Nílu by Selina Cancun Downtown — Hotel in Cancún

I never give an unfair rating. I try to find the positive, but with SELINA - it was difficult.

DO NOT GO HERE: Selina Cancun Downtown Hotel One of the WORST hotels and experiences I have had. **I was in a private room - not a dorm. $100CAD/night.

First about the hotel itself:

1. 1st night: I found a rather large spider in the room. I had to ask reception to remove it.

2. I was bitten by bugs in 3 or 4 places during the night. (I passed it off as mosquito)

3. There were several unfamiliar hairs in the shower area and on the sink basin and counter.

4. I was encouraged to pay 150 peso ($10CAD) for the breakfast in their affiliate restaurant, so I did. Mistake.

5. The choice of breakfast was - "scrambled or fried." (as per server) ...I chose "scrambled." It came 38 minutes later. They were greasy, cold and came with cold refried beans, a slice of toast, and a bowl of soggy fruit. As well, I was given a glass of OJ (which I think was Tang or some other powdered drink) and a cold coffee.

6. 2nd night: I asked to replenish the Nescafe coffee pucks for my morning. I was told "that can not be done as only the first night payment allows for that."

7. I noticed some small crawling insects in the bed, and was bitten again.

8. The second day's breakfast was even worse. Cold "fried" eggs that I asked to be medium, but they came nearly raw. Everything else was cold. A rusty spoon was given to me to stir the coffee. The servers ignored me for 40 minutes until I asked if the meal would arrive soon. I had to go to my room to receive a 2 minute phone call. When I got back, my plate of food was sitting in the wind, on the table, gathering flies. Needless to say, everything was cold, but no colder than the day before.

*I worked as a trained professional chef for 3 decades. It does not take more than 3 or 4 minutes to prepare that breakfast. I was among perhaps 1 or 2 other guests - it was not a "rush" time.

9. All of the sun loungers are covered in some kind of grime - body soil, I think. As well, the furniture that could possibly be used in a separate lounge area are filthy.

10. On BOTH nights, the doors adjacent to me were opening and slamming shut until way after midnight.

11. I have asked - twice for special requests for the coffee pucks - reception told me they would take it up in the regular shift change meeting. Then I was assured both yesterday and today that I would receive the coffee. And I was referred to your affiliate "Grab n Go" shop and paid 40 pesos for a coffee that took 7 minutes to prep (I was the only customer.) As of now nearly 48 hours after asking for coffee pucks, none have arrived.

12. Day 2, a cleaning lady entered my room without knocking, and ignoring the RED DO NOT NEED SERVICE sign. I was only half dressed on the bed, and she asked in Spanish if I needed cleaning. I replied, "no thank you." She then asked in Spanish if I had basura. Again, I replied 'No."

Here is the worst insult: I booked 2 nights at Cancun Downtown, as I was on my way to Merida from Bacalar, MX. and due to unexpected travel mishaps but had to stop in Cancun. On the 2nd night of my stay, when attempting to finalize the CANCUN - Merida leg of my trip, I was trying to secure accommodations in Merida. I had not received confirmation by 9 pm. So at SELINA's front desk, I booked and paid for 1 more night out of desperation. Less than 2 hours later, my Merida confirmation was received, and I went to the front desk to cancel the night I had just booked. I was told to wait until the morning when the manager would decide if they could refund my money (check out is at 11 am, and I had to pack everything up in anticipation of freeing up the room and leaving. At 9 am that morning, I went to find the manager and was told to wait 30 minutes. Again, 30 minutes later, I returned to the front desk only to be told that the manager said "since I paid by credit card, I could not have a refund. ($100CAD for a...

