May I first say that we vacation in Cancun every year and have been doing so for the last 12 years. We own at the Royal Sands and Islander, both 5 star resorts. We arrive early in the week every year to get the most out of our stay and we always start our visit here at the H.I. Ex. We have never been let down. Understanding that this is not a 5 star experience, it is by far the best bang for the buck. The full buffet breakfast is wonderful. Hot, cold, variety, authentic, poolside and great way to start your day. You can eat enough to carry you through to dinner if you wanted. The grounds are kept very clean and very green. The rooms are what you would expect for this price. The service is great. Bellboy at the door. Private parking lot with security. Though security has never been our concern. The location of the hotel is off the Hotel Zone located on Pok ta Pok. Easy to get to. Either by car, bus, feet or Taxi. It is located further north on the strip and is closer to downtown as compared to the airport. Minutes away from CocoBongo, Hooters, Etc. Walmart and Sam's Club is available as well. Be prepared to speak spanish though. Walmart in Cancun is not your American version. Same store front, same inside, same blue smocks but totally espanol. Do no expect to go to the deli and order your sliced ham in english!!!! The staff at the H.I. Ex is very well spoken in both languages. You can try your espanol there and they will help if needed. We found that more locals, meaning local travelling families and business class, use this hotel. It is always a quiet hotel. The rooms offer two doors of entrance. One door is in a common inside hallway and the other is from the outside pool courtyard. Chairs and lounges are plentiful. The AC in the room is more than adequate. The towels are great sized and do not feel like 50 grit sandpaper. Pool towels are available as well. If there is anything that I must say bad about the hotel is that like all hotels or public areas in Cancun, someone is trying to sell you something, timeshare, snorkle package etc. This hotel has a desk in the lobby disguised as a help desk. And at this desk is the nicest woman who will help you........to buy what she is offering. Persistance on both parties. You are saying no thanks and she is saying just try it. BoTToM LiNe - Do NoT ATTeND AnY PReSeNTaTiON To AnY PLaCe FoR aNy THiNg - JuST SaY No. Or like me, learn the hard way and suffer. If it helps the men here, my wife is as picky as they come. She will stay here without complaining. You might not know it, but that says it all.

We really love this place. Planning our 3rd vacation trip back to Cancun since July 2006 and will stay at the Holiday Inn again. It is so comfortable, relaxing and low key. The rooms and service is great , the pools and gardens are beautiful, it's quiet and the Continental breakfast is out of this world! You won't be disappointed if your looking for a nice clean, small and classy place and are on a budget. Sincerely, Chris - New Hampshire USA

We arrived at the Holiday Express with little expectations due to the low rates. We were pleasantly surprised on how nice and clean the rooms were and the grounds were very well kept. The rooms are on the small side, especially the bathroom. We had two double beds in the room, probably one king size bed would've given us more room. The staff was very pleasant and accommodating.
It was nice and quiet the whole time. The pool was adequate for our needs. We already had spent a week at the beach at the Casa Maya, which was very noisy with all the spring brakers. The daily free breakfast was also very enjoyable. We did have lunch at the Laguna Suites a block down the road. It's pricey there, but we were greated with a free glass of champagne and got 20% off our bill because we stayed at the Holiday Express.
The walk to the main road to catch the bus was easy. When taking a taxi anywhere you need to negotiate the price ahead of time or you might be surprised.
I really enjoyed the area itself. There are small delis close to the hotel. Two story homes in the spanish style flanked the small side streets with lots of flowers. It's a short walk to the Lagoon.
All in all, we enjoyed our stay very much and would stay there again.

The pictures on the website made this hotel look really good, but when we got there, we were VERY disappointed. It was very small, only 2 SMALL pools, the lobby was very small and the beach was not that great. The food was terrible, barely any selection at all although they did have room service which wasn't as bad. The only good thing about our stay there was our hotel room, we had one of the newer ones which was nice. They were still doing renovations while we were there and some things were not open. If you wanted to use the non-motorized sports, you had to travel 20min to "Aquaworld" which was on the lagoon. I would not recommend anyone staying here if you are used to nice 4 or 5 star resorts

Jennifer