An awesome honeymoon!

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Kantenah, Grand Palladium Colonial & Kantenah Resorts & Spa
★★★★☆
3.7
73.0% of users recommend this

Bostinaustin's review of Kantenah, Grand Palladium Colonial & Kantenah Resorts & Spa

“An awesome honeymoon!”

★★★★★

written by Bostinaustin on 20/08/2012

What a truly awesome place!!! We stayed from 2nd August - 16th August 2012 going with first choice in the Colonial side of the resort. Villa 21.

We booked this holiday 14 months before going and were not disappointed. The taxi transfer we paid for was worth every penny arriving way before the main coach transfer £38 via holiday taxis (one way only) through Thomson travel agent we booked with.

We were on honeymoon so got an upgraded room to a junior suite, which was fabulous and a fruit basket and half bottle of tequilla...very happy! What a change to get your aircon and safe included in the price, not what you get in Europe. The room was more than ample for us (and including our son) two double beds and a double bed settee, 2 chairs and table also, ironing board and iron, hairdryer even a spa bath. The drinks fridge was refilled daily with everything you would need along with coffee for the machine, which was used every morning. The location of our room in Villa 21 was 1 minute walk from the pool, 2 minutes walk from the beach and 3 minutes walk from the buffets/restaurants. With that much drink on hand for you all the time in the resort the coffee was the only thing used just for first thing in the mornings. The added extras of a ceiling fan, mosquito door if you wanted the door onto the patio open, TV, desk and stool. Rooms were excellent especially considering there was no way you'd want to be indoors on a resort like this. (plus we understand rooms are being updated.....updated they are great as they are but this resort is still pushing forward every year with updates and doesn't stand still).

The location of the resort was fantastic with many places to visit very near. (Approx 1 hr 20 mins from Cancun airport). Do not underestimate the size of this resort it is huge, you can try your best to see and do everything in two weeks but really is impossible and we will return to explore the rest! The amount of animals we saw was like being in the middle of a zoo, coatis, racoons, degus, beautiful coloured birds, lizards, iguanas it was truly amazing all wild but close enough to get fabulous pictures. The resort is only 30 mins from Playa Del Carmen which you can get to on a Collectivo (local bus outside the resort) and very cheap 35 pesos or around 14 dollars by taxi. Xel-Ha is also only 20 minutes away. Akumal Beach around 15 minutes away.

We ate in a number of al la carte restaurants in the evening such as the steak house, chinese, mediteranian, brazillian, ribs and more which was lovely to get waited on. In the Tikal, La Hacienda both buffett restaurants also of an evening. The La Hacienda, El Gran Azul and Beach Bars both Colonial and Whitesands sides in the day. All the food was fantastic, great quality, plenty of it and hot. You will really be spoiled for choice. We ate at a number of different times of an evening from 6.00pm up to 7.30pm and didn't have a problem once for a table no waiting at all. We always found eating at these times was lovely and quiet and relaxing and the food quality and service was just lovely. The Sports Bar was great for updates on the olympics during our stay, you could access the internet also their at a small charge and again food was available in their too including popcorn. We drank too in the Churchill Bar which did branded drinks and it was lovely and quiet in their too if you wanted some quiet time (plus it was a smoking bar inside too). We got advice off trip advisor to take bubba mugs so we purchased 2 to take over and boy they were worth it, the barmen happily fill these up with whatever you want them too soft drinks, beer, cocktails and they kept our drinks ice cold!!!! My son totally loved the ice cream on tap (out the machine) helping himself to vanilla, chocolate, strawberry or a mix in either a tub or cone, but be aware the heat makes them melt quickly so enjoy as soon as! The ice-cream in the El Gran Azul was scooped for you into tubs or cones and was delicious which was ideal dessert after lunch! David was lovely in the Tikal buffet for he helped us learn some Spanish.,....thank you!

No need at all to get up at dawn to lay towels on beds for the pool or beach, we always found spare beds by the pool up till lunchtime and all day on the beach (including hammocks on the beach too), the beach was so vast there was never a worry. The main pool by the beach was truly huge and never appeared crowded in the pool or around the outside, including several jacuzzi areas and swim up bar. Every day the pool photographers came round to take pictures which would include such variety, loads of animals were brought down to have photos pool side parrots, iguanas, monkeys, tucans. Photos taken with friends, family, individually all available in the Kantenah photo shop. These are reasonably priced and can be purchased in either sets, individually, on disc, on canvas all sorts and these are also displayed in books going back a number of days just in case you forget to pop in at the end of the day. You can pay by card so don't worry if you don't have the cash. Pool entertainment was really fun, we took part in paper plan competitions, darts competitions, crazy games but there's so much more you can take part in. There's zumba classes or salsa classes too if you're feeling energetic, Spanish lessons if fancy learning the language. If you go to the beach on the Kantenah side you will see a protected fenced off area for the turtle eggs that nest on their which is really interesting. You can snorkel out off the beach too and not that far either (I'm 5 ft 6" and was only up to my chest) and saw huge amounts of fish. You can do all sorts of watersports, pedalos, catemarans, kayaks, scuba diving, reef fishing and more......what a huge choice!

