We traveled to the Aventura Spa a little under a year ago with a large group. I had never been to Mexico and the appeal of the $1500 room credit really made our decision easy. I researched the options for the Aventura spa and day excursions (through Trip Advisor) . I poured through the reviews on every website possible and I must say we just absolutely loved the resort. I recommend it to anyone and especially if they offer the credits, which I am not sure if they will continue once the turnover to Hard Rock is complete.

During our stay we utilized the resorts spa several times. We have 2 couples massages, including the hot stone massage. I also had a facial, mani & pedi. The staff was professional and friendly. We also utilized the resorts excursions and traveled to Isla Mujeres and Tulum. Now, although these were great and cheap Id recommend planning a whole day for each. Time was very limited and both places have enough to offer a whole day of exploring. The hotel can help you line up transportation, but the hotel trips are just a few hours - DEF NOT enough time.

We attempted to eat at every restaurant on the resort, only on one occasion did the restaurant not have what we wanted. The food was excellent! Our favorite - the Italian Restaurant! We also bought large "Bubba" cooler mugs and the bartenders at the pool never had a problem filling these up for us, or adding more liquor when we asked for stronger drinks!

Our room was set back in a courtyard so no ocean view, but that was okay with us. We were hardly in it anyway. Here are my pointers:

*Get to the pool early or wake up and put towels out. its full by 8-9am. Even though the staff will get more chairs there was never enough.
*Go into Playa del Carmen and go to the Playa Palace for beachfront. Even though Aventura is transferring to Hard Rock, we just walked out and said we were staying at their sister resort, the beach staff didn't even think twice and we had full service on the beach (and it is right next to Senor Frogs!).
*Tip. You don't have to but it is just nice. The staff is so helpful and friendly!
*Go see the moneys on the family side. The day we went it was pouring rain so we couldn't :(

My husband and I just returned from a week at Adventura Spa Palace. We stayed on the spa side. It only rained 1 day (in case you're wondering about November weather), and overall, the resort is beautiful, service is just OK and the selection of food is good but average in taste. Here's the breakdown...

THE BAD:

- It took nearly three hours to check in, so you can probably expect the same - but no worries, a "personal consierege" will aim to distract you from this fact with a timeshare pitch and excursion bookings. This isn't altogether a "bad thing" though since you'll need to book the important stuff (like spa treatments) right away. In our case, the spa was so booked that we did not get to do a spa day! I had read other reviews where people expressed how overbooked the spa is - and it's TRUE. Very frustrating, considering it's supposed to be a "spa palace" (Right?). By the way, when we did finally get our room, we discovered it had double beds when we requested a king. We were told it was because we booked through RCI. (As RCI members, we felt like 2nd class citizens, so beware RCI peeps.)

- The next day we were moved to a room with a King size bed, and soon realized that the ceiling was leaking water. We reported it, but it was never resolved while we were there, so I feel sorry for whoever gets that room going forward. (Cross your fingers it's not you, should you book here)

- The service was hit or miss. Some of the staff were friendly - others didn't even acknowledge you when you walked by. Overall. it was sort of like going through a fast food drive-thru. Yes, everyone eventually does "get a turn" and "you get what you pay for", but when you finally reach the window, you're disapointed to find that there's just NO CARE put into the service. Shoutout to Rosa though (one of the servers who was fun and kept us happy and drinking on one of the rainy days there - and Josue, who was very charming and remembered our names.

- The resort is not within walking distance of anything, so you'll have to cab it to Playa del Carmen - which is a MUST to go and experience. Eat at "The Glass Bar" - food is amazing and the staff delivered world-class service! (Service we were hoping to get at the resort)

- The resort is transitioning into a Hard Rock - which for now, means hearing heavy metal music in random places throughout the resort... like, even at the lobby. Some of it was fine but just feels out of place because the resort is so beautiful and has an authentic Mexican feel. Just felt out of place.

- No ocean view. With the way the rooms/buildings are ANGLED it's nearly impossible to get a dead-on ocean view. If you have any hopes of getting an ocean view (or want to avoid any of the above problems), save yourself the stress and book elsewhere.

THE UGLY:

- We witnessed a bartender cut his finger on a broken champagne flute behind the bar. He was bleeding pretty heavily! We watched in disbelief as he doused it with tequila, smiled at us, and continued pouring drinks for the other patrons. We exited the bar, stage left.

