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Occidental Grand Cozumel Hotel & Resort Reviews

Occidental Grand Cozumel
Address: Kilómetro 17.5, Carretera Sur Cozumel, El Cedral Cozumel, Mexico Tel: 52 (987) 87 29730 Fax: 52 (987) 87 29745 Email: gserviceg@drcozmel.allegroresorts.com URL: Occidental Grand Cozumel	Type of Property: All Inclusive Beach Location: Beach Front (Directly on Beach/Water Front) Island: Mexico No. of Rooms/Units: 252 Scuba Diving: Dive Resort / Dive Operator Onsite

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Summary of All Property Reviews for: Occidental Grand Cozumel Ratings based on answers from a total of 11 reviews 10 is best 1 is worst
Feature	Ranking	Feature	Ranking
Cleanliness of Property	9.09	Quality of Property	8.55
Privacy & Quietness	9.36	Quality of Service	7.73
Courtesy & Hospitality of Staff	7.55	Accuracy of Website (marketing hype) VS. Actual Experience	8.09
Food and Dining Experience	7.09	Price/Value of Property	7.73
Safety Factor (Did you feel safe at property)	9.00	Quality of Beach (ranked closest beach if property is located off the beach)	6.64
Total Property Score: 8.08 out of 10 | Average Star Rating: 4.09 out of 5

• 73% (8 visitors of 11) said they would go back to Occidental Grand Cozumel again.
• 73% (8 visitors of 11) said they would recommend Occidental Grand Cozumel to friends.

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My wife, son and I visited in March 2005. My son and I were novice divers, having just certified. The dive masters at "Dive Palancar", located at the Grand Cozumel, were terrific!

The facilities, staff and food were great. We purchased a time-share on the resale market after returning from our trip.

We are bringing friends back with us in October 2006.

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this is a great resort once you get in, but they tend to overbook to fill up their neighboring and not so great sister resort, the Allegro Occidental (in which you share your food with the flies outside). They'll tell travel agents they have room, but when you arrive they'll boot you over to the Allegro. If you're lucky, you'll get a refund, but I met five honeymoon couples there who've had their vacation ruined because the Grand Occidental claimed it was the travel agents that overbooked and refused to offer compensation.

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Buffet not the best we have had, but the al la carte's were wonderful!!

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Everything about this resort is fantastic. If you are typical down-to-earth people like we are, you will have a great time. Any negative reviews will generally have come from the more the fussy and possibly 'uppity' crowd. Very clean and spacious rooms, and absolutely incredible food. Great for couples especially, as well as families. Staff friendliness and service was A+. The resort is highly reccommended and we will be back!

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One of the finest resorts we have stayed at. Everything from food to international brand liquors and wines was top notch. Specialty Restaurants are best we have ever had. Staff were exceptional. Will return

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The 'information' desks are really guys selling the 'vacation club.' Beware! It's a complete rip off and I expect to spend years fighting their illegal charges although I cancelled correctly and in the time period allowed (you have an unwaivable right to cancel under Mexican law for five business days). Stay away from the Vacation Club! If you get a *great* deal (by their standards), you'll only pay a little more to stay than you would by making your own reservations. If they think they can get away with it, they'll sell you a 'platinum' Vacation Club that should include the Grand Cozumel and other platinum AIs, but instead they'll put the name of one of their poorly rated hotels in the contract. And guess what the contract says? If that hotel pulls out of the Vacation Club, it's the only hotel you can stay at! From there, the contract just gets worse. Pay for your car rental and stay far far away from the Vacation Club guys. It's very disappointing to go to nice place and have them try to rip you off so outrageously.

The grounds were beautiful, and I enjoyed the food. The staff in the buffets and at the front desk are excellent. I paid extra for 'Royal Club,' which was a complete waste. The staff in the reservation-only restaurants is surly and the Royal Club concierges work only part of the day (thank goodness Ana wasn't there all the time!) and know less and help you less than the staff at the front desk. Here's what you get for 'upgrading' to Royal Club: part-time 'concierges' who are really check-in folks who are too busy, bathrobes to wear, slippers to keep, and blue beach towels that you can take to the beach without permission. Oh, and you can sign up for the reservation-only restaurants without waiting in line in the morning. NOT WORTH IT!

You need to tip constantly (keep the one-dollar bills handy at all times) to get decent service, but I didn't mind that. If you're tipping, you don't need Royal Club and you better be tipping anyway. At meals, leave a dollar. I left more for the maids each day. Overall, the staff was wonderful, except for the concierge, Ana, who even took the trouble to come to our room just to be hateful!

Overall, it's a beautiful hotel and the staff was really good to us. You can see that they are constantly trying to work on making things good. If I had avoided Royal Club and the Vacation Club guys, it would have been wonderful. As it was, the trip was tainted for me and I won't be returning.

