Buenaventura Grand Hotel & Great Moments - All Inclusive

All-inclusive is new to me. Buenaventura was what I imagine it must be like to be on a cruise ship, but without the ship! A lovely time. If you're looking for a clean, comfortable, safe, easy, lots-of-English spoken, stress-free, lively, social, beach vacation -- this is perfect. The staff were friendly and helpful. The location allows you to walk to many tourist sites (the Malecon, Gringo Gulch, Zona Romantica...) but it does require a walk, or an inexpensive taxi ride. An easy place to travel solo, even though it's largely families and couples. Very easy to strike up conversations. The all-inclusive alcohol is super cheap (obviously), so watch out for headaches! The food ranges from decent to pretty darn good. You can choose buffet or to have a more formal 'dining out' experience. Theme nights, activities, lots of people ready to happily wait on you. No complaints.

Things that surprised me -- the constant, loud music coming from everywhere, ALL THE TIME. This place is about FUN, NOT about peace and quiet. Bring your ear plugs if that's not your thing.

Nice-sized property with great pools and location. Very good (though sometimes fair) food at the buffet all day long. Very nice staff with a mix of English speakers and not. A nice spa area with a private bath tub.

Service was mostly totally fine, but there were some waiters at the pool who were much more attentive than others, so it was a little hit or miss. Many times we were in the lobby and other public areas, there was the typical "upselling" by the concierge to see the property next door so we didn't love that.

Loved the views. The bed was very comfortable. Loved the spa bath in our room, and the waiters and bar tenders were very friendly. Also loved the big shower head.

Upon arrival the worker who claimed to be a concierge (Alejandro) tried to sign us up for a club membership for the hotel and tried to get us to attend a presentation for that membership. Definitely wouldn't take no for an answer and we finally told him we might stop by in the morning on our way out to explore the town, just to have him stop pestering us. Big mistake, because he apparently got upset that we didn't stop by, and continued calling our room every morning at 9am for 3 mornings in the row. Just don't let him or guys like him make you feel obligated or force you to those meetings. That definitely gave us a negative feeling about the hotel.

The location was excellent as we were able to take full advantage of the site seeing areas, shopping and restaurants. Staff was all ways attentive and friendly.

There only negatives I found was one the cleaning of the rooms took longer than usual. At time we decided not to get the room clean as we would come back to the room tired from are outing and wanted to rest, but the room was not cleaned yet.

Very good for the price! Service was excellent. Staff is very friendly and helpful. The hotel is in a great location for walking around town. Food was good at the restaurants on site, especially the deserts! Spa was also relaxing and I got a nice back massage. We really enjoyed our stay!

One thing we didn’t enjoy was hearing the loud live music every night from the lobby. It stopped around 10pm though. The beach isn’t for swimming as it is rocky, but the pools make up for it, and great beaches are just a walk/taxi ride away. People selling things will bug you every second on the beach too, so it’s not not very relaxing. I’d recommend laying by the pools instead or taking a day trip to a more private beach.

I liked the servers at the restaurants/bars/pool area and also house keeping. They made sure we were treated well at all times.

I made a reservation for a balcony room with ocean view a year ago and when I arrived, they didn’t have the room available so I was given a regular room. Didn’t get a refund or any compensation from any of the receptionist including supervisor. They were no help so I will no longer be staying because I was charged for a balcony room with ocean view and wasn’t given that. Also security was horrible, I had a drunk man trying to force himself into my room claiming it was his room.

We liked the views from our ocean view room. The food was good and the staff was friendly. The located was perfect, and it was walking distance to the Malecon (beach boardwalk). We felt safe leaving the property to roam around the town.

I didn't like that the resort was undergoing renovations to half of the property and we heard drilling and hammering all day. We also didn't like that there was a pool designated for adults and a pool designated for kids, but the kids were in both. I also didn't like that we were only allowed one beach towel each. The vendors that walk the beaches are very aggressive and I felt it was never ending, so I didn't get to just relax on the beach without getting hassled to buy something.

Terrific view and jacuzzi in the honeymoon suite, food was generally great, staff was so friendly and helpful and remembered us from day to day. The pool area was wonderful and the adult zone was great. Nice vibe and chill music with a little bit of activity but no over-the-top hype squad. We never struggled to find chairs and the view/access to the beach from our chairs was super! The size of the hotel was perfect for us, just enough to feel lively but not too much that you were drowning in a sea of people or waiting in lines. The location was fantastic.

Not so much that I didn't like the following, but if I had comments they would be: FOOD - buffet food was great, but we would have liked a little more variety, bacon at breakfast, and sweet snacks during the day by the pool or easily accessed outside of the buffet area. COMFORT - pool lounge chairs were oddly uncomfortable but not unbearable; beds and pillows were totally fine but not luxurious. UNEXPECTED - around 4:30 a.m. on our last day, the ceiling above our jacuzzi started to leak and we had to get packed up and move rooms in the middle of the night. That said staff was amazing and fast to help and get us another room.

Very good buffet Very kind and professional staff Beautiful beach The „Fiesta Mexicana“ was a highlight: great idea, great show, great buffet

There was construction work in the building during our stay. At times, we were bothered by the noise In general, the noise isolation of rooms is not very good. We were bothered several times by noisy guests in the corridor

I liked the all inclusive, there were lots of activities everyday, staff was friendly for the most part.

We did a tour on possible purchase and when we went to use the discounts we were told we couldn’t because we weren’t spending enough money, the pool closed much too early and only room service available after 10pm. Also, they start taking food away before 10 on the Buffett and open late