The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: First off, a big shout out to Keith & Beth, Nate & Christy, New York Dan, Danny and Dave Tiff & Andy, and Dave & Maria - you made our trip what it was! A hat tip to Bruce, Ryan et al, Evan & Genoa, Sherman and Kirk, the two Scottish lads whos names escape me at the moment, and a whole host of others that made our trip bloody magic! The Good: Pretty much everything. The staff are excellent, including the entertainment staff, the waiters, the chefs, the maids - all were excellent and did a fantastic job. The place was spotless! Just a quick word, tip the guys raking up the seaweed on the beach and mowing the lawns - the bar staff get a lot of (well deserved) tips, but these guys are often forgotten. A shout to Hector and LouLou - these guys are funny! The food: Better than average at worst, at best, excellent - especially the Seafood/Steak place next to the quiet pool. I heard some people moan about the breakfast, but to be fair, that's the one place where EVERYONE is eating, and to cook for that many people is not easy. I personally thought that they did a fantastic job. If you want to do the excursions, go to Brad, the American opposite the resort and to the left of the Oxxo. He's cheap(er) - although not the cheapest (there's only a few dollars in it) , but he's honest, and he'll tell you exactly what to expect. His boss' brother owns the place, so he has no rent to pay, so can be cheaper than most. We did the jungle tour through him and it was brilliant, we'd definitely use him again WHEN we go back ;-) If you go to Chichen Itza, make sure to have small dollar amounts on you - it's much easier for bartering, and watch the mask makers - the ones you see them making are made from wood - the ones they try to sell to you are clay moldings! Take a hat, and a tonne of water! It's a LONG day! 12 hours door to door in searing heat! One of the funniest things I have ever seen was Keith's sunscreen reacting with the chlorine in the pool and turning him green! "Don't make him angry". Also, hearing an American saying "Hey Dave...can I bum a fag?" is just about one of the funniest things I've every heard! Keith - if you're reading this - the saddest day of our trip was when you guys went home! The first three days were spent in/by the sexy pool. To be honest, the games were ok, but were a little trite so we spent quite a lot more time in the quiet pool where it's easier to meet people and to get a drink; until the evening, then it was off to Paty'O's. The pool party on the Saturday night was a blast. I'm sure many people remember me pulling a glow-stick from MsDogberry's bum cheeks with my teeth in full view of the whole pool! After that episode we were surrounded by single guys almost immediately! Bruce winning the beer drinking comp was one of the highlights of our trip - I'm not sure I should say too much about the poor challenger who lost - it just wouldn't be fair to him. Of course, the entertainment guy didn't hold back at the time! Let's just say that the tiny mexican sausages you got for breakfast would have made this guy jealous! As to the *swinger* thing - sure, we were approached (somewhat more for MsDogberry than me :-( but that probably had more to do with the fact that she wore virtually nothing our whole trip from the outset) - at one point, she was squirted with breast milk in the sexy pool and was somewhat forcefully grabbed in *private areas* until our newly aquired American friends jumped in and put a stop to it (I was at the bar chatting - as per usual!). Most approaches were stopped with a short discussion and that was that - no bother at all. There was one proper serious approach, which we declined. Rather shallowly, if the girl had been pretty, we may have gone along, we may not - we'll never know. lingerie night was ok - it was a bit more like this: 5 or 6 decent looking girls in skimpy clothes being oggled by lots of men. I left early both times I attended wearing my "I'm the daddy" underwear. The resident band at Paty'Os was superb also. If you get the chance go to Coco Bongo's - yeah, sure it's packed, hot and you get knocked about a bit by the sheer volume of people, but the show(s) are fantastic. I'm not a 'club' type of person, but for this I would make an exception again! Try and get hold of Jessie by the pools selling the 'all in' tickets for 55 dollars. The Hotel will sell you the same thing for 100. The Bad: Hardly anything at all. In fact, I'm having to really think hard to put anything here at all. If you look hard enough, you can find a few areas of the place that look a little scruffy - but then, you have to look HARD! The only thing I didn't like, but fully understood, was that the pools close at 7pm apart from pool party night. I was expecting security to be a pain in the ass from reading some TRs from here, but unless you looked for them, you hardly even noticed them. The only other bad thing was that we missed the 'Boobs Cruise'. We'd even gone to bed early the night before so we didn't ruin ourselves for the next day. Over-bloody-slept! Woke up about 11am! Grrrrrr! The Ugly: There was very little trouble, and when there was, security were there almost immediately and it was dealt with swiftly and discretely. One day in the quiet pool, one chap was actually beating his wife! I had my back to it talking to Keith, who saw what was happening and shouted out to the guy...just as I was getting out of the pool to take a slash. The guy thought I was going to intervene - which I may have done had I seen what had happened - and was ordering me back in the pool with threats of violence - to which I held my hands up to show I wasn't threatening, and reiterated that I was going to the bog. Eventually they left and no more was said or done. Tips to the uninitiated: Get the beer mugs from the shop, on busy nights it's well worth it, otherwise you're walking back with a drink in your hand and by the time you leave the bar, you're returning for another. In the day, I was drinking the little cups to slow me down a little! If you smoke, buy your cigarettes from the Oxxo over the road from the hotel - they're better than half the price of the hotel shop. Also, haggle in the souvenir shops, for the most part you can haggle down to at least 50% - and only use registered cabs (or use the excellent bus service) - we heard horror stories about some cabs! PS. I've been back about 15 minutes, so am jetlagged to crap. I'll attempt to rearrange some of this later when I'm more 'with it' ;-)
I was going to mention that there were more than a few ppl hanging out almost daily by the quiet pool, now I know it was you guys. The bar def was easier to get to. Thank goodness the bar never made me wait, when it was tooo packed, my wife would go, they would take care of her immediately.
Treat TR Many thanks for the great TR, it's good to hear from a fellow Brit, we have to wait 'till next March for our next visit to TTR, reports like yours just make it worth the wait, out of interest who did you book with?
The way you posted your pics it links to porn sites which many may not appreciate. Plus lost of porn pop ups.
Glad you had fun. We have never been to the quet pool bar and enjoy the sexy pool bar. We also just got back. Sorry we missed you two.
Pics Gabez is correct, nice pics, but they come up with allkinds of porn pop-ups and sites. Good trip report, thanks! Just thought you would like to know!
Weird. I'm still not getting them. Ok, be warned, for some the pics bring porn pop-ups - don't click if offended.