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i read some of these reviews, and i don't know what anyone is talking about. everyone was very friendly, and the staff was always at your service. they seat you at every meal, including lunch, and serve you drinks, even while you are sitting at the beach, which is not the usual for all inclusive resorts. they bring you fresh towels every evening, put flowers on your bed, and bring you chocolates. i went with my boyfriend, we are both 24, and we had a very nice time. the resort is very family oriented. all of the swimming pools don't go deeper than 4ft. there are 2 large pools, and even a baby pool by the gym. the gym is great, and was never packed when i went. the only thing that i can say is bring mosquito repellent, they are everywhere, although they did spray the lawns and it got better by the time we left. we did a jungle jeep tour, and it was well worth it, you get to see the different waters around the island and it was so beautiful. they feed you lunch, we had chicken, rice, and chips with guacamole which is so good in mexico, but the tour is 88 bucks a person, not recommended for little kids, its to hot, and definitely bring a hat if you do that. they even take you to a snorkeling site with really clear water. the snorkeling at the hotel is not that great, not many fish in there. we never had a problem getting a kayak to take out. always were enough snorkel gear for us at any time of day. a lot of divers stayed at our hotel. we took walks to iberostar and allegro and our hotel was so much nicer. the food was the best i ever had at an all inclusive. they even have pasta and mashed potatoes, vegies, and all diff. kinds of desserts for lunch time! right by the beach. i ate like a pig there, and the ice cream was so great. my boyfriend and i didnt want to leave. don't expect much of a night life there. we saw one show w/ dancers, the latin show, it was good. but that was it, only a 2 man band was the entertainment. they have a bar/disco, open till 1:30am, but we went there once. we are a couple that likes to enjoy the day and then shower after the beach around 6:30, eat at 8pm, then we were back at the hotel room by like 9:30, so if you are a party person there may be other places that are more active, however you can take a cab downtown for like 15 bucks each way. the island seemed safe, we had no problems. just expect a lot of creatures around, like frogs, lizards and mosquitos. otherwise we had a great vacation. i recommend the grand.all of the water and ice is purified, so don't worry about that. something was making my boyfriend sick, i think it was the beer, they only have corona on tap, no other beer, except for in the rooms, in the allinclusive fridge, which has some bottled beer and water bottles, soda and some mexican beer that starts w/ an 'm' ....great! so i would find out before going there what the deal is w/ drinking beer from tap. i didnt get sick, and didnt drink the beer. the beach area is man made, but its the same w/ the other resorts too, like allegro and iberostar, cause they are right next door (5min walk). if you want to see the nicer beachs, rent a car or do a tour. it was still beautiful though, the property is very pretty. lots of pictures to take. one more thing, these guys love tips! who doesn't? usually all inclusives dont allow tipping, but here, at bars, they have tip jars and u do get faster service. have fun!!! wait..i forgot to tell you about the bathrooms,,, they are great, there is a walk in shower and a seperate tub. i loved that. i will miss that shower. it was huge.

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I could write for hours about all the things that were wrong but, I'll try to keep it short, here goes my top ten.
1. The girl (ANA)at check-in was rude.Promised 3rd floor room. Given 1st floor room.
2. Toilet stopped working on day two. It took 4 days to get another room. I complained at the desk 2-3 times a day but, toilet wasn't fixed. Even the public toilets were unclean and not working.
3. Lobby bar didn't open until 12:30pm. The nearest place to get a drink(alcohol,Coke,water) was the beach bar (200-300yards away). No waitresses at any of the bars. My husband or I stood in a line of 10-20 people each time we needed a drink.
4. The maid yelled at me when I asked for an extra towel. 'No Mas!No Mas!' We had four people,three towels and two washcloths.
5. The bars ran out of ice daily and there was no machine in our building. The closest was on the second floor two buildings over.
6. Both pools have mold growing around the edges and walkways.
7. You need to get in line to make dinner reservations at 7:00am or eat at the buffet, where the food is recycled (day after day) from previous meals. However, do not expect that nice a time at the upscale ala carte resturants either. The toilets are in little buildings outside the resturant and the waiters would serve different meals at different times at the same table. My husband and I recieved our meal after the others at our table were finished on more than one occasion. In fact, they would serve all but one person bread or water and walk away. They offered no explanation.
8. They have 2 Hobie-cats to sail, 2 kayaks and 252 ROOMS. You do the math.
9. They kept taking our drink glasses at dinner and leaving without asking if we were done or needed more.
10. Guests couldn't play pool in the disco because the employees were playing at the only pool table for the whole resort.

