back every time!

Our Privileged suite was really nice and roomy. Enjoyed the tub! Pool side service was non-existent, which was disappointing. Irving from entertainment and Saul from the Mercado Buffet stood out from t...he rest. Night entertainment was a lot of fun!

This was the greatest vacation of my life. If you are looking for a resort stay that is navigable, plenty of food options, happy welcoming staff, swim-up bars, lots of free activities all day, 3 gorgeous p...ools, and wonderful spa treatments (including a unique hydrospa experience) look no further! Very clean environment. Gorgeous views. Definitely going to come back next year. Met some people who have come 27 years in a row, and I get why! The pictures don't do it justice. If you are reading this, book your trip to Catalonia Riviera Maya. You won't regret it. Such a steal for the price.

Catalonia Riviera Maya review: This is long, please take a few minutes to read it. Here is my honest review. The good, the bad and the ugly. Including a very VERY serious warning for travelers with medica...l conditions. My partner and I stayed in a Privileged Romance Room (6107-building 12) from April 29 - May 7. We met up with some travel friends down there. For reference, we live in a 22 ft camper (with access to a house for facilities and cooking). So it’s not hard to please us. This is our 4th trip to Mexico. The first 3, we stayed at GRP. They are undergoing renovations and were wicked shady/lying about closures. This was our first time at Catalonia Riviera Maya. Drinks: 2/10. This is being generous. This resort uses artificial sweeteners for their juices. (Think, melted sugar free snow cone). Parts of the resort use real juice. (Beloved and Mah Loo). The resort does not make “mixed” shots such as snakebites, minions etc. There’s also no rhyme or reason for the drinks they give. You can order one drink from the same bartender at the same bar and get it different ways each time.. ??Scary medical situation: I am a type 1 diabetic with a Dexcom sensor and insulin pump. I have pretty good control over my blood sugars and can care for myself. On Saturday May 3, 2025 my blood sugar dropped to 50. I had multiple glasses of orange juice from the lobby bar. It wouldn’t go up. My Dexcom stops reading at 40 and it was reading LOW ???? (which means I was probably in the 20’s the arrows mean it’s dropping fast) that is borderline coma. I’m unaware of what happened after that (I blacked out) but apparently I had sugar packets and some nuts. After a while, I ended up ok but it took 24 hours for me to feel like myself again. The point of this story is if you’re experiencing hypoglycemia, PLEASE DO NOT GET THE JUICE!!!!!!! IT WILL NOT WORK. And well, you could end up dead. Use sugar packets!! Grab a bunch from the lobby bar and keep them with you. The staff do not understand diabetes despite trying to explain it. THIS IS CRUCIAL!!!!! For this reason ^ I will not be back until they stop using the artificial sweeteners in juices. Simple fix. Food: 8/10. My favorite was the bourbon ribs at the steakhouse. Fell off the bone and melted in my mouth. Delicious!! Ayami was so good as well. Interactive and flavorful. Don’t forget to get the fried coconut ice cream!! (I don’t like coconut but I loved it anyway. Try it!) The buffets were great though there was no real variety. Same stuff each day. There’s plenty of options so it worked out for us. We aren’t picky. I recommend getting a cheeseburger at the snack buffet and adding Mac & cheese to it. So good!!! The food was sooo much better than GRP. We were HIGHLY impressed. Room: The room was clean and nice. We walked into chocolates, sparkling wine and a fruit basket. (Some of the fruit was bad). The plunge pool was very nice. We were facing the “road” so we had more privacy. We enjoyed that. The temperature in our room was comfortable. We kept the blinds closed throughout the day to help keep the sun/heat out. Many of our friends stayed in the Privileged romance deluxe room. They did not have a plunge pool. The balcony is very small, chairs barely fit. There’s absolutely 0 logic as to why it costs more for the deluxe romance than the romance. There’s also no elevator so you’ll be bringing that luggage down at the end of your stay. How deluxe… Don’t do the deluxe romance!!!!!! Housekeeping: Make sure you put all valuables away and do not leave any cash in sight. We had our phone pouches on the table with less than $5 in them. We came back to the room to a paper on the bed that said they couldn’t clean the room because we didn’t lock our valuables up. At least we knew our stuff was safe! If you need something restocked, write a short note to housekeeping. They will restock. Or press 0 on your phone and let them know what you need. They are pretty quick! Our fridge and coffee was not restocked unless we asked with a note or phone call. We were frustrated that our water wasn’t replenished automatically. It’s very hard to find water to drink around the resort before 11am. Even if a bartender is there, they will not serve you water. (Except the lobby bar). For this reason ^ we will not be back to this resort until water becomes more accessible around the resort/pools instead of just at the lobby. Again, easy fix. Room Service: We enjoyed room service a few times. We made sure to order by 10pm so that we had something for a midnight snack. I enjoyed the cheeseburger. Concierge: Carlos is amazing! He was very helpful with any questions we had. Anytime he saw us, he’d stop and chat. Go find him if you need anything. He’ll be happy to help! We did mention our complaints to him as well. ETC: We decided to attend the 90 min presentation. We were quite bored and figured we could use the coupons they gave us. We also wanted to see the rooms. We’ve never attended one of these things before. I truly did not feel pressured. I asked the guy if say in 2 years we can’t financially do it, could we cancel. He said “of course! You just stop paying. By then you’ve already paid the majority of it.” I asked to read the terms and conditions prior to signing/paying. In the t&c it states that you have 3 days from signing to cancel for a full refund. If you use any services, that is void. No where does it state you can cancel and stop paying after that. I told him I would speak to my attorney and confirm the logistics before signing. He shook my hand and we left with our coupons. We enjoyed seeing the rooms and using the virtual headset for a 3D view of the other resort rooms. Activities: There’s activities hourly from 10a-9p. We didn’t find the daytime activities to be very fun other than water aerobics and water Zumba. We enjoyed the 5 min walk down the dock to see the dolphins every day. We also got to see a dolphin get an endoscopy on our first day. Very cool! I highly recommend the royal swim and the photos. We got 122 photos for less than $160 USD. Buy the royal swim on Groupon prior to coming. We paid about $90 each. Some of the people at the marina can be pushy regarding tours (more pushy than ETC). Just say “no gracias” and keep moving. As so many other reviews mention, book a golf cart with Paul. Located at the main lobby entrance. $50 for 12 hours. We took the carts to the main entrance of Puerto Aventuras and parked. Walk out of the security area and take a right. Walk the pedestrian bridge. Go straight until just after the gas station. You’ll see Chedraui. Just like a super Walmart. Buy your souvenirs there for a fraction of the cost you’d pay at the resort. It’s about a 10 min walk from the security entrance. Will we be back: We’d love to come back as we are obsessed with the community. Dolphins are less than 5 mins away!!! However, I will not be back until a few things have changed (as suggested in this review). They NEED to have water more accessible at all hours. Especially since you cannot drink the tap water without risking getting sick and they NEED to lay off the artificial sweeteners and use real juice. No one wants to drink a melted snow cone for a week…