Riu Palace Peninsula

I'll start by saying that my review might have criticisms that have to do with inconsiderate people and small children. I'm aware the Palace Penninsula is not Adults-only, so my critiques are not of the resort, but things that affected my trip. The Palace Penninsula is a beautiful resort, the lobby is "Prince's Dream" with a purple deco with lots of flash. It was December, so the Xmas decorations were up and were tasteful and looked wonderful. The check-in staff was very nice, got us our room "in a quiet area, on a upper floor" just as we requested. Bell staff was quick to bring our bags and show us basic features of the room. THE ROOM The room was very nice, a big comfy bed with only two sheets and a blanket in the closet if you get cold. The AC works great to keep the temp to whatever you want. There is a mixture of soap, conditioner, bath kit, shampoo etc if you need it and a little hair dryer along with two sinks. The sinks are in the main room as is access to the large shower. The toilet is in a small closet by itself. (I'll get to that later) The closet has a small safe for valuables, iron board and iron, R, and bags for cleaning service. There is a very small TV in the room, dresser, little table and chair too. It was a very nice room, but not without it's issues. We did have a view on the 10th floor that is beautiful and you can see Playa Mujares in the distance. The cleaning staff was good, but inconsistent. We started with 4 towels, some days we had 2, 3, or 4 (when we asked for more or took from cleaning cart in the hallway) The sinks have glass around them for drinking, but you don't notice they are right in front of a little sticker on the mirror that says Non-potable water. I didn't drink the water, but did brush my teeth with it until I noticed the sticker. Lastly, the toilet closet does not have a fan and has a large vent in the door. The hard walls inside act like echo chamber for any sounds you don't wish to share from the toilet. Many people talk about diarrhea is rampant in the hotel, so you can share the audio with your loved ones if you catch it. RESTAURANTS The main buffet is very nice, lots to choose from for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. Each station seems to change each day offering deliciousness for you to choose. Breakfast was mostly the same each day and did get a little old after 7 days. Lunch typically had by the pool, so I won't comment on that. Dinner we had in the buffet when we didn't goto the restaurants, didn't like what was served there, or we just went in for desserts. Accoustically the buffet is a big hallow room, so hear each other was hard unless we ate outside toward the open balcony areas or in the Steakhouse area. The Steakhouse was our favorite!!! The choices of Huge Lobster, Filet, NY strip steak, Skewers of shrimp and Chicken were awesome. We saw many people get two Lobsters if you are into that! (my girlfriend got two also...shhhh) The Italian restaurant was a big disappointment that we tried as it opened earlier than the others and we were starving when we arrived. I got a piece of lasagna that looked like leather and my girlfriend got to lamb chops that had little meat on them. At the same time the table next to our got really good looking food and chops with tons of meat. The saving factor of the Italian restaurant is it has a small buffet table to fill where the entres fail. No great, but filled us. The Mexican restaurant was the last one we went to as we love the Steakhouse and didn't try the others. The food here was very good, but wasn't spectacular. There was a buffet also to save the meal. THE POOL There are 4 main pools at the PP, the activity pool, Infinity pool, "long pool", and bar pool. The pools are gorgeous at the PP, but not without issues. There is one bar pool that has swim-up service we stayed near most days. The other bar is on the North end in the sandy area and rather out of place. There are TONS of servers to get your drinks to you though. Around our 3 day there, they switched for plastic straws to paper straws that disolve in your drink within minutes. We brought thermal cups and silicon straws with us as we have seen resorts go "Straw free" in the past. The paper straws are terrible, but it's how it's going lately. The bar pool was great, great service, etc. This was until around noon when the children came out. The bar pool is saltwater and the warmest of all the pools. The Infinity pool and "long" pool are freezing, although the long pool is the coldest. I assume the little kids don't like the cold water, so we soon found them in the shallow are swim-up bar jumping off the built-in lounge chairs and whatever around. Invariably hurting themselves on the changing depth and screaming with tears over the "party" music above. The adults were worse in some cases as the idiots would bring their own music and try and mix with the music already playing and singing loudly. It was sad but people are themselves, rude and stupid. We ended up moving for a quieter place although there is no real quite place except maybe in the villas. We did think about booking there, but wanted the views before the exclusive adults-only area. We did notice though, the loudest people we encountered were staying at the villas, so you can't always escape stupid. LOCATION The PP is not located in the "downtown" Cancun areas with lots around. To get there you would need to take a bus in either direction for around $1 US. The Riu Caribe is next door and you have privileges to go there too along with other RIUs I'm told if you go that far. The best part of where the PP is located is the ferry to Playa Mujares. It's about $21 RT each and you can goto spend a day driving a golf cart around the island getting a different taste of Mexico. Entertainment The entertainment at night was for kids first and more adult later at night. That said, to get good seats you need to sit through the Kids stuff, so I never saw the Adult presentations. Oh well. All in All, the Riu Palace Penninsula is a nice resort. For someone who wants to drink and sun all day, there is lots here. For the wanderer who takes the bus, you can see the malls in both directions and wander the hot spots. If you are a little fearful of buses and the safety, there is very little around the resort for you. I do recommend going to Playa Mujares completely as it was the best day of my trip. I might try one other RIU if it's adults only, but I probably won't return to the Palace Penninsula. One last note... This hotel seems very focused on the Europeans and smoking is allowed everywhere, coming from Michigan, this was hard to get used to.

We visited this hotel in November 2019, loved it. The staff the hotel and food were all fantastic. My only advice to this hotel would be to have an age limit on the swim up bar! Several kids spilling drinks in the pool, parents should manage it but didn't, also I did see a young girl jump off a bar stool in the bar and that's an accident waiting to happen!! All these things should be controlled by good parents but they were too busy enjoying themselves or thought it acceptable. Nothing is too much trouble for the staff here, we holiday at least 4 times a year and this is the best hotel we've stayed in. The food had everything you could wish for, steak, seafood, mild or hot and every restaurant we went to it was delicious.

The gentleman at the water sports booths are extremely unhelpful to the point of rude. We chose this hotel because there were a variety of sports equipment provided. We have not been able to use any of it. Even though the coastal authority said it was OK for water sports today, they would not even let us take out a anything unless there was a charge for it. In other words The per pay activities are available but the included activities are not available. The booth to get the equipment is extremely inconvenient for the peninsula hotel. I asked several different stations and they all said I had to go to the next station in. When I said that was a long walk I was told by a young boy that they were laughing at how heavy I am. One person Said to get Snorkeling atthis place and then he said it wasn’t there and we had to go back across the beach to the furthest point yet again. If it wasn’t for the situation with the included water sports, we would give this hotel a five star definitely. All the other service has been super excellent.