The hotel grounds were well taken care of. The food was terrific. The twice a week restaurant was excellent! There is no beach, but that is what we expected. I don't know what people were talking about in other reviews about getting into the water. There are steps down to the water and two scuba entry points near the dock. The staff was exceptional. We did a day dive and night dive off the pier out front of the hotel. We saw lobster, sting rays, octopus, lot's of sleeping fish, scorpion fish and lot's of eels. Definitely worth taking a splash there. The dive house was great. They were very helpful and took us to great dive sites.

Hotel: Fiesta Americana May 16 – May 24, 2006, All Inclusive Package. NOTE: At check-in you can choose to have the plastic bracelets attached to a lanyard and wear it around your neck. If you are a diver, I recommend this option since putting on a wet suit with a plastic bracelet affixed to my wrist proved to be both uncomfortable and problematic. We didn’t know this was an option until another hotel guest informed us. Also note, if you choose this option you MUST wear it at breakfast, lunch and dinner, as well as the bar so that the employees know you are all inclusive. Another benefit, when you go to town, the locals don’t know you are staying at a resort!

Vacation Package: Apple Vacations. The Apple employees were friendly and greeted my husband and I at the airport and promptly guided us to a shuttle for a 15 minute ride to the hotel. On the way, they warned against time-share pushers. A word about time-share dodging: If you are 27 the time-share pushers will leave you alone since you have to be some magic age (over 27) to qualify. Later, a representative at the hotel had great information about the island and excursions available for purchase. People that had visited the island previously said the ruins on the island were no where near as impressive as Tulum. NOTE: If you want to go to Tulum with Apple Vacation, you must make your reservation 24 hours in advance. The other option is to take the ferry to Playa del Carmen ( $20 US round-trip ). Take a cab to Tulum ( $140 US round-trip ). Pay the entrance fee, ect. It was a much better deal through Apple, but we didn’t reserve in time. :(

Room: We stayed in a Casita Suite which is off of the main hotel and part of a “quadraplex” of rooms. There is no ocean-view but the room was spacious and beautiful. It had an enormous bed and cozy living area. There’s a small balcony off the living area and we had the sliding glass doors open most days to keep a nice cool breeze flowing through the room. There was also an efficient air conditioner in the room when the humidity got to be too much. Personal refrigerator and safe were also included in the room at no charge. We had the pleasure of being graced by a huge land crab one morning. It caught us off guard and he was amazing to watch!

Bathroom: Great marble vanity, magnification mirror with light, blow dryer, ect. Huge bathroom with a shower / sunken “tub” combination perfect for rinsing yourself and your dive gear at the same time.

Food: Breakfast and Lunch were served buffet style at the Reef. I’m a fruit and vegetable gal, myself, so the offerings were plentiful and wonderful. Fresh pineapple, watermelon, honeydew, cantaloupe and Mexican papaya were served daily. This, along with fresh raw pecans, granola and cinnamon made my breakfast simply amazing. I adore smoothies and I would gather my fresh fruit, a container of natural yogurt and a banana each morning and take it to the bar to have the bar tender blend it for me. It was a fantastic quick digesting breakfast before scuba diving. They did it each and every morning with absolutely no problems. Truly wonderful!

There is also a menu (for both breakfast and lunch) that my husband would order from. He stuck with the lunch menu ordering the chicken quesadilla or the chicken sandwich. Take stephklein123’s advice and order the chips and guacamole – it is spectacular and I looked forward to it each day.

For Fun: Save your leftovers and take them to the pier. There are many fish there that wait in anticipation to enjoy ALL of your leftovers. They ate our fresh onions, bell peppers, bread, tortillas, ect. There was a spotted fish that continually circled and chased the other fishes – we affectionately named him Rapido. On one occasion, a menacing 5-ft shadow appeared in the water. We tried feeding it our leftovers, but it was more interested in the fish then in our tidbits. I ran up to the dive shop and they informed me that it was a barracuda, a BIG barracuda! It was amazing to watch him “herd” the fish around. Thankfully he didn’t eat any of them while we watched.

