I think 7 nights is a good max for us. And we are only mid 30s. And we spent the humpday exploring Isla Muejeres. It also depends on how hard you both party together. My wife and I go hard on drinks from noon on. We end up skipping bash nights unfortunately more than we plan, and end up with theme costumes we never end up using haha.
We do the same with us going pretty hard after noon(or basically whenever we have lunch). Many of our first 5-6 trips we hardly made it to PatyOs, and now barely to Bash. I personally didn't like PatyOs too much, so never really cared. I do like Bash, and the last couple of trips our nights out have increased, but aren't perfect. Sometimes it's honestly hard cause if you went to a late dinner, bash can be too much to lay right on top of it. And those "short naps" end up anything but. Totally feel you on unused costumes too. The other funny thing with those are that I will replace them for the next trip, even though they didn't get used. It's like they were supposed to get used, they made it there and back, and trying to use it again seems oddly like it's been done before, but totally hasn't.
How funny that we encounter the same issues. We've tried early dinners like at 6, thinking it gives us time to rest up after dinner before we start drinking again. But by the time Bash music kicks on, we can't rally and end up walking down, there with zero Desire to party anymore. On the flipside, late dinners allow more time for sex between 5-8. But we then eat before Bash and become too full to rally and resume partying. EmergenC, espresso, adderall, none of it works ha. Guess we gotta get old and stop going so hard during days.
That will depend on who you ask and what you are looking for in a holiday. Sean and I personally love Sky 3.5, and we go up there every day for lunch and spend a couple of hours up there. The food is superior, and we like hanging out in the pools up there, enjoying the amazing view. There is also shade up there, if you are at the resort during the hot months. I imagine it might be chilly and too windy during Dec/Jan, however, as it is always windy up there. We've used Sky 3.5 in April and July and we def found it a break from the heat at the Sexy Pool in July. Hard core party people do not use Sky 3.5 because they find it too quiet, and they don't want to leave the Sexy Pool party. To my knowledge, the resort is still allowing people to pay $20 each per day to access Sky 3.5. It is closed Mondays. So if you are not convinced you will use it every day, don't worry about upgrading, and just pay as you go. Having said that, the majority seems to prefer the Tower, based on posts here, unless they like the Jacuzzi rooms around the Quiet Pool. So you might want to upgrade to the Tower for reasons other than the access to Sky 3.5. We are staying in the Tower for the first time this trip. One of the things we are looking forward to is room service breakfast-with-a-view on the balcony every morning. Apparently the room service breakfast is very good. The Tower is the shortest walk to Bash and the Sexy Pool. Some (but only some) of the Garden rooms can be quite a hike. Some people complain that the Tower rooms are noisy, other people do not. I'm bringing earplugs, just in case. As you can see, it kind of depends on what you are looking for. If a view is very important to you, book the Tower.
Honestly sometimes the only solution is to not eat dinner. It can end up blowing up in your face though. But the dinners really destroy the partying. the flip side is you end up after a whole week vacation going to dinner 1-2 times. Totally feels like a waste, and that you are missing out. It basically a double edge sword.
In five trips, 8-11 nights each, we've done two excursions, an afternoon of scuba diving plus a day-trip to Isla Mejures. Both were fun but the FOMO of the daytime pool shenanigans was strong. For first-timers we'd say limiting the excursions to the rooftop bar or the hot tub beside BASH would be the way to go. Apparently both of those can be a slippery slope towards other on-resort "excursions", ummmm, or so we've heard.
