Rachael Meuwissen

Review of Holiday Inn Resort Puerto Vall...

We stayed at the Holiday Inn in Puerto Vallarta th...

We stayed at the Holiday Inn in Puerto Vallarta the third week of January. We had never done an all-inclusive vacation before and probably never will again after this trip. The food was mediocre at best, never hot when it should be, and the choices were limited. There were also a lot of flies on the food, especially at the snack shack. The booze is cheap but free flowing. Honestly, to get a glass of milk at this resort was harder than shoveling a grave with a teaspoon. The front desk staff were none to friendly nor was the security guard at the pool. It took us three tries to get a decent room. The first room they gave us had two double beds even though we booked a king online. despite Puerto vallarta being named one of the top gay friendly cities in Mexico, the Holiday Inn staff immediately assumed that two women wanted separate beds. We went down to the front desk right away to get another room. The first night of our trip we spent in a dirty, dismal room facing the children's playground. After complaining to our funjet representative we were upgraded to much nicer room on the 7th floor which had nice views of the pool and ocean.

If you plan on sleeping in on your trip unplug the phone because you will get calls from the front desk staff telling you "no towel on the balcony" even if you don't have any towels on the balcony.

Tip everyone for great service. Really recommend tipping the hotel cleaning staff, bartenders and waitstaff to have a great experience. Plus most of the employees work very hard and deserve tips. Some of the exceptional staff include: Enrique (waiter at the pool), Hector and Miguel (bartenders), Diego (bellboy), Augustine (waiter).

The staff around lunchtime are not so nice or accommodating.

The beach is beautiful but the vendors are annoying.

If you want a beach chair plan to get out there early to reserve one... like sunrise early. That was ridiculous!

Bring your own beach towel because the wait for towels was "10 minutes" which actually means anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour.

If you want some great food I'd recommend leaving the resort and heading to the Marina for food and drinks at Fajita Bananas! Delicious fajitas and ribs!! yum! yum!

If you want good food closer to the resort you could go to Adelita's BUT bring Peso's if you don"t want to be completely ripped off. They lie about the exchange rate and take out their own tips. as a matter of fact there are to many good places to go for food so just SKIP ADELITA'S.

all in all- the beach was nice, the staff were friendly but not worth the all-inclusive.