We never ate at The Tropical Forest – it was never open, the only option for dinner being The Hacienda Miramar. The Hacienda Miramar had “five-star” style food – fancy - as my husband called it. You can mess around and try all of the desserts, but the coconut ice cream is by far the best. If you enjoy kaluha, ask for some over the top of your coconut ice cream – it’s bliss! :)

Diving: We dove every day with “Dive with Martin” and were certainly not disappointed. They picked us up on Fiesta Americana’s pier daily on-time at 8:00 a.m. This is a full half-hour to hour before any of the other diving programs got rolling which meant we got to our dive site early and were the first to discover sharks, rays, barracuda, ect! Not only were they a great dive shop providing wonderful service at a lower rate that included any and all rental gear, Dive with Martin contributes to the local community – “Share With Martin.” Please take a moment to check out their website. We tipped $5 a tank per day, 2 tank dive = $20 a day. It’s truly worth it since the dive master and captain take all the “work” out of diving by setting up your equipment for you. The reefs are lacking in soft coral thanks to the hurricane and everything is covered in a blanket of white sand. Snow under water… Nevertheless, it was beautiful. The night diving was marvelous!

My favorite dive site was Columbia shallow.

Tipping: We tipped at breakfast, lunch and dinner. The community is still recovering from the hurricane and their great service and smiles truly warrant thanks in the way of gratuity.

Overall Service: Outstanding, I Agree!!! Wonderful, clean resort. Beautiful beaches. I cannot wait to return.

This was our first stay on Cozumel. Glad we picked the right hotel! Fiesta Americana was great. As avid divers, my husband and I were thrilled with the Dive House at the hotel. First rate and very organized. The resort itself was clean and well maintained, our room was very nice and staff was incredibly friendly. Great stay, we plan to do this again next year!! thanks for the wonderful vacation.

My boyfriend and I have been to many islands together and this one was our favorite. If you like to snorkel, dive, relax, and explore - this is the place for you! The first day we rented a car for 24 hours for only $58 - we drove around the entire island. There are beautiful beaches on the other side of the island away from the resorts - free. We took a couple tours - Xel-ha, snuba, and a resort dive course.

Xel-ha - $120 per person and it was NOT worth it. We wanted to go because we thought there would be great snorkeling, but the water was very foggy and you could not see the fish very well. Plus it;s like a zoo there - tonz of kids. I do not recommend Xel-ha!
Snuba - is a cross between snorkeling and scuba diving. If you have never scuba dived - this is an easier way - really cool
Scuba Diving - If you are going to cozumel - you have to dive at least once - you can take a resort course that only takes a 1/2 hr and then you do 2 dives for only $99 per person. This was the coolest thing I have ever done - everyone should try it at leat once.
City - you can get a cab into town for only $6 - well worth it - we bought alot of great things!
Main Land - you can take a ferry to Playa Del Carmen for only $20 - it's a pretty cool city to check out!

Food - OK
Breakfast Buffet every day - same stuff - eggs any way you want them - hot stuff, cold stuff and fruit.
Lunch - if you do all inclusive you have a choice everyday at the same restaurant - get the lunch buffet or order off the menu. I highly suggest ordering off the menu - everything was awesome. And ask for Chips and Guacamole -- it's the best we ever had!!!
Dinner - The buffet is OK - I started to get sick of the same stuff every night chicken, beef, pork and rice. The Specialty Restaurant is good.

Compared to the other resorts on the island -- this one is really nice. Everyone was very friendly and helped us out when we needed it. The rooms are clean, you can use the water at the hotel (we didn't get sick), The view is awesome from all the rooms. It's very quiet because most of the people that stay at this resort are divers and they are gone from 9 -3 everyday.

I do suggest to bring water walking shoes to go into the ocean - the rocks will hurt your feet. We had them and had no problem at all. The snorkeling outside the hotel is amazing.

Brings alot of dollar bills to tip with - the service is great the the staff deserves it!

Any Questions feel free to email me : stephklein123@yahoo.com