We have stayed at other places with lower ratings and were treated much better. All the guests kept making comments about the place being so understaffed(The pizza place had 3 employees total for 35 tables. They looked like they were going to faint.) and it looked like they were going broke. One man said that it was not this way when it opened but, it has gone down hill too fast for there not to be some big problems with management. They biggest problem with management was that they were invisible.

Sorry, I forgot two more important things. 'Kids Camp' is a small closet where a non-English speaking staff member has children color, watch cartoons and play video games. Also, be careful on the beach. They have NO DOCK and dive boats constantly come ashore amongst the small children playing and the snorkelers.

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Not a 5 star property as it claims to be rated. My wife and I have been resort hopping in the Mexican Carribean for the past 4 years and we can honestly say that Occidental is almost there. As far as the property layout, landscaping, and gardening... it is top notch. But be warned!! To get to the beach, you must cross a bridge over a swamp/forest area...MOSQUITO HEAVEN. It is imperative that you bring OFF! The one and only store at the resort never has any in stock. The beach.. very nice clean swimming area and great for snorkeling. As far as the staff is concerned, they were very friendly, but we felt the resort was very understaffed. Many times we would have to sit ourselves, and on some occasions, we were half way done with our meal before we would get our drinks. If you are not lounging at the pool, you will not get served drinks on the beach. The food was nothing special. Just your basic buffet food. We did find it a little monotonous, basically the same food everyday. All in all, it wasn't the best experience if you were expecting a 5 star pampered vacation, but it was a good experience. We would recommend it...but not to be compared to a 'true' world class resort. Occidental is almost there.

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The true quality of a hotel's service exhibits itself when everything doesn't go quite as planned. My husband and I booked this vacation for just the two of us, and decided to spend extra on a nice place where we could be pampered. Unfortunately, my husband fell rather ill with a serious throat infection just a short time into our week-long vacation, and I found that the hotel was very rigid and unaccomodating.

My husband had a very high fever and was too weak to walk down the three flights of stairs to go to the buffet. When I tried to fix a plate for him, I was told that no food was allowed out of the restaurant. I tried explaining my problem to the wait staff but was treated with indifference. I couldn't even buy apple juices or gatorade at the gift shop! I finally smuggled some dry rolls and cheese out of the restaurant in my purse, which is all that my husband ate for several days.

Later in the week, I noticed another man that seemed to have a similar problem. He just ignored the wait staff (the waiters are great but the hostess is particularly rude), said

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The rooms were nice with the bathroom being very spacious. The all marble shower was very large, it accommidated two very nicely. There are non-smoking rooms and no ocean view rooms,a natural mangrove stand is between the buildings and the beach. We've stayed at several other 5 apple places and the rooms are better.

The food was barely/slightly less than average compared to other 5 apple places. Variety was minimal . Large potions of the fruit were from cans and of course the buffet was the usual. The Pizza palor and Mexican Resturant was not open because of low numbers. The hotel was only 25% filled so it was very quite, it was occupied by mostly Americans and Canadians. The beach was being restored and the snorkleing was not bad at the south end of the property.

The dive shop was very accomidating and prices were: boat/tank- $32; BCD,wetsuite,regulator-$18, all in good repair. The fun thing was the divers pick the reef to dive, not the divemaster. The boat is shared with the Allegro 1/2 mile up the beach, but you are picked up at the resort. Four dives a day are offered. Most of the reefs are within 10-15 minutes of the resort. I used them the entire week and was very happy. You could buy a 10 pack dive for $290.

The staff was great. My glass was never empty and filled always with a smile. I wonder what it will be like when the resort is full.

Car rental-- an old VW was $52 with taxes/ins. a day.
The nightly entertainment was the same two guys all week.

I would go back!!

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Located 20 minutes out of town. This is a new resort. Rooms are in 3 story villa's with about 12 units in each unit. The villa's are quite nice as are the rooms.

Features of the resort:

Room ***** clean nice (bring a clock for the room)
Food it varies from *** to *****. There are two al carte restaurants which were very nice. (No limit on the times you can go but you need to make a reservation). The food was fair to good. Buffet: Breakfast ****, lunch (by the ocean) **** and dinner ***. There was a snack restaurant open late for pizza on the roof **** 1/2
Staff ***** very friendly
Bars ***** all you can drink - good quality liquor, wine ok
Beach ** (it was washed away from a storm)
Water facilities **** 1/2 very nice pool area
Disco ****
Tennis (lit courts)

Two issues, the resort is far from town and it costs $17-19 US to take a taxi in town. A hotel shuttle would have been nice.

There is NO evening entertaintment other than a local mexican 2 man group playing reggie type music until 10:00pm. Nights can be very quite. You will have to make your own entertaintment if you don't like the disco or bar.

Exterisions are expensive all in US$. Car rental per day about $45US.

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