Trisha0612's LONG Paradisus Review

Paradisus Riviera Cancun Review

So here is my review..it’s a little tricky considering we were planned for Dreams Tulum but ended up at Paradisus Cancun due to all the problems with DT.

Paradisus Riviera Cancun Resort: A

This resort is beautiful. It’s a lot closer than DT to the airport but still outside of Cancun so you don’t feel like your IN Cancun. The grounds are beautiful and the beach is amazing. When we got in on Saturday it was raining so they had rugs laid down throughout the hallways of the resort since it would be extremely slippery. The entire place is outdoors with only the restaurants and rooms inside.

Although we saw 3 pools, we spent most of our time at the Main Pool/Pool Bar. They have an entertainment crew that was there everyday providing some sort of fun activities for everyone to do. They played tons of music and it was a lot of fun.There are also palapa (sp?) beds available at the pool, but to get in one you have to get there really early as they are the first things to go. We joked the entire time that we were going to put my dad in one at night so we would have it ready for the next day! The other pool that we had access to was the activities pool where I guess you play activities..I’m not sure..like I said we were only at the one. There is also another secluded pool for the “Royal Services†guests. This was something we were def. bothered by since at Dreams there were no secluded areas for guests that paid more really. They had special rooms but all the guests were allowed to visit all the pools. Anyways, this pool was also really nice with plenty of beds for the Royal Services guests. We ended up upgrading ourselves and parents but only had our parents visit that pool one day. Everyone wanted to be where the fun was..which was at the main pool/bar.

Bars: A+There are only 3 bars in the entire place. Pool bar, Main Lobby bar, and the discoteca. As I said before the pool bar was a ton of fun since we did have our entire group there most of the time.It closes at 6 but they do last call around 5ish. Since we befriended basically all of the staff we managed to keep swinging drinks up until 5:45ish.

We also spent most of our nights at the main lobby bar, which was nice. They usually had something going on in there as well. I believe Monday nights are the Kareoke nights and I’m not entirely sure of what goes on the other nights. I loved how beautiful the main lobby bar is, and how open it is. There is plenty of space for all parties to fit, and always staff around to help. This is not a real lively bar, but if you can just hang out….or have a great time with your group it can be lots of fun. The bartender “Felix†was awesome and kept us lively by feeding us shots and drinks we never asked of or heard of.

The discoteca is open 6 nights out of the week. For some reason I believe it’s closed on Wed. nights..not sure why though. This is open til 2am. We visited the discoteca twice and had a blast. Granted it was completely dead…but with our party we kind of filled it up. And the first night we visited, there was another wedding party that were celebrating a birthday…and they were there as well. My friends visited the discoteca another night and had a great time as well. (this is also because we made friends with a ton of people/workers at the resort that kind of added like 10 ppl to the group) We went after the reception to continue the party and brought my IPOD since we still had a ton of songs on there and figured we could just play it there since NOBODY was there…the DJ agreed that he would but did not have a hook up..and well…I didn’t really pursue the issue since I apparently was more concerned about doing tequila shots..but hey! Anyways, the DJ seemed to understand it was a wedding party and played music that was good for everyone there. Then at some point it turned into club music so we all kind of bounced.

Restaurants: B+

Okay, so one thing we were not too thrilled about was making reservations for dinner. First of all, you had to make reservations between the hours of 10 – 4, and you actually had to go to the concierge desk to do it. You couldn’t just call. Now I could see this not being too much of a hassle if you were kind of just a group of 2 or 4 planning for the whole week at once, but since we had no idea about what our group would like we had to wait then try to pick. Also, not all of the restaurants are open daily. Only 3 a night plus the buffet was open every night. They also are very skimpy on giving out reservations for the same restaurant at the same time. Considering the resort was EMPTY (like 30% capacity). For example, we had scheduled a dinner for the Italian restaurant Capri at 7 and our friends tried to do the same thing later and they wouldn’t allow it, they told them it was full. When we went to Capri it was EMPTY! There was only 2 other tables of 2. They do “allow†walk ins if they can fit and I know many of the guests did this, but they do really stress making reservations in advanced. During the high seasons I would def. recommend making reservations way in advance. Also a tip…you can make reservations for like 10 ppl. At a time if they have the room…so we did this one night with 2 groups requesting 10-12 ppl each and we had our entire party at the Japanese place with jst a 20 minute difference!

Now for the food…I thought the food was much better than Dreams Tulum. The buffet breakfast was really good, and they’ll make ya egg white omelettes which I LOVE so I pretty impressed. Overall the buffet was pretty good. It’s the only restaurant opened all day except for the Reef Grill Snack Bar which is open from like 11-5ish. This is also in the buffet but you have a menu to choose from. Capri (Italian) was really good. We had dinner here one night with a group, and then decided to have our rehearsal dinner there as well. (You can arrange a rehearsal dinner without extra costs up to 20ppl.) The rehearsal dinner required a set menu to choose from. Everything was delicious though!

