My wife and I just returned from a 6 night honeymoon stay at the Occidental Grand Cozumel. We enjoyed many of the resort's amenities including the Royal Club room service, the grounds, the beach, the snorkeling, and the overall friendliness of the staff.

I did have a few dislikes about the resort. First of all, I was offended and felt bad that VERY FEW people leave tips for their food and drink service, house keeping and water activities. It seems that the entire staff works extremely long hours but remain courteous and friendly.

My second gripe is there weren't any vegetarian options as main courses. My wife doesn't eat meat so it was hard for her to find dishes to eat. However, the buffets did offer quite a variety if you like seafood.

My largest complaint about the Occidental Grand is the serving of unlimited supplies of alcohol to teenagers (13-17). I realize the legal drinking age in Mexico is 18 and I gladly accept that. However, I saw several teens drinking openly. When I questioned the manager on duty, Adrian, he replied that the teens had their parent's consent. Both the resort and the parents of these kids should be ashamed of themselves!

I highly recommend you take the 2 hour two reef snorkel trip. Also, get a jeep for the day and go into San Miguel and then over to the other side of the island.

As much as we enjoyed our stay at the Occidental Grand Royal Club and the island of Cozumel; we won't be returning anytime soon. We're looking to broaden our traveling horizon. But, if you like to dive or snorkel then Cozumel and the Occidental Grand Royal Club is for you.

P.S. Our favorite employees were Oscar and Carlos!

My husband and I along with our 23 month-old son booked at the deluxe concierge Occidental Grand from May 19-26, 2008. Upon arrival, we were upgraded to the Royal Club for free! Prior to choosing this hotel, I researched and read all the reviews I could find about this hotel. We were concerned about some of the reviews, but we chose this spot because it was close to the best diving sites and they had a babysitting service for $10/hr. The service, food and amenities were all excellent, and they really proved the negative reviews wrong! At the end of our stay, we were sad to say goodbye to our hardworking servers at the restaurants, as well as the royal club concierge. Kudos to Nelly at the Royal Club concierge, and Javier at the dive shop. A word of warning though...beware of the divemasters at the palancar dive operators...safety is not a priority for them. Cozumel is all drift diving and mostly deep. There was hardly any SIT interval between dives, and you will find your dive computer beeping underwater due to decompression warning if you are not careful...back-to-back deep dives! We would highly recommend diving NITROX, and perhaps explore the other dive operators in town (like Aqua Safari)! Overall, it was a great family vacation!

What a beautiful resort. The grounds are very well maintained, with beautiful flowers and iguanas to amuse us. A pleasant surprise after some of the negative reviews I have seen. It was not the busy time, so there were no line ups for food or drinks. Breakfast buffet was excellent, with much to chose from. The food was excellent - there sure are some picky people on these reviews. We tried all of the restaurants, with the Mediterranean being our favourite, and then the roof top pizza place. The beach provided the best snorkelling we found, for free. Lots of fish to feed peas to. Saw a beautiful barracuda, and a ray. Our room was lovely - very cool, and clean efficient maid service, and we enjoyed a lot of time on the balcony. The staff were all pleasant, whether we tipped or not. But please tip these hard working people - share your good fortune. Side trips were easily arranged through the hotel. We went to the Dolphin Experience, where there was also excellent snorkelling, and on a catamaran snorkelling trip (not enough snorkeling time when all the people had to get in and out of the water - a smaller group would have been better). We will definitely return to this resort.

After reading the reviews over the last year before heading to the O Grand , I was concerned that we might not have such a great experience. Wrong! The place and people were great! NO sand fleas, beach was fine, drink lines were short and a fun place to meet everyone, rooms execellent, food great, service wonderful, pools very nice, grounds kept as nice as Disney World......my only problem was cheap, selfish wealthy guests asking for the world ( numerous exotic drinks brought to their beachside lounge) without as much as dropping a BUCK to the sweet girl who was carting a huge tray full of drinks! Come on .....these people work hard!!!! and they will NEVER have what we have!give them more than a "gracias" ....unbeleivable to see in person.
There I've vented! Be the better person you will sleep better.
I envy those who are heading this resort. We had a great experience ....and IF you want to .....you will as well. One more thing ...don't miss Alberto's beach restaurant next door...a must!
Eric