We had a fantastic stay over the New Year, probably the best New Year's party we have been to with our family and friends (at the Hacienda)Brilliant entertainment and the staff are just so friendly. Everybody should go to this night, it is very very special.
The hotel is excellent all round, clean, well presented and some of the best staff anywhere that w shave stayed at. It puts the Caribbean to shame, also if you go all inclusive for a typical family of four, it is about £2000 cheaper for a 7 night stay compared to say Antigua.
The beach is excellent for snorkelling and certainly do some of the day trips to the ruins at Tulum or the cave diving, a unique experience.
The dine arounds are first class, highly recommend the Italian and the Japanese although the main buffet is perfectly good with a really mixed variety of food including Mexican.
The drink is not rationed as at some all inclusive resorts and the cocktails are worth a try, especially the tequila based ones!
We would certainly come back here rather than the Caribbean, better service, better value for money and just as good beaches.
Alfredo in the Mexican restuarant needs a special mention, a very friendly helpful guy who knows how to make you enjoy your holiday.
Downsides? The room towels are on the small size, Internet connection can be a little hit and miss, the hotel is huge so don't expect to see the same people too often but apart from that, go enjoy a great resort hotel!

My husband and I stayed at the Gran Bahia Principe Tulum Dec. 1-19th, 2012.
We couldn't have enjoyed a nicer holiday! The Privilege Club treated us like family and we
stayed in a Villa with a beautiful room overlooking the beach, palm trees and a turquoise sea.
Our room was perfectly clean and decorated daily with a cute towel animal ornament.
The grounds are immaculate and we were always greeted with friendly "holas" from all the staff.
The hotel buffets were all very good and as members of the P.C. we enjoyed an excellent a la carte restaurant every evening. All the Tulum Privilege Club staff were very warm, friendly and welcoming, especially Julissa. The Club concierges at the Coba hotel were also outstanding, including Karla, Martina, Miluska and manager Anna Lopez.
The beaches are beautiful, a bit rocky but there are nice sandy areas available for swimming.
The entertainment staff at the pool was so much fun with their daily aqua fit, games and Latin dances. Archie, Charlie, Isaiah, Israel and Julio along with others really went out of their way to make it special for everyone!
The evening entertainment was always fun and the Mexican night vibrant with all their
cultural dances.
For those interested in history and archaeology the ruins in nearby Tulum and the Coba pyramid were highlights. Also, don't miss seeing Chichen Itza.
Can't wait for our trip to the Tulum next Dec.!

Loved the Grand Bahia Principe Tulum. Overall a wonderful experence, great staff, friendly. Excellent grounds, fantastic beach and clean water so many fish to see when you are in knee deep, plenty of space does not feel crowded easy to get lounge chairs under an umbrella at beach or by pool. There are many locations to enjoy being around people or off in a quiet nook. Rooms are spacious and well maintained. Housekeeping did a great job. We stayed in Villa 18 second floor. We had 2 rooms side by side, 2 teeneage daughters had there own room which was great. Only downside of room was you had to pay to use safe in room (we thought this was tacky) Not a huge supply of alcohol in rooms but I really do not care about that plenty of bars on property as well as iguanas! Great shows at night and since you can go in between the 3 connected resorts (Tulum, Akumal & Coba) you can catcha 9:00pm show and a 10:00pm show easily. Our favorite was the Michael Jackson show (talented dancers)!
Only thing that I found quite dissapointing was the food. If you like pasta no problem because they do that quite well, but if you like meat I have never seen it presented so unappetizingly. I really could not even get myself to try it, It just alsways looked so overcooked dry. However you get 3 restaraunt dining experiences with a 1 week visit, Our first choice was Don Pablo and it was excellent! First class dining and beautifully presented food, the duck was superb! However the next 2 places we chose were very dissapointing - Dolce Vita and Tequila both had an appetizer buffet (Don Pablo was a true full service rest.) and the food was more like the buffet food. I wish we had picked Don Pablo for all 3 dining experiences. Activities we enjoyed- tennis on grass court. Free internet in lobby only is via satelite (in jungle) so not very fast but useful. If you want interet elsewhere you pay (we just used lobby). Took a day trip to Tulum ruins cab ride (about a half an hour south) there $23.00 cab ride back $30.00 and tour and entrance for 4 (we needed to do because we only had american dollars (entry only you need pesos) so we paid about $75.00. Great ruins! Overall very relaxing trip. If you do not care so much about food a great value. Trip was from December 29th, 2012 - Jan 4th.

We stayed as a couple in the diamond club for a week from December 26-January 2 and enjoyed every moment. The staff are always smiling and welcoming, a big thank-you to Omero at the diamond club pool bar, it was a pleasure to see him each day, and also learn some Spanish from him. Also, appreciated was Juan who was our server each morning at breakfast and Miguel who gave us extraordinary service during the buffet supper for the 31st. Also a big thank-you to Elizabeth in public relations who was always able to answer our questions with a smile. Many other members of the staff helped make our stay so enjoyable, they work very hard and are very welcoming. The property is very clean as there are constantly staff seeing to it.

In our opinion, the beach in the diamond club portion is by far the nicest, as we walked the entire length of the beach. Just for this, the extra cost of the diamond club is worth it. We had no trouble finding a palapas no matter the time of day. Also worth the cost of the diamond club is the calming atmosphere of the hacienda lobby.

If you are looking for a relaxing and quiet vacation,Tulum is the way to go. Although the hotel was at full capacity, we never felt crowded in either the diamond club portion or elsewhere, and service was quick and very efficient. We will definitely return to GBP Tulum in the future as it was beyond our expectations, and we were very happy with our choice after having visited Coba (which is more of a party atmosphere) and Akumal (which seemed very large).

Hope this helps making a choice between the 3 hotels at the GBP Riviera Maya.