Overall an outstanding value for a 4 star all inclusive. We stayed May21-27 and had a wonderful time. The following is a breakdown of our stay.

Staff: Exceptionally friendly and professional. Everybody from bells, to cleaners, to servers did a wonderful job. (especially Amanda at the front desk)

Veraclub: We don't see what the complaints are about. They were very friendly and offered to include us in all the activities.(we even entered a bocce ball tournament but lost badly) I think the problem is language barrier as they only speak a little English. (I.E. aqua jeem means aqua gym, known by us as water aerobics) They even helped us find the name of a song, and took a few pictures of us.

Beach: Outstanding! Plenty of shade, people who say they can't find shade are crazy, we showed up past 11am most days and found several shady spots. Only complaints are the Italians wearing speedos... GROSS

Room: Average size but super clean and comfortable. We really enjoyed the towel animals. The AC worked extremely well and we would get cold if it was turned too low.

Food: Pretty good for breakfast and dinner, lunch could have been better. Overall defiantly better than average for all inclusive. We only wish they had better food for lunch. Also house wine was not that great, and bottled wine was very expensive (I.E $20 for bottle of Sutter home blush wine which is $3.49 @ Walmart )

Drinks: Nice selection of frozen and tropical concoctions. Cocktails were served with mid grade booze.

Grounds: Beautiful except for the front entrance. They have a long path that stretches from the lobby to the beach. Along that path is a jungle filled with iguanas who bath in the sun and curious coatimundis. It was fun to see all the nature. The days we didn't use mosquito spray we got bit a few times, so use bug repellant.

Spa: We both got a massage and facial. They were good, but not worth the high prices that we paid.

I'll keep it quick.

The beach is fantastic. White sand, beautiful water, and no rocks...Plenty of room to walk in either direction and lots of room to swim in the beautiful water...

As good as the beach was, the food was that bad. At an all-inclusive, I don't expect 5-star meals, but the food at Catalonia Royal was really bad. It was by far the worst I've had at an all-inclusive. We tried all five restaurants for dinner (including the buffet) and each was bad. Real bad.

We will not be returning. As great as the beach was, food is a big part of the trip for us and we could not return.

As for the Vera Club, we did not find it to be a big problem. Not sure if other reviewers just have sensitive feelings, but the actual Vera Club members are nice people and have no problem with Americans joining in activities. Most of the activities are silly and we didn't want to join, but we played volleyball on a couple days, which was a lot of fun.

The only downside to having so many Italians at the resort is that a good percentage of them smoke, and smoke often.

In sum, terrible food will keep us from ever coming back to the beautiful beach the resort has to offer....

My husband and I visited this resort previously in May 2009. We were worried it might not live up to our wonderful memories, but our stay this year was even more wonderful! This review is really long - but in summary, we loved this place before, we loved it this year, and we can't wait to love it again in the future!

We are a couple in our late 20's and we stayed from May 19 through May 26. We booked the hotel, flight, and ground transportation through Expedia and after getting through customs very quickly, the Best Day ground transportation people were waiting for us. We left the airport about 5-10 minutes later and after dropping off two other couples at other resorts, we arrived at the CRT in about 90 minutes. We were greeted with a welcome cocktail and given the keys to our room - a ground floor room in Building 4.

ROOM: There are six buildings - 1 and 2 are closest to the lobby, 5 and 6 are closest to the beach and pool (there is an extra fee to upgrade to these rooms), and 3 and 4 are in the middle. After checking in, a gentleman came along shortly to bring us our bags and give us a "tour" of our room. The room was very nice with a king sized bed that was comfortable, a flat screen tv, a desk, two chairs, some end tables, and a patio with two plastic chairs and a plastic table. There was also a mini fridge (containing sodas, 4 bottles of water, two beers, and some cookies) and a digital safe. The closet held robes and slippers, an umbrella, and an iron. In the bathroom was a scale (eek!), plenty of towels, a hair dryer, and some basic toiletries.

