Awesome room (building 27 - southend of Tulum phase, so we were as close to the Akumal main building as the Tulum. Rooms at Tulum all seem to have view of the ocean though they are older. Still clean and neat every single day. Excellent service by our maid, Rohoan. Exceptional towel art! We looked forward to seeing what he'd create every single day. And please tip. These folks work hard for minimal wages and there are 10 people waiting in the unemployment line if they complain!

Buffet at Akumal and Tulum were very good. Enjoyed the daily selection of Mexican items at Akumal. For a la carte's Don Pablo was excellent. No buffet here to round out your meal. El Pescador also very good.

Resort amenities in general: red flag most days so enjoy water sports when you can. Beach rough near Tulum so headed to Akumal resort area most days. Beach volleyball windy. Tulum beach vball not recommended - rocky and a couple of injuries. Akumal beach vball was great and a good crowd usually there from 10 til dusk. Did not partake of shows.

Jose at the CoCo Beach bar near volleyball courts and Akumal resort was excellent. So friendly, and quick and always trying to make a joke along with serving his famous concoctions.

Tons of wildlife in/around the resort. Watch out for iguanas sunning pretty much everywhere.

Quick access to snorkeling at the actual Akumal beach (not to be confused with the Bahia resort). $3 US each way using highway based white van - public transit. Clean and cool! Akumal beach - saw sea turtles and stingrays and great variety of fish. Went back a second day it was so good. NO shower, but there are small shops and a few beach restaurants/stores.

Tulum ruins also accessible by collectivo, so save your pesos and don't do the tour, although you may want to arrange for a guide. There is signage, but it is minimal. Also, use washroom before you go in. It is the only one. Beach is fabulous - body surfing here was awesome. No change room however or shower. VERY hot there when sun is out so take water.

Coba, rapell, zip line tour through Air Canada vacations something like Go Natural? tours. Arranged in main lobby of Tulum highly recommend. Coba ruins - not for faint of heart if you suffer vertigo as you can still climb the 42 m main temple steps and look out over the jungle. See ancient basketball game hoops and other great excavations. Fair distance from parking lot to main temple - 2 km, so took a bike or take a mayan limo (they peddle - you sit). Our tour guide Angela was EXCEPTIONAL. Rapid fire Spanish to English to French and she easily dispelled the myth of the Mayan calendar and civilization ending in 2012 Dec.

Would highly recommend and would return.

We stayed at the Villas Hacienda in the Tulum resort. The rooms were nice, towels and mini bar was stocked daily. The people and staff were friendly and helpful. Sometimes the information was confusing. Not all the staff gave us the same information. It's a huge staff so they don't always know what's what.
The beach at the Akumal resort was the best for swimming and snorkeling, but also the most crowded. If I went back, I would probably stay there. They have trolleys but we did a ton of walking anyway. Food was good for resort food, plentiful with alot of variety. My only complaint was that the drinks are watered. Even if you asked them to make them stronger, it didn't do much. Even the beer - one type only - was weak. We are not big drinkers but this was dissapointing. We booked 4 a la cartes and they were fine.
We booked a taxi to take us to the resort and used the travel agency transfer to return. This worked out very well.

I booked a fishing trip which was overpriced and they just trolled around until I suggested we start bottom fishing. If you want to fish my advice would be to take one of the boats off the resort - just to the left of the Tulum beach.
People got up very early and put their things down, but only once on the Akumal beach did we have trouble finding chairs.

All in all, I liked it alot. There were a ton of activities and things to do - or not.

Spend 10 days at Gran Bahia Principe at end of January. All our requests were granted. Stayed in Villa 23 overlooking Dolphin pool. Close to snack bar, Pools, and favorite breakfast restaurant - La Gran Tortuga. Favorite buffet was Riviera at Akumal. Booked 3 A la Cartes via email wiht Customer Relations prior to trip: Frutos Del Mar (Seafood), Don Pablo (International), and Mikado (japanese). The best was Don Pablo. We enjoyed riding the shuttle around 3 resorts. Grounds are beautifully landscaped. The Staff / Service is wonderful! Could not do enough for us. Definately book Best Day for transfers to and from airport. They are the best.! We also booked an excursion thru Best Day to Xcaret. The evening show "Mexico Espectacular is worth the admission alone. Other highlights were: Sea Turtles, Horse Exhibition, and Dance of the Owl. Went to Akumal Beach snorkelling, as beach is rocky and water was rough in front of Gran Bahia Principe. Would recommend to others if you want to relax and spend time at pool. Will probabely go back to Barcelo next time for better beach, activities, and night shows. Hola!!

This hotel - Gran Bahia Principe Tulum, Akula and Coba i>s aspan> HUGE disappointment. We had water running out of ceiling light and when we reported it, no one hurried to fix the problem. We called twice and finally had to walked to the front desk to show them video on the running water on my cell phone. We had our personal belongs ruined due to the water that dipped on them. Then later we had bugs crawling on our personal bathroom items. We were told by the staff you can not expect perfection in Mexico. We had to take a shower in a new room which had bigger bugs crawling on the ground floor, in order to make our 8pm dinner reservation. We returned to Tulum at 11pm and was told we could not return to our orginial room. &nboriginalbsp;had to move in the rain, at 11:30 pm to a new room. The new room was over 80 degrees inside, When asked for a replacement to a simple item, such as a toothbrush. We were told that would be impossible and they would not be bringing us a new one from the housekeeping store room. I was promised by the General Manger to hear back from him that night, instead we never heard from him or anyone, even when we checkout we received no apology, no refund, instead we were charged for toothbrushes!!! Once we returned home I complained to the Gran Bahia Principe Hotel (top) Guest Service Manager, only again to be ingroned, This hotel does not care about it guest and has horrible management!!!! Avoid this hotel unless you like to be miss treated, ignored, and disrespected. Never will be returning to any of these resorts.