We have stayed at the Barcelo in the past and liked it , as well as this time. Overall a great facility with wonderful beaches, safe, a TON of kids activies and that SUN is amazing. For the hotel.. I feel like the tropical was outdated a bit, beds were ROCK HARD and the food was OK, the buffett was old after a day and the reservations resturants felt like food off the buffet except for one, the Koyko? Oriental one - very good. I will bring my kids back to this resort as we know what to expect, love the beach and facilities. As for a personal spot for just my hubby and I, probably will go elsewhere . Daily entertainment was fun but nightly entertainment is very scarce, besides the lobby bar there is nothing going on. A few shows and a disco however they are not overly busy nor exciting by any means. Coupon special is a joke, still have to spend a forturne and if i recall they were the same price (after the coupon was used) that they were on the last visit so no real bargains. The SUN, WARM weather and atmosphere was GREAT! Would reccommend if your bringing kids forsure -- if your up for a ton of night life - keep shopping.

I know we should have known better, but we thought the water was filtered and consequently, if you even just bruch your teeth with the tap water you will get sick, as each one of our group of 6 found out, independently! Drink the bottled water they bring into your room. It is included and therefore will not cost extra. Use it to rinse your toothbrush and you will be just fine! The buffet is great, lots of choices, and the service is very good. My daughter in law read this in a review and we found it very helpful to look between the mattress and the box spring on your bed for a very nice (and new) mattress cover to make your bed softer and more comfortable. Heaven only knows why they hide these under the mattresses??!! We also found that the more you tip, 20 pesos and up, the better service you get, although they tell you tipping is not required. Every little bit helps these wonderful people who take such good care of you.

We stayed here for 7 days at the end of Jan. 2013. There were 9 of us total and we had a great time. Some of the family members have never been to a resort before, and were amazed at the beauty of the place. The food for some reason was better than we remembered it to be from last year.
You will not go wrong staying here,there's plenty of space at the beach and you never feel crowded. Some of us went snorkelling right off the beach and seen many fish,turtles,and stingrays. No need to go on excursions to snorkel.
We will definitely be back!!!

Just returned from Barcelo- stayed for 6 days (January 25-31st). We had booked the Caribe/Beach section and were very pleasantly surprised to be upgraded to the Tropical section upon arrival.

After spending many hours reading through all the forums here I was a bit nervous about what to expect. There seemed to be a lot of negative reviews? We have a few minor complaints about the resort....but who doesn't?

The hotel grounds were immaculate...felt like paradise! Lush plants/flowers everywhere. Grounds keeping crews were always working to pick up leaves, cocoa nuts, trimming grass etc. Loved all the pools of water and the covered walkways from the buildings. Saw tons of iguana's on the grounds (all different sizes) my 8 year old son loved this.

Beach: Absolutely fabulous!! White sand that seemed to stretch for a mile. Tons of beach chairs available....never a problem to find open ones. There are some rocky areas in the water- bring along water shoes for sure. The beach in front of Beach/Caribe section was much nicer than Tropical/Colonial......could walk out farther into the ocean where the water was waist deep. Went out on the pier several times, always lots of neat fish swimming around. We never snorkeled around the pier....only in the beach part. Bring lots of sunscreen and a hat- got sunburned very quickly even with tanning before coming. Bring your own beach toys as the ones for sale at the resort are very expensive.

Pools: A bit on the chilly side...but we were hotter than heck most times we jumped in so they were very refreshing! Swim up bars were great! Seemed to get quicker service at the bar being in the pool than on the ground side. We had so many different kinds of drinks at the poolside bar...it was great. Alcohol was acceptable- could ask for anything you wanted. We are not big "hard liquor" drinkers so we could not comment on quality....we had no problem getting a good buzz going.

Buffets: Over all pretty good. There was such a HUGE variety of items to choose from that we pretty much had something good to eat every day (breakfast, lunch, dinner). Yeah- it's not the greatest quality...but what do you expect when they are serving 100's of people a day. I tried a lot of different things...such as rabbit and lamb etc. Tons of fruit, veggies, salads, bread to choose from. I was a bit disappointed that I could not find any strawberries or blueberries to eat. They are my favorite fruits and I eat them all the time! My husband and son enjoyed most of the desserts (they must have sampled 10 or 12 different things) ....I personally did not care for any of them. I would not say anything was totally inedible.....some things were just not for me. It was nice that they had a kids section too...with chicken nuggets, french fries etc...as we all know kids can be very picky. My son loved the guacamole and chips and he ate tons of that.

Ala Carte Restaurants: We ate at the seafood place and we enjoyed our dinner very much. I had the salmon...which was delicious....my hubby had the lobster....he loved it and I thought it was great as well. My son had the kids dinner (fish sticks/french fries) and he liked it as well. Excellent service here! We ate the steakhouse second and that was not so good. My ribeye steak was plain old gross (tough/fatty)! We are quite picky about our steak (we usually eat filet mignon at home) and my husband had the New york Strip. He said it was not so great either. No big surprise for me...we certainly didn't expect much. We had no problem getting our dinners booked. We actually had 4 nights of meals at the restaurants...but we only went to 2 of the reservations...we either got back to late from day trips or were too lazy/tired to get dressed up. Yes....we were very low key on this trip.

Rooms: We had a double room and thought it was plenty spacious for the 3 of us. The bathroom was nice with a big deep tub and shower. We could not get the sink/shower stoppers to function correctly...but no big deal. There could have been more towel hangers in the bathroom....and or located better...but not too big of a deal. I was very disappointed with the cheap little hair dryer. The low setting was pretty much useless...and the hot setting was so damn HOT that it felt like my hair was about to catch on fire. I could kick myself for not bringing my own hairdryer from home! My hair pretty much sucked (felt dry like straw) the whole time I was there....thank god for hats! The TV pretty much sucked as well. Certainly not HD- nothing in English but CNN news. It was small...maybe a 28" or 30". This was disappointing as I really just wanted to veg out and watch some TV late at night after a long day of walking all over (both at the resort and excursions too). I wish there was a clothes dryer in your room (even a community one would be nice) because it took forever for any of your wet swim suits/clothes to dry outside. We had several very thin tank tops/shorts (quick dry material) and they dried fast...but a thicker cotton t-shirt/underwear took 24-36 hours to dry. This is due to the high levels of humidity...hence a dryer would have been great! The A/C and ceiling fan worked great...my hubby actually got cold at night and we got him an extra blanket. The pillows were ROCK HARD- felt like a bag of cement! Bring your own from home. The beds were hard/firm.....but we prefer that. Loved the tile floors in the rooms.

We did not ever go to the theater or disco...we were too tired by the end of the day. We could never find the mini golf course....no big deal. Plenty of sports activities to do- basketball, ping pong, shuffleboard, etc.

Shopping at the Mexican plaza was OK. Prices are quite high...better deals to be had in Playa Del Carmen. Enjoyed the kids show where there were the staff was all dressed up in traditional Mayan costumes and my hubby got in on a game of "hit the ball through the rock disc" type (don't recall what it is called). Had to leave for a dinner reservation before they lets the kids break open the pinata....my son missed out on that.

All of the staff were very gracious and attended to our every need. Overall we had a great time and would most definitely consider coming back!! Not everything was 100% perfect...but what do you expect?

We stayed in the Yucatan building...room 7444 ground level. I actually liked the ground floor because you could see all the iguana's and other wildlife right there from your patio.

If I forget anything I will come back later and revise my review.