I traveled to the Grand Mayan in Acapulco in April this year. The hotel is very nice but I must admit I was expecting more. I've stayed in nicer places in Palm Springs but since it was a timeshare exchange I thought it was good. I will say that they were doing construction and so the lobby was completely gutted and we could hear construction during the day from our room. We were only in the room when our daughter napped so it wasn't too big of a deal.

When we were there they had a kids appreciation day for the staff's children and that was nice because otherwise the water park was dead and not that much fun. I don't think it's worth it to pay extra for it. We were very disappointed that it was very difficult to find a restaurant open for dinner at the resort. The only restaurants serving dinner were the cafe and the sushi/crepe bar. My father doesn't like sushi or crepes so it wasn't a good option. The cafe was nice if not a bit pricey. It is better to buy your drinks during happy hour but down on the beach the men with the horses were also selling beers and sodas out of coolers for a lot cheaper. They also had other food vendors near by and I chanced it and had a very good ear of corn.

I too recommend that you stop at Walmart on the way in. Don't worry, you won't be the only one with Walmart bags on your bell cart!

Our driver was excellent. We used Cesar O. Santos based on reviews here. I too understand why people talk so much about their drivers as it makes a big difference. He was very friendly and funny. We did a half day city tour that was $80 for all four adults and saw the cliff divers. Another day he took us on a lagoon tour. My husband and I had a private boat. The tour guide didn't speak English and Cesar translated for us. He even applied the special mud on our faces! Afterwards the tour guides wife cooked us our best meal in Acapulco. The best sopas, snapper, and guacamole. While she was cooking we relaxed in hammocks. He also took us to some nice restaurants in town but nothing beat this place and it was very affordable. They even offered to let us use their rods to fish for a while. Cesar will always have a special place in our hearts because he saved us about $12,000 but i'll probably write about that in another more appropriate place. I would recommend him to anyone, we felt completely safe.

The resort is in a nice area but you are far from the main city or "Golden" area. I think that when the construction is completed and the restaurants and bars are back open this resort may deserve the rave reviews I've seen but for now I could have probably enjoyed another hotel just as equally and think I will try a different place next time.

They do offer you incentives to attend a timeshare presentation. If you know for sure that you won't buy and you stick to that pretty well, it's worth it. Otherwise, I would avoid it at all costs because they recently changed their contracts and you are not getting what they try to sell you.

So in summary, the hotel is nice but with all the construction you aren't able to enjoy what it fully has to offer. The time share people are big liars and Cesar is wonderful. Acapulco is a beautiful place and I look forward to returning. Oh, and it is better to exchange your money once your their. No fees. There were better rates there and Cesar took us to a good place with great rates.

Hotel is nice in a certain way. It is more apartment building than a hotel. With no lobby it is very confusing the entrance and the room they are using is too small. The check in was terrible. While we were in the middle of it, they started giving service to another customer! We paid a special price because we went for a wedding, but usually they charge more than 6000mexican pesos. With those prices go to Banyan Tree. Half of the rooms don't have ocean room and check in is at 5pm and check out at 10pm.
It is fair to highlight the good things too. Gibran, at the front desk, is a responsible manager who listened to our complaints and gave us an upgrade to compensate the bumpy beginning. Food is expensive but great and the restaurants' service is good for a five stars hotel.
Rooms have an okay size, and come with nice colors. The room with no ocean view is like not going to the beach. Not really a view, and feels uncomfortable going to a balcony and have a feeling you are in the city. The shower needs an update, but the space is good size. The bathtub is separated but is outside the bathroom.
Basically is a very uneven hotel, more fashionable than really a landmark, as long as it nice it will have visitors, but it may seem at the end, as many hotels in Acapulco, it will have glory days, and then decay. Hope they decide to change the uneven service and strange politics to become a truly good hotel.

The Acapulco area is beautiful because of it's location in the mountain coastline, with lovely beaches and swaying palm trees. We liked the Grand Mayan because of it's very safe location in the Diamonte Area, with only a short drive to the heart of town. The food in the hotel is very good, the Spa is relaxing, and the pool and beach area are beautiful and easy to access. There is also a fun water park for Grand Mayan owners with a lazy river which we enjoyed. Our suite was very roomy, with a full, well-equipped kitchen. I really don't prefer the color scheme in the suite, and the beds are hard. Be sure to ask for several egg-crates for the bed.There are nice plunge pools on the terraces of the suites. That being said, we really had a wonderful vacation!
Prices in Mexico are the same as you would pay for any beautiful resort area.
We found it extremely helpful to hire a travel guide to visit Acapulco and the sorrunding areas. Sebastian Hernandez, eskp_rsh@homail.com, was recommended to us, and we found him to be very interesting and knowledgable about the area. Ask him to lay his collection of music in the Taxi - it is eclectic and very enjoyable. Also look for him on Google - Sebastian Hernandez, Acapulco. We took a tour of the city highlighted by The Chapel of Peace with the 150 foot tall cross, The Hotel Los Flamingos that was formallily owned by John Wayne and Johnny Wuissmller (Tarzan), There is a breathtaking view of the the bay from the terrace, and plenty of nostalgic pictures. Of course, the cliff divers are not to be missed, and the Diego Rivera Wall Mural, made of thousands of small tiles is quite amazing.There are so many interesting and fun places to visit that I simply cannot write about them all.
On another day Sebastian took us on a tour of the Tehuacalco Ruins about an hour's drive from the city. The ruins were not totally escavated, but it was refreshing to see them without fancy sidewalks, and railings. However the terrain is a bit rough so wear good walking shoes.
On the same day we went to Taxco where every kind of beautiful silver can be seen and purchased! In some of the upscale shopes you can view the silver pieces that were made for the annual silver atrisan's contest. They are absolutely amazing to see!
Also do visit the Santa Prisca Cathedral. It is adjacent to the town square, and has unique wood carvings covered in gold. And, the paintings in the church are quite remarkable, as is the pipe organ. The church is very visable as you approach the city of Taxco. The trip to the ruins and to Taxo took all day, but I would highly recommend the investment of a day. The scenic drive along the way is unbeatable.
On our last night in Acapulco, Sebastian took us to a secluded restaurant and beach park. We enjoyed a sunset dinner of fresh red snapper and shrimp right on the beach under a large palapa. After dinner the staff built a lovely fire on the beach for us to enjoy while we watched a million stars line the heavens. I truly did not want to leave this enchanting city.

