El Dorado Royale, Catamarán, Cenote & More Inclusive

First visit to the Yucatan Peninsula. We really can't fault this hotel. We stayed for 15 nights in total, rather than 14 due to our return flight being delayed because of Hurricane Beryl! I will break the review down into segments: 1) Food A great selection of restaurants serving different cuisines. Our favourite was the "Habb" Indian restaurant. Rich, creamy curries and great starters and sides. I think we ate there 3 or 4 times in total. On our last night they brought us a cake out with "come back soon" iced onto it. A nice touch. A close second was the "Santa Fe Grill". Steak cooked to perfection. We never got to sample all of the restaurants as we went back to the ones we liked so many times. Cocotal was our favourite breakfast spot as there was such a great selection of food on offer including a taco and omelette bar. During the day we would normally grab something from the "Health Bar". A smoothie or salad. This was in a great location next to the beach. We also enjoyed dinner at the Fuentes culinary theatre (3 times!), where a local chef demonstrates how to cook a dish before it is served to the audience. A fun and interesting way to dine with great music provided by Paulo on guitar. We only had one poor meal during our stay, that was the first night. My lamb was overcooked and the chef offered to cook me something else straight away. There is also a very good room service menu at no extra charge. For some restaurants you have to walk to the Generations end of the resort. It takes 10-15 minutes but you can always catch a golf cart if you don't want to walk. The only negative about the restaurants was the booking system for the restaurants at the Generations end of the resort. People staying at our resort could only book dinner after 20:45. I believe this was allow times for families to eat. The problem is that the restaurants close at 22:00 so you felt a little rushed at times. 2) Accommodation Spacious rooms (we had a junior suite), well appointed bathrooms including a whirlpool bath and a great shower. The bed was huge and very comfortable. The mini-bar was restocked whenever we asked. We didn't make enough use of the balcony. They have swim up rooms which we will look to book next time we visit. 3) Facilities Several pools are dotted around the resort and the majority have swim-up bars. The main pool seemed crowded at times but that was because all activities such as water polo took place there. Toilets are very clean throughout. There seemed to be an endless amount of golf carts driving staff and guests around so you don't have to walk too far if you don't want to. We found them handy if it was raining and we had dinner booked at a restaurant a walk away. We used the tennis courts daily (we brought our own gear), they are in great condition but you do get the occasional iguana spectating... The only negative point was the beach. We couldn't swim as the man-made reef had been displaced by a previous hurricane which made it dangerous to try. 4) Activities. There is an endless amount of daily activities you can join in. From Yoga to rifle shooting! Our favourite was the jungle bike ride (everything not built on is still jungle). We should have used mosquito spray beforehand though! Entertainment of an evening was pretty good, from Karaoke and bands to a really good singer/circus show. 5) Staff. Everybody from breakfast to the chamber maids were friendly and always said "Hola". They couldn't do enough for us. We read some reviews stating staff were unhelpful. Not true! They were so helpful in the run up to, during and after Hurricane Beryl struck. 6) Overall The El Dorado Royale exceeded all of our expectations. We normally don't return to hotels after visiting once but would return here at the drop of a hat. For us, it was the perfect holiday.

The best all inclusive resort Amazing! We have been to Mexico and the Carribean over 15 times and this is the best resort so far. The food was amazing, from Cocotal for breakfast to the lunches and all the all a carte restaurants. Just know there are no buffets for dinner it's all a la carte. We loved both Italian restaurants and the Japanese restaurant Kampai. The steak house was very good too. Rooms service was also very good. Every staff member was incredibly helpful and friendly. Couldn't ask for a better staff in all areas. Tennis and pickleball. They turned one of the courts into three pickleball courts. The tennis court has fake grass and is well kept. Only down side is getting the lights turned on we were told was $50 USD/hour which is way too much. Loved playing on the tennis court though. Pools there were so many and all well kept. Found the main pool too busy for our liking but the rest were all great. The grounds are beautiful and perfectly maintained. No bracelet or beach towel card made it so much more relaxing. If you don't like to walk there are constant carts going around to ake you to where you are going. We liked to walk and it takes about 30 mins to walk from one end to the other. We were in building 12 right across from the tennis courts and it was nice and peaeful. The rooms are very spacious with a jacuzzi tub in the room and a shower seperate in the bathroom. The beds are very comfortable as well. If you don't like waves there is a protected part to swim in. You can walk for hours along the beach and its very safe. There is a 2 free tours. You can use Nickelodeon water slides for a day. Also you get to take a catermaran from a different El Dorado location un Punta Maroma where you can snorkel and use that site for the day, The nightly entertainment was good as well. We have never gone to the same place twice but we will definitely go back to the El Dorado Royale.

