Awesome Report and we can totally agree. We love the resort and have made great friends there along with the staff. We are going to split our trips next year between Desire and Temptation along with our yearly trip to vegas (live at moorea).
We have been 11 times and heading back on NYE. Everything you said is how we felt after our trip in January. It’s disappointing to see our happy place change so much in such a short time. As you said, the ship has sailed and there is no turning back, but we will be back.
Thank you for the TR. I would have to say I feel your report is very accurate all around, especially during the Thursday - Sunday period of the week. Maybe something will change in the next year, hopefully when international travel is back to where it was. Fingers crossed the old way Temptation was isn't going completely away. Again I continue to stress it's now more important than ever to make sure you are traveling with a group that has a similar style.
It's called Desire Riviera Maya... and it's absolutely awesome. LOL! ...but... that being said, the rest of the commentary on the crowd at TTR and it's changes ring as spot-on truth to us. If/when we go back to TTR it'll be our 31st trip (not a typo) and we've sort of been doubting that we'll go again, seriously, it'd only be because we've got our own group of people who really do know how to have a good time, right there in the moment and not dependent on others to validate it. "I'm having fun! See, my Insta feed, don't you see how much fun I'm having?!?" (*Stop and check phone in about 15 minutes, if not 15 seconds*) "Look! I AM having fun! I got 11,000 likes!" WTF? I guess I'm old. I like the old-fashioned party, I suppose. I take pics, but I take them of my lady and her friends, other people take pics of me & she, and when everyone gets home, we share them all into one spot and we sort of take turns taking pics out and sharing them around and laughing our dumb asses off...
I am the same. Barely in any of my own pictures, and they all go into an album weeks after the trip is over. I do end up in a picture every now and then though. But normally it's me doing something funny/stupid, not instagram posing and serious for "likes". As you can see in this picture, I need my "likes" in the moment from my adoring cheering fans! Hahahahaha
We were there at the exact same time as this post, and the report is pretty accurate. We did notice the crowd changed significantly, as did the vibe, when the weekend crowd rolled in. Wednesday and Thursday was pretty much the old TTR vibe, with a good crowd and a higher percentage of topless ladies. Friday was similar, but as usual, many guests were on the Boobs Cruise. Actually Friday was better than we expected for a Boobs Cruise day. Saturday had an entirely different feel however. There was definitely an increase in the Instagram and wanna-be a Kardashian crowd, (and apparently quite a few hide something special because they leave their tops on) although to the resorts benefit they did rent more of those sharp stick-in-the eye cabanas. We generally stayed at the end of the pool that seemed to be the hangout for the fun people. Perhaps there was some sort of takeover the next week we didn't know about, but the vibe did change. We did venture up to the skybar twice, and counting us, there were exactly 4 people there, and two of them were bar tenders. Unfortunately the Skybar seems like a huge waste of resources. Why even keep it open? It must be a miserable place to work if you're counting on tips. In talking to a few long time and relatively well connected members, we learned that not all has worked out as planned with the attempt to push out long-time customers in favor of new money. The problem is, the Instagram crowd doesn't return, and they generally create more problems than the long time crowd. There is a feeling this will come full circle, as has been the pattern at this resort in the past. This trip (our 15th) did get us thinking we'll definitely be limiting our days at TTR in the future, and when we do go it will be with a known, established group we can count on for a party. Just our observation.
When we have gone at the end of October the Sky bar is always busy. We head up there for a late lunch when the load repetitive pool games are going on, and there have been up to 30 people there at times. Nice change of pace, we like it, and the foods good. So, it can be a lot of fun up there, but I agree if you were the only one it wouldn't feel the same. You would feel like you are missing out on what's going on down below.
We recently returned and find the report sadly accurate. The weekend is a shit show. The only fights I ever saw at TTR were between husbands and wives. This time there were several testosterone induced incidents. I never felt I needed to keep my guard up at TTR. On Friday I found myself constantly scanning the crowd for problems and they existed. I was bad enough that I pointed out points of egress to my wife when we were at different location at Bash in case a brawl broke out. Not realy the sexy environment we are looking for.
I think the positive sign I can take from this thread, other comments here, on Tripadvisor, and FB are things are normalizing but is still very much hit and miss at not only TTR but many other resorts. Resorts did what they needed to do to stay solvent during the pandemic, that resulted in very steep discounts. I posted in another thread that we were recently in the Detroit area for a wedding and a night at the Fairfield Inn was more expensive than the sale prices they were running at TTR. At that price point, with stimulus checks, pretty much anyone can go. They allowed you to book out as far as October at the steep discounts, discounts started falling off in November. Now in many resort forums there are less people complaining about behavior and more people complaining about the prices. These large groups of mostly singles traveling cheap simply cannot afford the resort now. Higher end resorts have a older demographic not just because they cater to them, they cater to them because that's the demographic that can afford it. The younger a persons gets the less likely they are to have the expendable income to afford $200, $300, & $400+ a night rooms. Some of these groups, aka Weekenders, could have booked a Fri - Sunday stay for as little as $350 if they booked at peak discounts all at a time airfare was cheep. That will not even cover a night on my Christmas trip. Room prices are high, airfare is even higher. Also people traveling on the cheap are unlikely to buy passes to Skybar or other upgrades. I think the hit and miss nature people are seeing at TTR, Breathless, Sea Side Suites, Planet Hollywood, and other is just a factor of how many budget rooms were booked for that time period. But again the positive take I see is the largely negative review period is over and we are firmly in the hit and miss period. Since I'm a betting man, I would bet by the end of October it should be mostly normal, and by Holiday season it'll be back to normal.
So we have never been hustled too much by the premier sales staff. A simple, but firm, “No” at check in normally is enough. I do get accosted in the lobby while walking through, occasionally, and the sales manager is always respectful, but he wants to know why we don’t want to be members, I just simply tell him no. The wife and I have actually talked about membership. This year my response (and it’s the truth) is simply going to be “we were seriously going considering becoming members but the way the resort has changed the last couple times we were here we can’t commit long-term”. And then point out all the perceived changes...phones, packs of d-bags (and single d-bags), instagram, bachelor parties, pool side cabanas, bottle service tables at Bash, etc... Maybe if this was a common response to the sales pitch it would get the marketing manager listening. We are taking Stacia_and_John’s advice and have a scheduled trip to DRM in March.