We vacationed here from April 24 until May 1. We stayed in the Grand Mayan and had a one bedroom with kitchen... plunge pool on the balcony... etc...

Just to make sure we didn't miss something COMPLETELY obvious, I just did some searching on the internet. The only mention of construction at this hotel was somewhere buried in the Grupo Mayan website that says something like demolition started in 2007. 2007! That same website reports that the construction should be completely by 2009. Well, 2009 has come and gone, and this doesn't appear close to being finished. Though if you ask the time share (errr... vacation club) people they will tell you they will be fully open in November or December of this year.

Anyway, we were somewhat disappointed upon arrival to see that quite a large portion of the place was shut down for construction. There were restaurants and bars that were closed as part of the renovation and that was somewhat disappointing as well.

Now, that said... we certainly got what we came to this resort for. A very nice RELAXING vacation!

Our room at first was not situated on the beach side and I was a little disappointed about that. I knew I would make more use of the balcony if it were facing the beach. We went to the front desk on our second day and asked if it was possible to be moved. They told us that they would check after the checkouts and checkins for that day were complete. We were shocked to find just a couple of hours later there was a message for us that they had a new room for us. YAY! It faced the beach and was awesome to sit on the balcony and watch the waves or read.

We went to the beach every day and never had any trouble getting one of the little huts to stay under. Sometimes we went in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon.. there was always a hut to be found.

It is true, the vendors do get quite annoying. If you don't intend on buying anything from them then don't tell them "maybe later". Just say NO. There was one guy that we did say "maybe later" to and he kept coming back day in and day out, asking us when we were leaving, bringing more samples for us to see, etc. But quite honestly we weren't really bothered by him because he was so FUNNY! I kinda wish we were interested in his product!

We did buy a beach bag from one of the vendors... definitely BARGAIN with them. I stuck my ground on my price and got it.

After sitting at the beach we would usually then go up to spend another hour or so at the pool. Again.. absolutely no problem finding seats at all. If you happen to sit near where the towel hut is however, there is activity that goes on every day from bingo to salsa lessons. So if you want peace and quiet, you will need to go further down the pool. Not really difficult since it is sooooooo large and long! Truly the end of the pool that is most beautiful is the end near the Mayan Palace anyway. That's where all the waterfalls and rocks and things are. Of course you get more kids down there because of the structure to play on but there really weren't many because most kids were in the water park.

We absentmindedly wandered into the water park on our first day there, layed down our stuff and went for a float on the lazy river. At one point a worker pulled my raft aside and said rather sternly "you have to pay". Well then, someone should have told us that as we strolled in! No one said a word until we were floating along the river. My husband was up ahead of me and no one had pulled his raft aside. I just looked at the worker and told him we didn't know. I think he expected me to jump off the tube at that moment but I couldn't and there was no where to get out of the river at that point anyway. So I asked him to please let go of the tube and we'd get out at the next exit. He finally let me float away.

I actually really enjoyed the food. And given that a few restaurants/bars were closed for the construction it appeared that the Mayan went out of their way to make each night seem "different" with their menus and options. There was usually some kind of themed buffet available but you were never forced to just take the buffet. You could always grab a menu and order off of that as well. There were also theme nights at the Aqua Park and you could sit outside and eat and watch the sunset. Lobster night was fabulous!

We usually grabbed a late breakfast and kinda treated it as "brunch" so we wouldn't have to spend a lot on lunch. We did get room service for breakfast once and holy cow the amount of food we got was incredible. The "American Breakfast" for one person really did serve two people quite well. We just should have asked for more coffee! We also had a box of cereal and milk in our room that we ate most mornings as well.

Oh yeah.. the coffee... the smoothest best tasting coffee! I had it at EVERY meal! LOL!

We kept forgetting about Mondo and went there for the night before our last night and were pleasantly surprised. So much so that we went back there for dinner on our last night as well. The sandwiches were really good, the desserts were really good, the crepes were really good!

The service we got all around was really very nice and helpful. I can't think of a single time that we were not happy with the customer service.

Room service was funny. We are not the type of people who need our room cleaned and fresh towels every day. So usually we just leave the "do not disturb" card in the door. Most places this has worked well and we would have them clean the room maybe twice that week. Well, at one point I guess the maids REALLY wanted to get in our room because the "do not disturb" card became missing and our room was cleaned. We got another "do not disturb" card and put it on the door the next day, but again it disappeared that same day. I guess they really want to clean your room every day regardless! I'd guess they were very happy with us anyway... peeking in some of the rooms each day as we walked down the hallway and they were cleaning we were appalled at the mess that some people leave. At the most the maids had to maybe make our bed and sweep the floor.

We hung our towels as the message that we would "use them again" and it was funny... the maids would leave the towels but then also supply new ones as well.

Overall it was a great experience and a very nice vacation. I only wish we knew about the construction (which we only heard them working on maybe twice?.. so it was not disturbing at all)