Worst night's sleep on my 3 month trip in Mexico and Guatemala (including night buses and red-eye flights)

Re: my experience as a guest in a 4 bed "community room" on 11th September 2021. This Selina is not so much a backpacker's hostel, but rather more like a slightly shabby motel (at least in the rooms/bathrooms) where you share with very unfriendly and unpleasant strangers. Nobody shows/tells you anything about the facilities, and it's all extremely impersonal. It seems that people aren't staying there to meet other travelers, but because it's cheap, this means you'll be sharing with people of all walks of life that may well have terrible dorm etiquette. I'd heard similar things about other Selinas but I decided to take a chance with this one because of the proximity to the bus station.

In my case, a (middle-aged male) roommate come back sometime after midnight (and despite two of us being asleep before he arrived), turned on the light and crashed around for about 40 mins before falling asleep and performing the loudest snore I've heard in almost 2 decades (the other was on a train in India). Sharing a room with the human equivalent of a howler monkey in full screeching mode made it impossible for me to sleep despite my ear plugs. After a further hour of lying awake to the snoring, and knowing that the Selina definitely wasn't full, I asked if they could please please please switch me to any other room. The first (dark haired, didn't get names sadly) guy on the desk seemed kind and wanted to help but his "superior" refused and told me this is the risk of a dorm. Having travelled to almost 60 countries and stayed in dorms in most of them, I'm pretty familiar with the "risks" of dorms and I've only ever asked to move once before (when the roommates came back after partying and vomited kebab all over the shared room and bathroom). I've also had a lot of experiences in hostels where the staff were kind, understanding and helpful and that makes all the difference. If they couldn't help because the place was full, I would have understood, but that clearly wasn't the case. I could have paid again for a private room, but it was around 3am and I needed to be up in 6am hours anyway for an early bus, plus i seriously didn't feel like giving them any more pesos at this point.

So I went back to the room, trying to get some semblance of sleep before being genuinely relieved to get out of that place at dawn the next day.

The risk of a dorm is sharing with strangers that are totally inconsiderate of the peace of their roommates. The risk of this Selina is that you'll have some kind of problem and the staff will be just as unkind and unhelpful. The Selina risk is not one I'll be...

Questionable procedures to increase revenues, run down property and furniture. Unfortunately, no check-in at 2pm possible, no attempts to check with housekeeping if rooms would be ready. I was staying in a shared room and was told by other travellers the room was "cleaned" and already prepared at 2pm. The room itself had a bad smell. The bathroom was not separated by a door from the shared bedroom. The shower had a typical slightly transparent shower door and the toilet had a louvre door which did not block any sound or smell coming out the toilet. Only the shower had a window, the toilet had no window. No problem, use the public bathrooms as in many hostels? The public bathrooms at the pool area were closed for the entire stay. Only in the main building, across the parking lot were 3 unisex public toilets. To little for such a large property with many travelers. The WiFi in the room constantly stopped working which was super annoying. I went down to the pool area as the WiFi in the room was not working and took my water and carrots cake with me. The WiFi was ok but unfortunately, I got told by the staff it was not permitted to consume any food or drinks from outside at the pool/restaurant/bar area. This is the area right in front of your room, so you can not eat and drink in front of your own room. Ofc only if you order it from the restaurant, they don't offer carrots cake and the beer of your choice will probably be sold out. Solution to consume outside food, go to the communal kitchen in the main area, there is a terrace to enjoy you own food. The seating area of the terrace was at that time of the day in the complete sun. Most chair were damaged. In the evening I decided to get something from the bar. 3 kinds of common beers from the menu were unavailable. I got recommended a beer which was not listed on the menu. The beer tasted good but was 50% more expensive than any of the 3 beers I originally tried to order. The property itself leaves a run-down impression. Pool tiles were missing, floor boards at the entrance to the restaurant/pool area are damaged or missing, chairs in the communal area are damaged, etc... Overall I had the feeling this properly is being used to squeeze the last money out of its travels without the willingness to invest any money back for renovations. I stayed at Selina Playa del Carmen which was the complete opposite with great experiences and vibes. If not for the location right next to the ADO bus station, I would recommend to stay at another...