We traveled to the Grand Mayan Palace Resort this past week. What a Beautiful resort! Stunning! I LOVE the smell of the entry into the lobby of the resort. Such an exotic perfume smell that reminded me of beautiful Pismo Beach. Our 2 bedroom 2 bath suite was perfect for my family. There is a small grocery store also available for buying water jugs but otherwise we mostly ate at the many restaurants in the resort since buying groceries at the small market is more expensive. The prices are the cost of a dinner in the US in California, about $25-35 per person. There is AC in the units which was muchly needed since we arrived the hottest 2 weeks of the year, with humidity bringing the temp close to 107 degrees for the first couple days--the pools are salt water and they were warm and hot. So, we moved to different pools that were cooler. For example, the infinity pool, less people and cooler temp inside the water. You will love seeing the numerous iguanas every morning laying out on the wooden walk ways. What an adventurous SURPRISE and soo much fun to see them because you don't see large iguanas walking around in regular life on your walk to your house mailbox.

Upon arrival at the Grand Mayan Resort we were immediately greeted by Ericks big smile and warm welcome. He proceeded to provide us with an overview of the resort, must see and do activities, and how to best navigate. His professionalism extended through the trip as he continued to be a resource to make our stay there the best it could be….. and it was! Thanks Erick and Staff.

This was my second stay at a Vidanta property in the last 12 months. And like the last time, it was disappointing. The property itself is beautiful. But sadly, that is about the only positive thing I can say.
Check-in/Check-out
There is a members line. But it was almost never staffed during our stay. Check in was VERY slow. Even though we arrived after 6:00pm, the room was not ready. During registration, we were asked for a deposit of $2000. This deposit was not mentioned in anything of the hotel confirmation or information that was sent ahead of time. So I refused. Then I was told that the least they would accept was $1500. I opted to pay by credit card instead of leaving the deposit and charging everything to the room. What the resort failed to tell me was that there was a "problem" with all US credit cards. So anytime I tried to charge something, the charge would not go through. After several trips to the front desk to deal with the problem, I was asked if I wanted to just leave a deposit. Of course that was the plan all along. We agreed to a $700 deposit. But funny thing, there was NO problem using the credit card at the high end restaurants. So clearly there is not really a problem with US credit cards.
Check out was also very slow.
Room:
When we finally arrived in our room, we discovered that the room was in need of a serious update. Furniture is old, beaten up, and tired looking. The kitchen stove was in bad shape. The kitchen was missing many items necessary to be able to cook a meal. For example, the only sharp knife was very large, and totally impossible to use for most jobs.
But what was a bit shocking for this type of resort was the fact that we did not have hot water for a few days! The first couple of days it was luke warm part of the time. But on the third day, when we wanted to wash dishes, it was cold. Maintenance did fix the problem. But I would have expected management to be in contact with us. They finally did call the room. On the last morning, as we were getting ready to check-out. Funny enough, that was after we filled out a survey and mentioned the issue.
Information:
Finding accurate information about resort activities is a challenge. For example, there is a Lake Show. On the app, it said it started at 7:00pm and that it was an awesome experience. When we arrived at the restaurant, we were told it started at 7:30. The show lasted less than 10 minutes. The food was good, otherwise it would have been a waste of time. Then somewhere else we saw that there is another Lake Show, starting at 10:00pm on certain nights. We assume that this is the "awe-inspiring" experience that was advertised.
Food:
There are complaints about the prices in other reviews. The restaurant prices are not much more than what we pay in California. But things like coffee are way over-priced. And the overall quality of the food is not great. For example, during our visit a few years ago, we ate crepes at Sweet Paris. They were very good. We were looking forward to eating there again. Pretty hard to get crepes wrong. But they managed! One of the 3 we ordered we actually had to return because the bananas inside were so bad. The price was also way too high. The bill was more than $50 for the 3 crepes. There were two exceptions - La Cantina, and Tramonto both had great food and the price was reasonable for the quantity and quality. I recommend both.

If I did not have a membership, I would not go back.