Summer Getaway My husband and I had an amazing stay at El Dorado Royale. Check-in was very easy at the resort, and we were given drinks right away at check in. We booked a swim-up junior suite through our travel agent/delta vacations. Our room was beautiful and well kept. They stocked the mini bar daily with various sodas, beers, and water. We had chips and chocolate restocked each day in the room as well. The A/C in the room worked well. We had a gorgeous swim-out with ocean views in building 2. We were right by the health bar that served very delicious smoothies and healthy foods (no alcohol though). Our swim-out pool was always the perfect temperature as well. We rarely saw our swim-out neighbors. The resort was very beautiful and luscious. There was lots of wildlife and animals to see as well. The resort is very big but there are many carts always zooming around to take you places. We spent quite a bit of time in the main pool (La Isla). We loved the swim-up bar there, the bartenders were great. We brought our own tumblers, and they filled them all the way up with whatever drink we wanted. The pools did get very warm in the afternoon, we had a hard time staying in them as they started to feel like a hot tub and were not refreshing. But that was a minor inconvenience. There is not much of a walkable beach at this resort, but they have a path that borders the beach along the entire resort and it is very beautiful. There is one nice section of the ocean you can kind of swim in, we did this in the afternoons as the water was not too hot. There were small fish swimming around and the water was very clear. The food at this resort was phenomenal. We did the buffet at Cocotal each morning for breakfast. They had crepes, fresh fruit, omelet station, fresh squeezed juices, and more. We went to La Cabana pizzeria right next to the main pool for lunch most days. Their pizzas were awesome, service and drinks were great. We also tried some appetizers and tacos, all were good as well. We tried all of the evening restaurants except Fuentesn (we did not go to any restaurants at Generations because reservations started at 8:30pm). You have to make reservations for your evening meals when you get there with the concierge. We did think the portion sizes were very small at the restaurants, but we actually loved this because we could try so many different things each night. We loved Kampai, went there three times. My husband loved the sushi. I got the Phad See Lew Neur twice, as it was the best entree I had there. We tried all of the desserts there, the fried ice cream was very tasty. We also loved Santa Fe, each entree we had there was also very delicious. The desserts there were also really good. We went to both Italian restaurants, we preferred the one on the casitas side. The cacio e pepe at Casitas was some of the best pasta I have ever had. The veal was also very good. If you want a bar with really good alcohol and a fantastic bartender, I definitely recommend the Belini bar. We went to this bar before our evening dinner reservations. The bartender remembered us each time and our drinks were not weak. We were only approached one time by staff at the resort to talk about their time-share club. It was not an intrusive conversation and we felt they respected our “we’ll have to think about it” answer. Our concierge was very helpful with any questions we had during our stay. We ordered room service twice, portions were tiny, but all the food was very good. If you order room service, I recommend ordering lots of food. All of the staff at this resort were amazing. We highly recommend this resort to anyone that wants to stay at an all-inclusive in Mexico. We cannot wait to come back!

Better value elsewhere This is supposed to be a luxury resort at 500/night. I do not expect to be pitched timeshares and put on the “let me take you to our other resort and trap you there.” Very unprofessional. Outside of this, food is great and service at the el dorado is nice. However, there is no ocean to swim in at resort. The break waters make too much chop and it is unsafe to swim in ocean.

Pick a different resort! Dinner time is a mess at this resort no matter what restaurant you go to. They are Disorganized, have small portions, and service is beyond slow. For instance, we sat at our table for one hour and 10 minutes before someone took our order (after us seeking out the manager 3 times). The food from room service was below average and sometimes room service never came at all. This resort seems to share a manager with its other 2 sister resorts. When we had an issue we had to wait 30 minutes for a manager to come over from another resort. The grounds are beautiful but we would not recommend this resort; It was not an stress-free vacation and there are other resorts that are a better value!