Must do trips for us was the Dolphin swim at X-Caret through First Choice, there was the 3 of us with a dolphin all to ourselves for a whole hr, and by the time we finished we realised we were the last out of the part of the lagoon area it was truly a "must do before you die" experience. The trip was Dolphin Silver at $159 dollars per person (same price for children) expensive yes but worth it. But unfortunately the cost of photos was ridiculous $233 dollars for the DVD and photos on USB or $29 dollars per 10 x 8 photo. We also did the Underwater World trip through First Choice too $74 dollars per adult and $45 per child, 1/2 day with a swim in an underground cenoti which was breathtakingly beautiful and courage building followed by a trip to Akumal Beach to swim with the Turtles. Wet suites, snorkel, lifejackets and flippers were all included in the cost along with a bottle of water and snack returning to the hotel at 1.30pm. It was another memorable trip which was well worth it, purchasing photos on this one was so much cheaper at 350 mexican pesos for all your family group photos only on disc (we got 45 of the 3 of us) plus the photos of the animals we saw and onother 100 photos of other fish/animals seen in the sea.
We did a full trip also Coba Mayan Traditions which was $110 dollars per adult and $55 dollars per child, which was expensive and unfortunately the trip did not live up to our expectations, mainly I think because the first visit to a traditional mayan village was brief, the onto Coba which was an 1hrs walk to climb it, plus an 1hr back seeing the rest of the ruins on the way. Coba is extremely high and the view was well worth it. Then onto an outside Cenoti which we didn't go into because the rain and we'd also done the underground cenoti the previous day. So for us the cost was high for what we got out of it. Plus it was a whole day out 8.15am pick up and back at around 6.00pm ish.

We took Mexican pesos (on advice from the uk friends/family) and only but realised much of the currency used was american dollars. If we would have known this before we would have taken majority of the money in dollars and a small amount of pesos. Take lots of 1 dollar bills for tipping as the staff really do work so very very very hard and are worth being tipped for the service they provide. We English are not accoustomed to tipping but please please do. The staff are so hard working, friendly and well deserve it as there are over 3,500 staff their working hard to ensure so much is done for their guests in front and behind the scenes.

The entertainment of an evening we always found fun, my son age 10 particularly enjoyed this. It went on in the Colonial part from 9-10pm and then moved over to the Riviera part afterwards. Plus after the show at the Colonial part had finished a live band played also.

There were these golf buggy trains that took you everywhere!!!! Ones that took you to all 4 lobbys in the resort. Ones that took you to all the villas in the resort. Ones that took you to your room on arrival and collected your cases on your return home. Plus the one just like a train to take you everywhere!

We were really concerned that the resort would be too big for us and we envisaged catching a golf buggy train everywhere but once you find your bearings you really only use them when really needed or maybe not if you enjoy the rides so much.

The weather over in Mexico was hot and humid. We expected rain every day during our stay but didn't get much at all a few sharp showers but that was about it. Only on the one day on our Mayan tour did it start to rain and carry on for the day purely because we caught the tropical storm left over from hurrican Ernesto but that didn't ruin anything, in fact it was rather exciting but again when it did rain the resort was well prepared the trains had zip down plastic covers to protect you whilst riding and lobbys hand rolled down plastic sheets to protect you whilst sitting and having a drink......the resort knows exactly what they are doing.

I had some fantastic chats with Neil our First Choice Rep who was very down to earth, practical, giving fantastic advice. We got on with him extremely well and spent 2 evenings happily chatting away to him....thanks Neil :-)

Our favourite barmen were Valentin and Santiago at the Colonial and they always placed another drink down as soon as our glasses were empty, but not only had fun with us but our son too. Thank you both.

Mosquito bites are always something I suffer from terribly but having purchased a mosi band from Neil for $20 dollars each for me and my son as well as using high bug spray I didn't get half as many as normal so that was great for us!

There is a lovely market held in the areas by the resort lobbies which is nice to amble round as well as on the beach by the snack/beach bars as we didn't hit the shops on our visit so was great to buy momentos for us and family at home.

We purchased a phone card to phone home to the uk from the machine by the pay phones in the lobbies which was a brilliant idea and cheap too. It enabled me to phone home 3 times!!! $20 dollars for 18 minutes.....what more could you ask for. Free wii fi was available in all the lobbies enabling facebook to be accessed easily.

For the cost of the holiday was amazing for what we got, you REALLY didn't have any hidden extras to pay for as you can often find when going on holilday. What you pay is what you get and what you get is truly amazing. I put on my first facebook status.......I'm in paradise with my husband!!! Europe is well and truly knocked on the head by this resort. I've never been to Mexico before and therefore this is only resort hotel I have stayed in and well I wouldn't want to stay anywhere else. I have even emailed the hotel to tell them how wonderful it was and having heard on the plane return home from other couples their hotels were not a patch on ours and now I'm going to rave about this with everyone. We are planning on returning in 2 years time and have mentioned it to our friends who are also going to come with us, let's hope it isn't full as I know its so popular with return guests, we met a family from Maryland who were such fun and it was their 3rd return and have now become travel club members too!

We didn't use the spa facilities, eventhough heard good reports.....just didn't have time, however, my husband did have a massage at one of the massage areas by the pool. Don't think you're having this done in full sight of everyone either because they are hidden away from view.

Don't also think this resort is full of a particular nation also as we met american's, canadians, english, french, spanish so a lovely well rounded resort of nationalities.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to the Grand Palladium Colonial, Kantenah, Riviera, White Sands Resorts Spa and to all its staff, we had an awesome time staying with you and are looking forward to our return to your resort to check out all the rest we didn't have time for a re-do all the things we enjoyed so much.

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