We stayed in the Zoetry hotel in Mexico. Our twin centre family holiday to Cuba and Mexico was just the perfect combination. Instead of staying in Cuba and heading to Varadero (the largest resort in the Caribbean with 20km of uninterrupted beach) for a few days R & R after our full-on Havana experience, we jumped on a less than an hour flight to Cancun and spent the next week cruising around the Riviera Maya. It was a good decision – so much to do around that region of Mexico and it was cheaper than staying in Cuba, thanks to the exchange rate of the Peso.
I’m going to have to write about our experience in Mexico in several posts because there was so much to do and our swimming with whale sharks deserves a post all of it’s own because it was so extraordinary.
So firstly….a review of our Zoetry hotel. On the whole excellent, but with the worst spa experience we have ever had. There are many choices of hotels in the state of Yucatan and the Riviera Maya but we chose an all inclusive hotel (a very important consideration when your children are all nearly over six foot and consume their body weight in food and drink on a regular basis) called Zoetry Paraiso De La Bonita about half an hour away from Cancun airport. A gorgeous hotel with fabulous grounds and lovely big airy rooms. Our room was overlooking the sea and had a plunge pool in it – couldn’t have been happier with the space.
Here we have just arrived in Cancun to be picked up by the hotel in luxury:-
Our room view:-
Our room with a sunset view:-
The view from our room with iguanas posing:-
Little flowers on our beds every night was a lovely touch:-
They had a number of restaurants included on site – all of which slightly struggled to cope with the group of 12 that we were, which was surprising given the numbers of groups they seemed to be hosting from America. The food was good but it would have been great if they had a dedicated Mexican restaurant, instead of changing the cuisine daily as we didn’t ever get a chance to try their Mexican fare. The food around the pool area was excellent and we went through far more Pina Coladas than we should have.
Breakfast was fabulous in a restaurant overlooking the pool and the beach and we enjoyed strolling from our rooms in the morning, looking out for all the wildlife on the way.
A little hummingbird at breakfast time:-
One of the numerous iguanas that roam the hotel:-
One of the many parrots they had at the hotel:-
They even had a resident crocodile:-
Breakfast – which they happily set for 12 every morning:-
Here is my team off to dinner:-
The pool and beach area were fantastic, but there is quite a large development being built at the moment which takes away some of the peace and tranquility of the place.
The palm tree colours:-
Charming photo of my children:-
The pool at sunset:-
The best yoga location ever:-
The people that worked there were lovely and very attentive to our needs, except when they were a bit busy and there were too many of us….
But I’m afraid our spa experience was a disaster, so be warned.
Given that they pride themselves on the spa and wellness, it was a real shame that we had such a bad experience, which they seemed unable to resolve. My daughter, who is still recuperating from her knee operation was very keen to have a massage, so I gave her my voucher to get a discount off the back massage and facial. Basically – half way through her massage she became aware that the masseur was no longer using two hands to massage her back. All she could feel was one hand circling her lower back, followed by a few distracted taps of the fingers. After 15 minutes of this she looked up from the hole in the bed to find out what was going on only to find her masseur on her phone!
Texting.
Which explained the distracted tapping she was getting intermittently. Instead of admitting it and apologising, she instead tried to cover it up by immediately pointing the phone at the ceiling lights in order to pretend that she was trying to turn up the lighting. Then she also said she was trying to turn up the music and because my daughter looked so astounded that she could try and fool her so ridiculously she even bothered to go out of the room and shout to a colleague that she was trying to turn up the music and could they help. I mean honestly. How bad is that? My daughter complained to the woman in charge and they offered her a complimentary second massage which I thought was reasonable. However, when the final bill came in they had charged me for the original massage, so I went to complain. At that point, the manager on duty told me that my daughter must be mistaken (i.e. a liar) and that they are not allowed to have phones in their rooms therefore they wouldn’t refund me the cost of the massage because she was clearly wrong. The hotel management did agree to look into it for me and get back to me once they had had a full and proper discussion about it with the spa manager. So I had to pay for the massage and as I write, I am still waiting to hear back from them about the outcome of the discussion.
The other thing to be wary about is using the all inclusive washing service. We all lost items and received others items that didn’t belong to us on return, making the free service rather dubious.
Apart from that, we had a lovely time and once they sort out their spa staff, I would most definitely go back.