- Room service delivered a hamburger that was 70% RAW. Order the shrimp cocktail - don't order the hamburgers.

THE GOOD:

- The Italian restaurant at the resort was great from start to finish! Service there was WONDERFUL. Again, we wished we had recieved similar service everywhere else on the resort.

- Weather was surprisingly good. A little overcast on some days - but it only rained once.

- The disco is fun. We wandered in and ended up staying, met some great people and killed it on the dance floor! :)

- The cove is nice and full of fish, although there's no "beach", you can still snorkel (my husband did and loved it).

- Definitely book a day at Xcaret and float down their underground river. The scenery is beautiful and it'll be a nice break from the resort.

- Finally, it IS a beautiful resort with lots to discover. The jacuzzis in the room are a nice touch, the bed is comfy and in the end, a vacation is what you make it. Despite some of the (horrible and frustrating) things about this resort, you pull through and have fun through the memories and new friends that you make along the way! We have no "regrets" booking here - but will never book here again. Like...ever.

The Aventura Spa and Cove have been purchased and are not, and have not been, part of the Palace Resorts since January. According to people we spoke with, since then the hotel has shipped away the best staff and the quality has gone down. It is being made into a Hard Rock.

The perks, which keep it from being a 1 star, are the beautiful architecture and landscaping. These were truly marvelous. The rooms were small, but nicely laid out.

Everything else is bad to terrible.

These are some of the problems in the two rooms that my family booked:
We were locked out of our rooms. TWICE.
The safe in the room didn't work.
LIVE wires were hanging down, uncapped, in the closet.
The light in the closet wouldn't go out.
Half of the towels were good quality, but half of them were rags.
The staff kept forgetting to replace the right number of towels, so we had half as many as we should have had.
Booking anything, from a massage to a trip, took at least two hours. That is valuable time on a vacation. They don't have enough staff.
The "personal concierge" was only concerned about when it was time for her to leave, not about her guests.
Staff of the spa were unevenly trained - some were great, but others were terrible and could have easily injured the person they were massaging if one wasn't careful.
Speaking of the spa, if you wanted anything other than a standard massage, and there was a long list of things supposedly available, make sure you book them two weeks before hand or you aren't going to get them.
The fancier the included restaurant, the longer the wait - we literally went to the gourmet restaurant and were told that it was a 40 minute wait for them to prepare a table for us - even though we could see only a quarter of the restaurant was in use and other tables were free and ready. They didn't want people eating there, as far as we could tell.
The resort credits could only be used for a very few things; there are four tours to choose from - so I hope you like golf or fine wines or spa treatments, because those are about the only decent things you can use your credits on.
If you tell them you have a problem, expect a 1-2 hour wait before anyone shows up, even though they will "be right there".
Make sure you ask for a bellboy 2 hours before you need to go - it will take about that long for them to get to your room.
Expect to walk a long way to most things.
When we first arrived in the dark, a bellboy took some of us to our room, then we called for a lift back, as they had not given us maps (they ran out and were re-printing them), and they said they were too busy to send a golf cart around. Which would have been fine if we had a map or had been there or had any idea how to get back, but was completely inappropriate in this case.
One of us was stung by a jellyfish in their lagoon - which is fine, and happens, because it is connected to the ocean, but the place at the beach to get snorkle equipment isn't stocked with vinegar or anything else to help ease the pain of a sting.
If there wasn't money in it for them, the trip advisors there weren't interested in lifting one finger to help you. At all.
When trying to speak to a manager, he would speak to others, who hadn't been waiting as long, before speaking to us.

I will NEVER book another vacation here nor to any other Hard Rock anywhere at any time.

Beware of the bellmen at the spa palace. Upon arrival they took our bags as our room was not yet ready. By the time we got to our room-many hours later-I discovered my iPhone had been stolen from my luggage. Foolish me left my iPhone in a zippered compartment of my luggage as it did not work within the country. We notified the front desk as soon as it was discovered and they assured us they would do an investigation. Their investigation resulted in nothing. As they said, the bags were in a public location and could have been breached. My advice is keep your valuables with you at all times or locked in a safe or don't bring them to this place. The overall quality of the place was average at best and because this location does not have access to a beach it's not a location I'll ever return to.