Last Christmas my family decided they wanted to go on vacation rather than doing the usual exchanging of gifts and things of the sort. When I heard they had decided that Mexico was to be the destination I was a little more than dismayed, I didn’t really want to go to Mexico, rather opting to go to somewhere like Hawaii or the Caribbean. We signed up with a Suntrips package and our hotel was the La Jolla de Mismaloya. We didn’t have any idea of what to expect and so we went on blind faith, hoping that we had chosen a nice hotel.

The La Jolla de Mismaloya is located about 20 miles from the nearest town or city, in a very secluded area, and the only other buildings were other resorts of the same sort. The La Jolla de Mismaloya was located in the center of a private cove, with hills rising to each side covered in lush green vegetation. It was one of the most beautiful places I had ever seen. The weather at the time of year was absolutely spectacular and made for doing anything you wanted perfect, whether it be swimming or hiking, whatever.

The hotel itself was absolutely gorgeous, in the true Mexican style. You arrived and the lobby was a rather small open-air room with a large chandelier hanging from the ceiling and a waterfall in the center. The grounds of the hotel were absolutely spectacular. The hotel had 2 swimming pools, two spas, and a number of tennis courts on the grounds. The main area is hedged in, a wing of the hotel to the left and the right, the lobby behind you, and the ocean straight ahead. It was picturesque.

The rooms were of fair size, a bedroom, kitchen and a living room, but all were rather small, and when you are traveling with three other people, it means two are sleeping on the couch in the living room. The rooms were not very large, but not so small that you couldn’t move around easily enough. And anyways, all your there to do is sleep in the rooms, what’s more important is what there is to do.

The La Jolla de Mismaloya has a beach party every Tuesday, where they serve the most spectacular food and there is live music and dancing. I would suggest arriving on a Tuesday, because the party was a great way to start a vacation off. After the party there are many great things you can do from the La Jolla de Mismaloya. They offer many different services, some of which you are charged for, and others which are free. We opted to go on a day tour with one of the guides and it was absolutely splendid. Other activities include Para-sailing, jet skiing, every water sport you can imagine, the list goes on.

The beaches were absolutely spectacular. The waves were very calm a peaceful, and the beach was very relaxing. There were a number of hawkers on the beach, trying to sell you things, but because the beach was private there was a roped off area where the hawkers could not enter, which was very nice if you didn’t wanted to bothered with their merchandise.

One of the downsides to the La Jolla de Mismaloya was the fact that it had only one restaurant. Every morning they served the same buffet, so there weren’t many options for eating. There were a number of family owned restaurants on the beach, and on the hills there were two very high class and expensive restaurants. My family ate at the restaurant at the hotel once in the evening, but I was quite sick that day and didn’t leave the room so I can’t comment on it.

There were a few things about the hotel that did put a damper on the experience. One of the things was that they only had two computers that were open for public access. If you are a businessman and need to work on a computer, you should bring a laptop. And if you need the Internet to do your work, you will have to pay a fee of 50 cents a minute to use it. I thought that this wasn’t very practical, and Internet and computer use should be free to anyone who needs it. Another thing was that the bar tenders had no qualms about selling alcohol to minors in the interest of gaining their patronage later. And finally there was the fact that everything on or sold around the hotel was ridiculously priced, and we found that it was more economical to pay a taxi and go to town to buy a case of soda rather than purchase it from the hotel.

Over all I would gladly return to this hotel on my next trip. I absolutely loved the beach and the surroundings, the rooms were decent and fairly priced, it is a family oriented hotel so you can bring your children (keep them away from the bars) and the service was amazing, everyone was very kind and they all spoke English and Spanish. I would suggest that you go during the down season, as it can be very crowded during the tourist season. The day we left they entered the official tourist season and the hotel was completely booked, so make arrangements well in advance.


Recommended: Yes