We (Me, My Husband, and 21mt old daughter and sister in law) stayed at the Riu Emerlad bay from November 2nd-9th 2012. And we cant wait to stay at another Riu soon, the service we received all week was beyond amazing.
Check in Was the fastest ive ever had, they had a representative from the hotel come and meet you in the bus and give everyone all hotel information we would need while others give us our bracelet. Once this was done we walked into the hotel and we were greeted with a drink and directed to the lobby bar for our room keys and were free to go. so easy!!!
Rooms were nice and simple and had everything we needed.The pillows were a little hard but thats just a personal prefernce We didnt ask for a crib for our daughter during booking but there was one there waiting for us when we got there. We were just planning on having her sleep between us so that made things much easier. We were on the 14th floor and the view was amazing!! We never waited longer than 2 minutes for an elevator so I am not sure what the other riviewers are talking about when refering to the long elevator waits.
Food was good, we ate at two of the a la cartes and we were able to make our reservations for the entire week when we went to the sunwing orientation - Bamboo was a buffet style a la carte and was amazing. lots of options! and Tabasco was also very good. We ate at the buffets the rest of the time and we always left full. There are so many choices and the Ice cream was amazing!!! Try Mr. Lionsos Down the beach, great seafood and mexican food and mexican athmosphere.
Beaches were nice but we didnt get to spend much time there cause the little one was scared of the ocean! Pools were nice a little cold in the morning but once the sun warmed them up they were perfect its just too bad that the pool with the swim up bar is adult only. would have been nice to be able to use this feature.
I really have no complaints about this hotel. everything was great!!

We just came back from a one week stay at the resort and we're very disappointed. We have been to about half dozen other all inclusive such as Cabo cancun varadero and punta Cana and this one was our least favorite one. Everything that is said below is true. This hotel is nowhere near a 5 star but more of a 3 on a good day when it's not full of locals. This hotel primarily caters to locals and right now I am not even sure why sunwinng offers this package. All announcements are in Spanish and majority of staff struggles to speak English. Elevator waits can be pretty bad when the locals are in the hotel Thursday to Sunday. Food is the worst we had in an all inclusive. It's heavily recycled and they only change one item a day which they then cook up on the third day and serve again. Some dishes they didn't even bother to warm up. There was no decent seafood which was a bit of a shocker for me. There is no poolside service and the nightly entertainment was pathetic. Most of the staff were friendly and the building was well maintained but that's about all the positive I can say. So spend your money elsewhere and go to another hotel. If you still want to book this hotel keep in mind that it's a 3star hotel on a good day and that's Mexican standards. Oh and kids are in every pool screaming and jumping around so forget about a relaxing swim. All the Canadians were hanging out at the beach where it was quiet.

I booked a week with Sunwing vacation packages for December of 2011 staing at the Rui Emerald Bay in Mazatlan. The hotel was obviously new and absolutely beautiful. The service was incredible and the rooms were very very clean. However, two reasons why I would not return....

1) THE BEDS are as hard as a rock. I don't mean lumpy or uncomfortable....I mean as hard as a rock. Every morning I woke up with lower back pain and a sore neck. I tried bunching the covers up and sleeping on top of them. I also tried to sleep on the pillows but unfortunately I was like the princess and the pea- the hard bed was felt right through the covers and pillows.

2) THE SWMMING POOLS were ice cold. It was Mazatlan in December- the pacific side on the coast of northern Mexico; it was chilly at night and in the morning. During the day the temperature was nice. But the pools were ice cold - not heated at all. Everyone tried to go into the pool but it was like walking into ice water.....and it didn't warm up at all nor did your body become accustomed to it.

All in all....gorgeous hotel. The staff were very welcoming and kind. If they fixed the beds and the pool temperature I would definitely recommend but if not then I would suggest another hotel somewhere further south (in the winter) that has a heated pool for the winter.

Warning. Not like the rest of the RIU’s I have visited. I went from Oct. 24th – 29th and was disappointed. Tourism is down due to Cruise Ships stopped coming and the Canadian’s boycotted the hotel so they must to do a local promotion because on Thursday through Sunday, local people buss in and over run the hotel. Four nice pools, with kids in everyone of them, some with bathing suit and others in plain clothes, all pools are like bar pool with smoking in them, straws floating around, no class. Be prepared for people who don’t recognize a line, they just cut right in front of each other. Two, other disappointments were that Bar tenders didn’t speak English well enough to know cranberry and there were no runner bring drinks to customers. Good things were: Hotel Staff was courteous, bed were soft for Mexico, HVAC worked, food was good. My wife and I are in our forties and like to party as well as relax, so this warning isn’t coming from an uptight traveler. I have visited RIU’s in Bahamas and Puerto Vallarta. I will go back to those locations but will not return to Mazatlan. For the same monies I could have went to Cabo and maybe you should consider that too. Remember, Weds we arrived very quiet, Thursday – Sunday was 1500 people at hotel and only 8 were American, Monday back to quiet. Be well and safe in your travels.