Our favorite restaurant was the Japanese restaurant. It was Tepanaki (sp?) and had sushi as well. Although the cooks were not very enthusiastic it was still really good food and a great experience. Like I said before…2 separate people from our group had made reservations for like 10 people and we made our own for 6 and we had our entire group eat there the last night we were all there together! Trav and I did go solo one night and we met a bunch of people and had a blast. It’s def. a social atmosphere!

The Mexican Grill was also really good food. The only restaurant that was OK..or so I thought..was the Reef Grill. The food was alright.

We never visited the French restaurant….we’re not into French food.

Service: A+

The service at Paradisus was amazing. All of the waiters and bartenders are so nice and accommodating. We felt as if we knew everyone there. It is the same staff that works everyday almost at the same places so by the end of our 10 days..they knew our drinks..coffee….and even what we wanted to eat at some places! Throughout the resort everyone there had a smile and were so happy to help us with questions or any thing that we needed.

Wedding: A+

OK..this is the tricky part. Since we were moved from DT, we still had Landy there to help us with everything. However working with Perla and Daniella was also a pleasure. As soon as we got in I had asked the front desk about setting up an appt. with Perla…I did not realize that the welcome letter we received was from Perla informing us of our meeting first thing Monday morning. Anyways…they contacted Perla and she called us from her cell phone to see if we needed anything and if we wanted to meet later that day after the wedding she was currently working on. We met Monday morning with Perla, Daniella and Landy. We went through ALL of the details and settled my brain a bit. At the time I did not have that much of the materials I had done for the wedding since I had spread them amongst my friends to bring down and they were not arriving til Wed. However I did have the Welcome bags so I gave them to her to have them delivered ($4 a room). Many of my guests did NOT receive their welcome bags on time so I was kind of bummed about that..but in the end they all received them and no one seemed to care that much except for me! Wed. afternoon I dropped everything off to Daniella since Perla was not around. I gave a very quick rundown about what everything was for and Daniella said she had it all under control. Even the seating cards which I forgot to punch holes and bring ribbon for.

One thing I was upset about was that after they cleaned my dress they hung it back up in my room with NO COVER….so Travis walked in by himself and turned around and walked out. He had his mom come in and take it since he DID NOT want to see it until wedding day on me!

I was really nervous wedding day since we did not do any rehearsal. My flowers had arrived but since DT only offers corsages or pay more for bouquets we got our moms corsages. I had to call Perla to find out when the cart would be by to pick me up. She did call me when they were ready to tell me the cart was on its way. Of course the golf cart broke down on the way to the ceremony..lol..buuut they sent another one.

Overall the entire ceremony was perfect. The cocktail hour seemed to go really well and everyone enjoyed the Mexican Trio. The food and service at the reception was amazing. We used and IPOD so that worked out perfectly (bring a charger JUST in case..my battery was dead before dinner was over..luckily my friend had a charger. The hook up is not one that chargers as it plays) I did get annoyed that Perla/Landy were nowhere to be found for anything after the dinner service…we were not sure what to do about cutting the cake and dancing. Luckily Jean Marcus got everyone ready for the cake cutting and my brother a former DJ took over for the dances. We requested a microphone. The champagne for the toasts came out really late..but we had already done a toast using tequila shots!

The reception was over by 10;30 and we moved to the disco.

Salon: A

Leticia the woman at the salon (I think she was the only one) did a great job on my mani/pedi. For my hair appt. the following day I was nervous since my bridesmaids were not pleased with their styles from her. They showed her a picture of what they wanted and it came out NOTHING like they had asked. Leticia speaks very little English and they spoke very little Spanish. They redid their hair on their own. I brought my SIL since I know she would speak up since I don’t. I think if I was by myself I would NOT have liked my hair style since she started doing it NOTHING like the picture..but with lots redirection I LOVED my hair. I did my makeup on my own since I was running low on time.

That’s it for this part of my review…I am going to do my own review for Jean Marcus!

Hope this helps!!!!

Yea! So excited that everything went well! I am a Paradisus bride and honeymooner ... so I'm glad to hear that it sounds like your Paradisus is very much in line with my experiences in the DR! I can't wait to see your pictures! We are thinking of trying out that Paradisus soon!

Anyway, just wanted to say that with all the hassles and added stress, I'm so glad that your big day was still dreamy!!!!!

Trish, it sounds amazing! I'm so glad it worked out for you after all of that last minute chaos!

Its comforting for the rest of us with upcoming weddings at DT as we are waiting for information!!! Cant' wait to see more pics than the teaser pics Jean Marcus posted!! Welcome home and congrats!!

Congratulations! Sounds like you had a wonderful time!

What a wonderful review. I am soo glad that everything worked out for you - makes me even more excited for my wedding there in 5 weeks!

Congratulations! Can't wait to see pics!!!

Great review Trish! sounds pretty much like I will write mine. I think we pretty much had alot of the same things. My wedding day went perfect too...who would've thought, lol!

I'm so happy to hear you & brooke had a great wedding!

Congratulations, I can't wait to see your pictures!