Here's the review that I wrote for travel websites. I plan on expanding a few spots for the forum, but it's gonna take me a day or two to post it. ------------------------------- What a wonderful time we had at Temptation! My wife and I have never been to a fun, exciting, sensual resort before. I was pretty excited about it and my wife was a little nervous about some aspects, but also excited. It was great, every part of it. I’d like to start off with a few minor negatives just to get that out of the way so I can spend more time on the positives. The bathrooms need more hooks. For towels, wet swimsuits, etc. The lighting in the bathroom was also not very good my wife said which made it tough doing hair and makeup. There’s not much space for things like phones, water bottles, Tylenol and anything else you might like within reaching distance of your bed. There was still a little bit of construction/repair type stuff happening, but most of it was hardly noticeable. Those are the negatives for us. Pretty mild, eh? Ok, on to the good!!! Carlos was our bellboy and he was great. He chatted with us the whole time during the walk to our room, and then all the way back to the front desk when we realized our room had two full beds instead of a king (which the front desk fixed for us). He was a great welcome to the hotel (we arrived late so we didn’t get the normal concierge greeting), and every time I saw him during the rest of our stay we’d have a quick chat and a high five. He was awesome and always had a big smile on his face. My wife and I both enjoy a good meal, and Temptation did not disappoint. Are they 5 star Michelin chefs running the resort? No, but the food was very good and definitely well above average for an all inclusive. The buffets were nice. Pizza, sushi, made to order omelets, a bunch of meat/poultry/seafood that you could choose from and they’d cook it right in front of you. All sorts of fresh fruits. Once you had your food you took a seat and were tending to by the wonderful, attentive wait staff. Amores was great. We went there for lunch and they had a nice salad bar and other yummy buffet options. My wife got a salad and ordered a chicken quesadilla and I had the beef fajitas. Both were pretty darn good, and that’s coming from a southern Californian that eats Mexican food multiple times a week and is fairly critical of bad Mexican food. Romanza, the Italian restaurant was delicious as well. I had the caprese salad (their creative take on a caprese) and my wife had roasted pepper salad, both were very good. For my main I ordered the pesto ravioili’s and she got the meat lasagna. Sooo good. The portion size of my meal was fairly small, but the great part about being at an all inclusive is that if you’re still hungry you just order more and it’s totally free. I however did not order more because I was looking forward to late night snacks later in the evening. The atmosphere in Romanza was nice, although it was a little loud. That may have mostly been due to the table nearest to us where the guests were having a very fun time. It definitely didn’t ruin the experience for us by any means, but it did make it a little less romantic. Sea Flirt – Great location with large windows looking out over the sea. Ok, the food here was pretty darn good. I had a salad and a steak and my wife got a salad and crispy shrimp. That being said, it was a little difficult to enjoy our meal here. It was even louder in Sea Flirt than Romanza and then they have large light installations on the entire ceiling and one wall which is constantly changing colors and patterns and flashing bright lights. Like if you have epilepsy it might cause a seizure. That’s kind of a joke, but kind of not. So between the noise and the flashing lights it definitely took away from what was a really good meal. I think our favorite restaurant was Sutra, Asian fusion. Oh man. The fresh sushi was seriously delicious. I could not get enough. I had a sea bass with curry for my main and it was scrumptious. My wife had the Pad Thai one night and a fish dish another night and those were both very good as well. They have a teppan grill table that you could reserve if you wanted, but we never did that. But you can still see the teppan chef do his work from just about any location in the restaurant and feel the fire when he was putting on a show. This was the only sit-down restaurant that we ate at twice, we liked it that much. She – We actually never ate at She, so I can’t rate it. But we need something new to look forward to on our next trip, right? We drank wine with most of our dinners and while they weren’t the most highly rated or expensive wines out there, they were definitely still good and we never felt we needed to spend extra cash on the higher end bottles. Sexy Pool – This is definitely the place to be during the day if you’re feeling social, want to observe everyone else (not in a creepy way, I just enjoy people watching), watch the entertainment/games, get some good drinks and soak up the sun. We split our time about 50/50 between the pool and the beach. The beach is very nice white sand and pretty quiet compared to the sexy pool, but you can still hear the party going in the background and we’d pop up to the pool to check on the action if it sounded like there was something fun happening. And the Sexy Pool is where you meet the Play Makers who are there to make the party happen and keep everyone smiling, more on them later. Bash – the nightclub, which is actually all outdoors. So much fun happened here during our stay. I’m a pretty shy, conservative guy, but the atmosphere at Bash entices you into having a fun time. I probably danced more with my wife (and on my own) in the 5 nights we were at Bash than we have in the last 13 years of our marriage. It was so