Gala Resort - Playacar
Written: Oct 10 '03
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Best Beach, Best kid's program, no hidden costs, beautiful diving
Cons: Rock hard beds, need to "reserve" pool/beach chairs, little follow through
The Bottom Line: Mayan Riviera is a beautiful destination with friendly locals, beautiful scenery, great history and lots of activities.
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| sierrra's Full Review: Cancun |
This is a very long review so if you want lots of detail – happy reading. We stayed for a week at the Gala Resort Playacar 4/19/03 - 4/26/03. We had a group of 12 – 9 adults and 3 kids (ages 7,7 & 11). I read all the online reviews before we went to prepare and was glad that I did. First, we booked through Apple vacations and got a great price – total of $3400 for 2 adults and 1 child (they broke it out as $1565/adult and $270/child). This included r/t airfare from Oakland, CA to Cancun and back on American, transfers to and from airport and 7 nights at Gala. We booked 7 months in advance because we were going at Spring Break. Apple was prompt with tickets and even had to reissue two tickets because of incorrect names (our mistake, not theirs which was discovered five days before we were scheduled to leave!) and did it with no charge and within two days! The reps on site left a little to be desired but I will get to that later. The flights were on time with minimum lay over in Dallas. The “More room in Coach” that American advertises really does make a difference. My husband is 6ֺ” and did not have his knees touching the seat in front of him like he does on other airlines. We were warned repeatedly that when you land in Cancun, that all of the “information booths” are time-share people – they are!! They actually are quite nice and fine with you just nodding and walking right past them. What we weren’t prepared for was that as you start to exit the terminal with your baggage, if you have a cart, they stop you and tell you to take off your baggage. As you are taking it off, a porter runs up and grabs it and starts putting it on his cart. You sometimes have to fight to get it back. So if you do not want to have to tip a porter to take your bags outside, keep a good grip on them. Our transfer was waiting outside and we had no problem getting to the hotel. It is about a 45-minute ride. Check in was very smooth – they had everything ready. We had requested to have all five rooms close and they were all in a line with only 2 rooms in between us. We were in Room Tower 2 close to the pool and Ola-la restaurant – very convenient. The rooms are large and clean but definitely not five star – but after reading the reviews, we did not expect that so were quite happy with them. The king bed is wider than the ones we have in California, which was nice, but they are as hard as a rock!!! I like firm beds but by the end of the week, my hips hurt (I am a side sleeper). The maids do come twice a day – once to clean and then turn down. We always seem to be missing something small after cleaning (a washcloth, hand towel, extra towel) but the linen closet was across from us and I just got use to helping myself. It is no problem to call and they will bring it but I found it faster to do it myself. The minibar is a joke. It isn’t very cold and is very leaky. In fact, the minibar in the room next to ours leaked under the wall and into our closet – luckily, it did not ruin my shoes. There were minor maintenance items that I noticed – paint on dressers, closet door sticks, etc. but again, my expectation were not that high. The bathrooms were larger than I was expecting with nice size showers. Great hot water pressure but the cold trickled out – the opposite of what you normally encounter in a hotel! They advertise four pools which is a little misleading. There is the adult pool and the other “three pools” are really one big pool with connecting shallow areas. But there was plenty of room in the pools. Not so with the chairs – you really do need to get out early and put towels out to reserve chairs. No umbrellas around the chairs – just the tables so very little shade at the pool. On the beach, however, the palaypas provides great shade – but again, you must get out early to reserve them. The beach was spectacular!! White, soft sand with turquoise green water – my dive computer said the temperature was 82 degrees – really wonderful!! It was very shallow and great for the kids. We only had one day with a red flag that had a very strong current. Bargain with any beach activity you want to do – they said Banana boat ride was $15 a person – we got him down to $12 and then watched as the next group got him to agree to $10! We never saw any peddlers on the beach selling items like I am use to all over Mexico – a part of me sort of missed it – not sure why!!
The food at the buffets was okay to good – depending on what you got. I am extremely picky about food but could always find something to eat. Again, I was not expecting gourmet food so was not overly disappointed. We did not eat at the Italian restaurant since it didn’t seem like any one like it but ate at the Mexican one twice. The food was much better than the buffets and you really do have to get in line at 8 in the morning to make reservations two days in advance. My husband did get food poisoning the first time we ate there – he had the Flan for dessert and was sick all night!! Yes, we ate there again and no, he did not have the Flan so we are giving them the benefit of the doubt that it was a one shot occurrence. We were there when the hotel was oversold and expected to have long waits for drinks at the beach or pool. Never happened – there always seemed to be some one there to take your orders. We did order two drinks at a time to save time but found the service to be efficient and friendly. Yes, we did tip for drinks and at meals, but only if a waiter had to bring us something. If we got it ourselves, we did not tip.
For scuba divers – the diving is right from the hotel and I felt very comfortable with the dive master. He checked and doubled checked everyone’s tanks and regulators. Beautiful and easy dives – about 10 minutes by boat from beach. One couple diving with us were staying at one of the RIU hotels and said they were quoted $160 each for a one tank dive – our hotel was $68 each for a two tank dive!! First dive had tons of turtles – I stopped counting after 10! Second dive – beautiful coral walls – a few swim throughs, lots of fish. If you have the time, Cozumel is only a ferry ride away and has spectacular diving.