FOOD: For breakfast we went to the buffet (by the lobby) - this was my husband's favorite meal of the day. There is a large variety of food to choose from including all the traditional american breakfast foods (sausage, bacon, an egg station, french toast, pancakes, lots of fruit, yogurt, cereal) but I loved that they also had a large selection of meats, cheeses, and breads since I'm not much of a breakfast person and prefer to eat a sandwich in the morning. Most important, of course, is the serve-yourself mimosa bar - good way to start the day!

The lunch buffet was also good - several mexican items, a pasta station, sushi, bread, desserts, and a salad bar. We also ended up eating at Sorrento's (next to the pool bar) several times either for a quick snack or for lunch. This was previously a very small buffet of pizza and a few other snacks - but they have changed it so that you now order off a menu. I thought the previous style was convenient, but the food is much fresher now, there is a lot more variety, and you can still grab something and take it back to your chair at the pool if you want. During our stay we tried the pizzas (very thin crust - so it was a relatively light lunch - and very tasty), the club sandwich (my husband actually ordered this three times - I am not sure why, but he was obsessed with it), the hamburger (delicious), nachos, guacamole, and the burrito. Also on the menu were some salads, a variety of sandwiches, some mexican specialties, and several different pizzas.

For dinner there is a steakhouse type place (which we did not go to), an italian restaurant, mexican restaurant, tapas bar/restaurant, and a dinner buffet. My favorites were the italian and the mexican. The atmosphere at the tapas place is very nice, and we were seated next to the cenote so it was nice to look out over the water while we ate. The tapas that we tried were all very good, but the main dishes were not my favorite - just a little bland. The buffet was good - we ate there several times - something different each night. There is a station where they cook fresh mexican dishes which were always very good. We ate dinner fairly early - around 6:30 - so sometimes we were the only ones there.

BEACH/POOL: I am an early riser so I would usually get up at about 6:30 or so and take a walk along the beach (very peaceful and quiet). I would estimate that you can walk almost a mile in either direction before having to turn around. During our stay it did not seem like it was peak season, so I didn't ever feel the need to reserve chairs (although some people did). Instead we usually ate breakfast and came to the pool around 9:00 or so and there were plenty of chairs available. I don't think I ever saw a time when all the chairs at the pool were taken - sometimes latecomers had to move chairs around to get some empty ones next to each other, but we never had any problems. The pool is very large and very clean. We usually sat around the pool most of the day, with a trip to the beach once or twice to swim. The beach is amazing. We did not really get to enjoy it on our last trip as the water was very rough on that trip. But this time we got to see it at its best. If there is a rock on the beach or in the water, I couldn't find it. While it is true that the loungers are clustered close together, if you walk down the beach a little bit before you get in the ocean, it almost feels like you have the place to yourself. There were kayaks, small catamarans, and snorkeling equipment available to borrow, but I ended up just floating around in the water.

BARS/DRINKS: We are not big drinkers, but we did try a few frozen drinks (the margaritas were my favorite), the white wine (drinkable), and some after-dinner drinks at the lobby bar (Baileys was always available when we stopped by). The staff at the lobby bar was always very friendly. We were usually pretty early (since we ate dinner so early) so they chatted with us quite a bit.

ENTERTAINMENT: There were several activities around the pool/beach area during the day. At the time we booked there were some negative reviews about the VeraClub staff, but they must have taken care of that because they just seemed to be an extension of the regular hotel entertainment staff to me. We watched a few activities, but didn't really participate. There is a schedule of the day's activities posted near the gift shop by the pool. There's also a schedule of what restaurants are open and what the evening entertainment will be in the central area of each of the room buildings by the phone. I never managed to stay up past 9:00 - so I have no idea if the evening entertainment was any good.

STAFF: Everyone we encountered was very friendly. The pool waitresses have a tough job carrying around all those drinks in the hot sun, but they were always smiling and nice.
ODDS and ENDS: The hotel has a very eco-friendly feel to it. I appreciated that they did not use disposable cups, or anything disposable for that matter, aside from straws (and there were little placards at the lobby bar reminding you to take your drink without a straw when you can). There were hand towels in the bathrooms instead of paper towels, and they would replace your towels only when you left them on the floor. Also, they did not hand out a paper map, or a paper daily schedule, instead these were posted in central places which cuts down on waste.
I love this place.