much fun. And the theme nights not only add to the environment and the good times, but they also helped me go out of my comfort zone (dancing) because it was almost like I was disguised. Pedro up on stage getting the crowd pumped up was always super entertaining, especially when he’s dressed like Mr. Incredible, haha. Another note on the themes/costumes: you can be (almost) as racy as you want or totally conservatively dressed and nobody cares. Everyone just wants to have a good time dancing and drinking, and there’s a lot of both of those going on. We dressed up every night and really enjoyed ourselves. At the end of every night, after dancing for hours, we looked forward to our cheeseburger and fries that were being cooked up fresh right there in the club (that chef was working hard, non-stop). Soooo good. The only slightly negative we had about Bash was that sometimes the DJ would play a song that lost the dance party and he wouldn’t always recover quickly with a good song to get the crowd going again. Sometimes it took Pedro or one of the other Play Makers to make a request to get things pumping again. But that’s a small gripe. The staff – all the staff at Temptation were great and always there to help a hand, give you directions or whatever you needed. They do try to get you to do a time share tour, but they’re not too pushy. We never did it and that didn’t seem to bother anyone. We just politely told them we weren’t interested and went about our marry way. Bar tenders were awesome. Super quick and happy to help get you the drink you wanted. If you wanted a stiffer drink, just let them know and they’ll top it off with more booze, it’s all inclusive! The wait staff at all of the bars and restaurants were all very helpful and attentive even during busy times. The Play Makers – they are what made this resort stand out for us (besides the whole topless optional/sensual thing). JJ, The Kid, Mini Cooper, Stefan, Bella, Laura, Pedro, Lollipop, Miguel, Shelby and Zach (I think there was one or two more, but these were the folks we saw on a consistent basis during our visit). They run the show at the Sexy Pool. A few times a day they look for volunteers to play in all sorts of games and competitions. Some are simple games like beer pong or hand/eye coordination games, others are a little more racy and scandalous, but in a good, fun way haha. I participated in 3 different games which is totally something I wouldn’t normally due. I don’t like being the center of attention, especially not in front of couple hundred drunk folks looking to be entertained. But it was great, I had a ton of fun and I’m really glad I did it. The Play Makers totally make you feel comfortable and you know it’s all in good fun and most importantly you’ve got to remember that nobody cares, seriously. Everyone just wants to have fun. The PM’s also had shifts at Bash during the dance party and they, led by Pedro, made sure the party stayed pumping late into the night. They’re all really, really awesome and Temptation would not be the same resort without them. Last but not least, the guests – What a fun mix of people! Soooo many Canadians, hahaha. They sure do like to party. There were young people, old people and everything in between. And they were all there to have a good time and not judge anyone. Some people went crazy on theme nights with their costumes and others just dressed nice and nobody cared either way (although if you had a good costume then you tended to get a lot of compliments on it). We met people from all over the world and everyone we talked to were good people (even if they didn’t always remember the conversations the next day ;-) My wife was nervous about going topless so I told her to pack her bathing suit tops and not do it if she isn’t comfortable. I think the first day we went down to the beach and saw everyone else it took her less than 10 minutes to take it off and it seemed almost totally normal by the end of the trip, and I enjoyed it quite a bit! There were no creepers or weirdos there that made us/her feel uncomfortable. Lifestylers/swingers - They’re there, yes. But they are just like the rest of us looking to have a fun time away from home. We met quite a few, and some even asked if we were interested and when said that we’re not into it, our conversation continued with them totally normally. Everyone we met (swingers or not) were very nice, friendly and respectful. We had a great time at Temptation, and we’ll definitely be back.
Great trip report!! Really enjoyed all of the detail. We are first timers going in April and my wife is somewhat nervous about what to expect. I can't wait to share your trip report with her.
What an adorable review! Thanks so much for taking the time to post it, Jimmy. You made me grin several times while reading it.
Nice review. Glad you had a nice time on your First Temptation vacation!! Just wondering, would you mind if I let my Grandmom read this and just substitute my name in so she thinks I go on vacations that we never can talk about
Great review. We were supposed to go this month but could not make it. Hopefully we could make it in late August. My wife is very interested and looking forward for Temptations, she wants to experience the whole topless environent and get a tan with no line.
Love the review! Thanks and loved your costumes in another post. 13 days to a marriage refresher and another amazing time with friends.
Great review!!! Thanks for sharing your experience. Looking forward to our upcoming trip (March 20-26). I am wondering if they have fixed the issues with the swim up bar and bar stools? I had read in a few reviews that they were breaking down and the trusty duck tape has been used. I’m hoping that they have taken care of the new ouchies already but figured I’d ask Thanks again!
