RIU Palace Pacifico All Inclusive

Great customer service. Reservations required at all but one buffet restaurant was a pain. Took two days to get a reservation. Buffet was set up horrible and difficult to get good fresh food especially at breakfast. Other restaurant food was great. Room service a nice perk but only has cold food. Lounge chairs at pool fill up quickly. Pool was nice but would have preferred an adult pool as well to get away from the kids and large crowds.

The hotel had not only the friendlies staff but were very serviceable. The rooms were clean, the food was good. My only complaint had nothing to do with the hotel. It was tooooo hot. Don't go in August.

Overall the hotel was good. There were however, a few disappointments in the week we were there. It would seem the hotel has cut back on costs and this is evidenced by a lack of the beautiful food displays and ice sculptures the buffet used to have. This is not that big a deal, but I was disappointed in the quality of the food they offered. On numerous occasions, the food trays were empty, and the food always seemed cold by the time we sat down to eat it.What stood out the most to us however, was the discrimination we felt when we ordered a better quality wine than what they were offering. For the most part we were accomodated with this request, but on the last night, we requested the wine and were told there was none. We were rather surprised that there could be no Chilean wine in the whole resort. Then we witnessed something very disturbing. Some people we had met at the resort, requested the same wine and got it! When we confronted the waiter, he told us his manager told him to lie. I am not sure why we were discriminated against that night. Looks like the hotel will need to revamp their quality of service in that department. Overall, the staff were professional and friendly (except the manager at the buffet) and we enjoyed our stay.

food could have been better

I was traveling with my 2 kids and was interested in the Kids Club but this particular RIU location did not have many daytime activities planned because, apparently, they did not have many kids staying there so they didn't plan anything. My kids were 8 and 11 and it would have been nice if I could have dropped them off for short periods of time. There was an area for dropping off toddlers and one of the staff did offer to play with my kids in lieu of activities that were pre-arranged so that was nice but my kids would have rather had a group activity. My 11 year old ended up playing water volleyball with the adults. Also, there are evening activities for kids starting at 8:30pm but I wasn't told about them so we didn't participate. FOOD: We arrived on Sun evening and on Monday we tried to make reservations for the restaurants and all of the good ones were booked for the week. We were leaving Thurs. The only place we could reserve was the Mexican one and so we ate there Mon night and then ate at the buffet the rest of the nights. I did manage to complain to management and got into the Japanese restaurant the last night. The buffet was ok - lots of selection but only some of it was good. The salad bar and deserts were very good. ACTIVITIES: The Pool closes at 7pm which was ridiculous but it was very nice and had a swim up bar. For "all inclusive" there were only a couple of free watersports available - boogie boards and kayaks. My kids were too young for kayaks - they had to be 15. ROOM: The room was small but fine. Our room was over the lounge where the shows were at night so we weren't able to fall asleep until after 11:30pm because it was so loud. SHOWS: We saw the Michael Jackson show and the Vegas show. The MJ show was excellent and the Vegas show was ok. Kids were allowed at these but mine only really liked the MJ one. They are probably more geared for adults. Had we known about the earlier kid shows, that would have been nice. The music at the pool was a little annoying because they played a lot of "club" music instead of relaxing music like fun tropical stuff. BEACH: The beach was very nice. Sandy, warm water and few rocks. We saw dolphins in the water and if you take a boat they will come nearby. STAFF: The staff was very friendly and attentive.

un profetional hotel staff

I had a great time there, but I would make some improvements...there is not any snack bar next to the pool; you need to go to the sport bar that is next to the lobby to get some snaks. They should have a pool for adults ONLY. The food is good but could be better. The internet access is not free, you need to pay after 90 minutes, if you log in and log out after 5 minutes it does not let you access the wireless after 24 hours.

This was my 4th trip to this hotel. What I learned is that when they aren't near capacity, that this RIU sells vouchers to the locals for a pretty good deal. What that means is that come Thursday night, it gets very crowded and doesn't let up till noon on Sunday. The pool was absolutely nuts on Friday and Saturday with small children snorkeling by the pool bar and parents that couldn't care less. Sunday morning, there was not one piece of bacon to be found on the buffet. Very sad. Beautiful resort, but I don't feel that this practice is very fair for vacationers.

The food was ok, the room was ok and the location was ok. The vendors weren't too bad, the smoking wasn't too prevalent and the pool announcer wasn't really terrible (about as annoying as every other one - but a little louder). The staff was tremendous - their waiter and maître d training program is very good - gracious, loose and friendly, knowledgable restaurant staffing was impressive on suh a large scale. The beach waiters were mostly awesome and checked by frequently. We will not be returning, however, because of the noise. The doors and windows aren't necessarily less soundproof than other places but the acoustics in this place are good - if you want to hear every breath in the hallway or every peep from the bar while trying to sleep. The hotel has apparently no control over customers and the blasting shows go well past the posted 11pm - usually almost midnight. Also, the last two days we were there, the whole place was invaded by a super-annoying group of 30 women and 60 preteen girls. Probably the least relaxing two days of vacation I've ever had. If getting up early is your thing, this is not your place.

Great location on the beach, enjoyed the use of the water sports equipment.