We found all of the other guests to be polite and friendly. There was a good mix of people from all over. For the most part it was a quiet group, which is what we prefer.

I find it difficult to criticize anything about it, really. The only things i felt could have been improved were 1) usually there was one or more of the toilets in the women's pool restroom that were not working properly and 2) the churros were not as crispy, warm, and fresh as they were last year. Not exactly deal breakers, so I think it's safe to say we'll be back!

Overall: This is a 4 star resort and generally meets that category.
Two main problems neutralized by two good items. More about this later.

To get to Catalonia Royal Tulum (CRT) you need to book an Airport to Hotel Transfer.
I have been using USA Transfers and happy with the service. (They also go by the name as brent-entertaiment) You book it online and pay for the round trip when they deliver you at the Resort. At the end of your stay they will pick you up. It is about 1 hour from the Airport in a private car. Probably 80 minutes if you use a shared ride.
If you need to make any changes, do it online and not with the starter or the driver they will surely forget it.

After reading some of the comments about the buildings one would think that there are six buildings in a row. It is only 3 buildings as far as the distance goes from the lobby or the beach. Blds #1 and 2 almost even and 3-4 is almost even. So it does not make a huge difference where you are walking from to the beach or the lobby. If you like to be at the beach or pool and frequently commute between your room and the pool then you may want to get Blds 5 or 6. (they are usually $20 a day more)

Chairs on the beach are hard and at one section they were covered with dried on mosquitoes. UGH..
You may want to take a small cushion for yourself. The pool chairs had a thin sponge covering.
As for availability of the loungers, at the pool they usually gone by 9 am if you want a hut and the front row. At the beach it is 10 am to get a hut.


There is a lots of shady places made up with huts and palm trees. Very nice. So the hard loungers were one of my problems.
Pool temperature in the afternoon 90 F. The ocean 84 F in the morning and 86 F at 3 pm.
If you like to walk or run the beach is about 1.5 miles either directions so you can lose some of the pounds you gained at the restaurants.

Room: Big, comfortable bed, slow bathroom sink (15 minutes to let out a quart of water) when reported they told us that “toilet goes slow too” like it is normal that the gravity is much less here.
Anyways, they did take care of it and their “Gravity” fighting team succeeded.

Fridge in the room stocked with water, soft drinks and beer, part of the package.
People: about 30% Italians and 30% North American (Canada and USA). The rest from all over.
The Italians are not much problems but a few has no manners. Cut front of you in the food line like he is some king. 95% of them were just fine.
They smoke but it was not a big problem.
So I don’t just critise the Italians, many American women was guilty of hugging the loungers.
Exp.: I got to the beach 20 feet behind of a woman who put her towels down on the left two loungers under the hut, so we took the right two but she would not have it. She said she is reserving that. So I wanted to take the next two and she was reserving those too and said I am reserving the whole row.
So we took up residents further back and all day they only had one couple take up their offer to seat with them. They must felt good to have ten reserved. I have seen this several times. Otherwise there would be not much problems getting a lounger under the shade.

Restaurant: My second big problem. Food was good or sometimes very good but not excellent.
Breakfast was the best with fresh squeezed orange juice and a lots of food selection.
The problems I had in the other restaurants were the tough meat. In the Steak restaurant (Grill) they indicated on the menu that is USDA PRIME but it is hard to believe. Even the chicken cooked front of you on the grill was tough. Best was the TAPPAS but even there the meat was tough. If you get a seat near the lagoon it is beautiful to be there.

Nightly shows: They are great the best I have seen anywhere. (This is the good!)
I have seen 3 shows and they all were great. At other resort it is something I have problem with.
Also enjoyed the Spanish lesson with Rolando. He is a great teacher.