The staff is at the Gala are extremely enthusiastic and hard working. They have water basketball, aerobics, bingo, music trivia, ping-pong tournament, etc. all day long. I now know why several reviews mentioned - AAYAH, AAYAH.... OOOOOH, OOOOH!!! It gets on your nerves but you learn to ignore it! The activities were great and kept the kids occupied. Unfortunately, we had a major fiasco the last day. My 7-year-old son won the ping-pong tournament the last day we were there. They make a big deal out of the winners every night at the shows – bringing them on stage and presenting them with award certificates and prizes. He was told to make sure and be there by 9 pm to get a good seat. He talked about it all day – worried that we would not be done with dinner on time and was feeling very important! We were in our seats by 9 pm – show starts at 9:30, hum… they didn’t call up winners. We waited thinking they would do it at a natural break – no. Half way through, we remind a staff member that Connor was waiting in the audience to get his prize – no problem, we were told, they will do it at the end. Now it is at the end and they are introducing the cast – my husband and I grab the MC and remind him yet again that Connor is waiting – no problem, we are again told. All of a sudden – it is over and everyone leaves!!! Now, as a parent, to see your child be totally let down and disappointed and not understanding why they ignored him but no one else the rest of the week, you start to see red. I will completely admit that at this point, I become rather emotional and vocal. We went backstage and confronted the cast and was told – Oh, sorry, it wasn’t “that kind of show”!!! Not sure what that meant unless it was to cover up their mistake. They came out and handed him a certificated that had the name “Andrew” on it – his name is Connor - and an adult’s t-shirt. I marched to the front desk and asked for the hotel manager and, yes, I admit, I let him have it. I know that I was out of hand and probably shocked the manager with my anger but I felt that no guest, especially a child, should be disappointed as thoroughly as he was. He had no explanation as to why it happened since the prizes are always given at the show and the he asked what he could do to make it up to my son and I told him nothing, since we were leaving the next morning. He said he would think of something. We made up a story for my son that the computers were down and that they were going to fix the certificate. The next morning, when we went to check out, they did make a big deal for Connor. They had balloons, candy and a ceramic box and several staff dressed up as cartoon characters and took pictures with him. And, most importantly, they had a certificate with his name on it and not some one else’s. It did make up for it but it overall left a horrible last impression of the hotel.
As for the Apple rep on site – they are nice but you have to stay on top of them. We booked two trips for 12 each. One to Coba and one to Xcaret – both were great and I highly recommend them. However, the Apple rep, Eduardo, was not good at details and quoted the wrong times for busses and assured us that we would have a private van to Xcaret since we had 12 people and the vans only fit 12 people. The van thing was not true – it is a tour bus – minor detail but, again, misinformation. We did find out the right times ourselves but it was irritating to have to work to get the right information yourselves! When we mentioned this to the replacement rep – Ana – her comment was “I know, Eduardo got too busy and let some details slide”. Our transfer to leave also had slight problems – they only had four of us listed so I grabbed Ana. She looked at me like she had never seen me before and asked if everyone had come to her office with the transfers. I rather pointedly reminded her that when that I specifically asked if she needed everyone to come down and she, several times, said no, that she would put all twelve on my voucher. She had to call her office and told me another bus was coming for the other 8 people but four of us had to go now on this bus. When the second bus came, he had all 12 of us on his list and had to spend 15 minutes finding Ana and clearing up everything with her. Yes, we all got to the airport with plenty of time but again; it was not as we were told. We found that to be the case not only with the Apple rep, but also with the front desk and Public relations (concierge desk) staff. You would ask for something, they would smile and say yes. You would ask for it a certain way – no problem you were told but it never quite worked out that way. We figure that they were trained to just say yes to anything just to get you to walk away. All in all, they were minor irritations but are worth mentioning to be aware of. You are in a different country and things just don’t get done as well or as correctly as you are use to.
For you shoppers, the shopping in the Playacar area is as good if not better than going into Playa del Carmen but it is smaller. If you have the time, do both. If time is limited, go to Playacar – you can walk or ride bikes from hotel (about 5 minutes away).
Now, would I go back to the Gala – maybe! We talked with a lot of quests that have been coming there for years and most seem to think the Gala is the best on that stretch of beach, primarily for its location and size. PLUSES – Best beach, medium size so not too spread out, Good waiters/waitresses, decent (not great) food, nice size rooms, friendly staff, extremely kid friendly, Security very evident. MINUSES – older hotel so more run down, rock hard beds, Front desk not good with details, little to no shade at pool, buffet food got very repetitive. All in all, at the price that we paid, we more than felt like we got our money’s worth. No, this is not a five star hotel by American standards (more like a 3 1/2) but more than adequate to enjoy the beautiful Mayan Riviera.
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Families
Best Time to Travel Here: Mar - May
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Epinions.com ID:
sierrra
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Reviews written: 5
Trusted by: 0 members
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