The Westin Resort & Spa, Cancun

Guillermo, Ivan, Genaro were Awesome- they made our stay at the Westin Cancun fun, entertaining and memorable. What a great crew!!! The activities at the pool, yoga, drink and food classes, music trivia were so much fun. Will definitely be back!!!

Guillermo, Alberto, Genero and Ivan made our stay extra special with their amazing, fun personalities and knowledge of Cancun. My whole family took the cooking classes daily, where Guillermo was the star of the show. We made memories to last a life time. Water aerobics, new friends, and yummy food ALL at the Westin. Muchas Gracias!

Guillermo was amazing. He made the experience so much more enjoyable. He was so interactive. During the drink class and cooking class Guillermo made that class so much more entertaining. Genaro also was fun and exciting. Especially during bingo. He allowed some people to choose the next card in one of the games. Allowing the guests not playing to still be involved and included

We had the pleasure of having Martin as our pool server for our stay! He was great and very attentive. Martin was kind, so fun to be around and was always right on it. Every other server we had too was also great and very friendly! The service here has been fabulous all in all. Thanks, Martin, for helping make it such a great stay!

On our 6th Mexico trip (5 areas). Here is a very thorough run down of the Westin… Cleanliness- property fairly clean. Little things like perimeter of property like Landscape next to triangle pools not tended to so some trash. Value- tough one. $250 for a non-inclusive oceanfront room with balcony isn’t too bad these days. But we probably could have bit the bullet and found an all-inclusive instead, as we end up spending well over $100 on food and drinks daily for our family of 3 anyway. Daily deposit of $100 is stupid, that would mean for a 10 day stay they put a hold of an ADDITIONAL $1,000 USD on your credit card (eye roll)!!! Rooms- we were in tower D as we had oceanfront with balcony and the other tower was being painted. We requested to be away from any paint fumes due to son’s asthma. Big Balconies are wonderful. Bathrooms could use some sprucing up. I did find there to be lots of places to hang all our wet swimwear by tub, etc. Lack of lighting in there. Amenities- No microwaves in room made it really hard to feed our picky kid while staying here. No robes or slippers sucks. WiFi works well. Beds are comfy with nice bedding and pillows. Water- I assume they claim the water is filtered but I thought the tap water had a taste to it so we used bottled. Stop at a big grocery store on your way from airport and grab a big jug or a bottled pack. With Private shuttle/SUV this is standard to make a stop. Parking- a little walk for main tower. Where we stayed had close parking. Location- Loved! slower bottom of the “7” hotel zone. Still plenty of food options off property but quieter family/couples area away from the parties. Beach- pristine with clear water and spectacular sand. Right in front of hotel is red flag but made for a truly wonderful sound of loud crashing waves at night from our balcony. Walk 5 min down and kids can play in the water (yellow flag) in front of Club Med and past, just stay down by the water line. There are lifeguards and pretty shells. Cannot speak to sargassum season. Pools- lots of options. Our kiddo loved the shallow triangle pools that close at 5 pm. Other pools close at 10 which is nice. Seating didn’t seem bad. Umbrellas/palapas didn’t really seem to give much shade but at least they are there. Not normally lifeguards. Service- attentive. Plenty of servers by pool/beach. Expect “Mexican Standard Time” everywhere not just the resort. If you are in a rush, don’t choose a Mexico vacay. Activities- lots to do included. We attended a salsa making one, lots of sampling for $4. Dining- sand and stone is very pricey so we went off property for nice dinners. Room service was decent we ordered a few times, was able to get cappuccino. The sports bar is decent, $15-20 items mostly. It’s the fastest we found for suddenly hungry kiddo- they’d have food ready normally in 10-15 min and we could pickup. I wish after 11 am there were more than the sports bar open for lunch. Would be nice to have more than one option. Cocktails by pool are American prices. The little hotel market has seltzers and beers for $4. Beverages are pretty much the only thing affordable there in true-hotel-gift-shop-tradition. The market also has a mini Starbucks which we did appreciate. Crowd- lots of English speaking guests here. Activity schedule we were given at front desk upon check-in was only in Spanish. There’s an English version on white board by pool towel check-out. Other- “Concierge” we avoided, no need to get hounded to see a timeshare presentation during our coveted vacation time. They did call room daily in attempt to get us to come down and see them and emailed. From my experience at least half the resorts in tourist Mexico do the same. Tip- if doing activities off property I highly suggest taking cabs/uber or renting a car. Group activity Shuttles take FOREVER. You can waste an entire day with 4 pickups and all the other time wasting they do. On both ends. We won’t even take shared shuttles from the airport anymore, not with the combined price of a vacation. It’s simply not worth penny pinching on the transport, find elsewhere to save. You will thank me later! Be aware there is some traffic in Cancun as well as South of Cancun. Cancun Family activity suggestions- private photographers start at $125 for portraits if you plan in advance. 2 hour fishing charter on the calm lagoon around $200 use fishingbooker. Don’t book Captain Hook pirate show and dinner as an English speaker, it’s terrible! Many excursions are down in Riviera Maya, which is why we always schedule half our family trip down there. Playa del Carmen and Tulum are in much closer proximity for great snorkeling, cenotes, adventure parks, turtles, monkey sanctuary and caves. So that’s something to take into consideration when planning your trip. Have a great time in paradise!