InterContinental Presidente Cozumel Resort Spa by IHG — Hotel in Isla Cozumel

We have been traveling to Cozumel for 20 years now. We traditionally stay at smaller family owned properties to avoid other American tourists. We have always gotten good deals and service at these properties.

This year we wanted to change things up as our go-to resort had not updated their beds in a few years and I really wanted to have some solid sleep, so we decided that we deserved an upgrade. Best decision ever.

The hotel is gorgeous. The staff is AMAZING, and the snorkeling is incredible!!

Our room opened to the beach where we could sit on the deck and watch our son complete his Scuba cert class. We also had an outdoor shower that is now very hard to live without now that we are back home.

I could go on for pages about all the things I love about this property and all the surprises it holds- but here is the simple, to the point info:

If you go and you have a bad time, it's you. Trying to speak a little Spanish and using your manners insures that you will hav a stellar vacation.

Everything you need is on the resort. There are at least 4 restaurants that are all above average.

The Snorkeling and Scuba at or leaving from the hotel dock is world class.

Although, quiet kids are much more appreciated here over loud kids- this is a very kid friendly resort. There are 3-4 coral pyramids on the property that house several very large iguanas, in fact you will see iguanas pretty much everywhere.

Just snorkeling in the beach area between the two waterfront bars we saw loads of fish including: Stingray, baby octopus, moray eels, a lobster, the tinniest flounder you've ever seen, and loads more fish.

The Gym and Spa are legit and not just an after thought- they are both very impressive.

There are two pool areas, a party one and the quiet "secret pool"

Every morning boats from the near -by harbor come to pick up people for assorted tours and scuba trips.

There is a sunken barge off the larger beach that houses hundreds to thousands of fish- all within a quick swim from the beach.

There is only one store- but it is impressively stocked and well thought out.

There is a child care building next to the paint your own pottery hut- located next to the tennis courts- near the hidden gardens.

My son decided to get Scuba certified from the service on the property and SANDRA was his amazingly perfect, high energy, super positive instructor. We will return next year to dive with her again.

We just could not have been happier- The rooms that open to the beach or a pool are the best. The staff was amazing.

Generally speaking, almost everyone on site speaks English. Take the time on the flight down to learn some basic Spanish and phrases that have to do with food or greetings- this is like giving yourself your own VIP card. The staff were constantly throwing in little extras here and there, sharing local info on things we should go see, etc.

The hotel is super safe, you can lock up valuables in a safe in your room- but if someone is going to steal from you, it's more likely to be another guest. You will likely see people leaving their phones unattended at the pool, beach, and bars. We didn't bother locking our beach access door most days.

This is a nicer resort, so we chose to tip at 20% based on resort towns here in the U.S. You can of course tip less, especially off-property, but keep in mind that tourism is the sole industry here. Tipping a boat captain for a day trip should be about $10.00 per person. Tipping house keeping at the end of the trip should be $1-2 per day.

The restaurants on site are on the higher end, price-wise. We always get a rental car so we opted to eat off-site or get groceries most of the time we were there. Keep in mind that all food has to be brought to the island and the whole world is going through inflation- so add that you are staying at a nice resort, and there is your explanation behind prices. There are plenty of cheaper restaurants all over the island, but you are taking a gamble with your stomach. The food preparation standards on the resort are what you would expect from a similar place in the USA- so, if you want to make sure you don't lose any of your vacay time to an upset stomach.. the restaurants on-site are a better bet.

Don't worry about the water, it appears that the hotel has it's own water treatment plant on the property. Although you are provided with plenty of bottled water in your bathroom- I didn't have any issues brushing my teeth with the tap water.

Ok, that's the short version- any negatives were directly the result of rude guests. Even if the weather turned bad and rained everyday- we still would have been happy.

One last note- this trip we decided to be fearless about attempting to speak Spanish, this was the right decision! Try and speak what you know and don't be too timid to ask to be corrected!

Love this place and we will be...

Following is the email my husband sent to the Managing Director and the Reservations Director of the Presidente Intercontinental Cozumel. Since neither of those individuals bothered to reply to what my husband wrote, I am posting the email, in its entirety, here.| |"I am writing as a followup to our stay at the Presidente in January/February 2025. As a frequent guest, I feel that you should receive feedback other than what appears on TripAvdvisor and other social media sites.||Following are thoughts and suggestions my wife and I had after our recent visit:||As always, we thoroughly enjoyed our stay. Javier at the front desk does an outstanding job, and Mariel was very helpful as well. The property is lovely, and the grounds, beaches and pool areas are well-maintained. Our accommodations were excellent, and the housekeeping staff does an outstanding job servicing the guest rooms and public areas. We also appreciate the convenience of having the ScubaDu dive shop on-site. We did note several maintenance items that we were surprised had not been addressed over the course of our stay: the automatic flushing mechanisms in the women's restroom in the main lobby were not working properly which made the restroom very unpleasant to use. Also, the family pool women's restroom had one toilet that was missing a toilet seat. Neither of these issues were remedied over the course of our 10-day stay, which is substandard for an Intercontinental hotel. In addition, many of the beach lounge chairs are sagging, frayed and stained, and should be replaced.||With the exception of one dinner, we took all of our meals at the hotel, either at El Caribeno, Le Cap or Faro Blanco. The menus at all three restaurants are great, and the chefs are very skilled, providing delicious food that is nicely presented. At El Caribeno, we are particularly impressed with Yazmin and the great job she does actively managing the restaurant, training and supervising the servers, interacting with guests and keeping things running smoothly. She is rarely empty-handed, and is extremely diligent and observant of what needs attention at all times. She is a gem. We also especially appreciate the hard work of servers Felipe (who always brought my wife a perfect latte in the morning), Diego, Carlos (new to the hotel), and Oscar. The made-to-order quesadillas are a great addition to the breakfast service. We also truly enjoy the live guitar music at dinnertime. One recommendation we believe would help service would be for ice water to be available to guests on a self-service basis, particularly at breakfast when the restaurant is often very busy. Given that the offerings are buffet style, this seems like a fairly easy thing to add. At Le Cap, we love the food, but believe that the service could be improved with closer management attention. Unlike at El Caribeno, the manager seems to spend a lot of time standing around chatting with the servers. In addition, lively "beachy" music at lunch is perfectly fitting, but at dinner, the overly loud, thumping techno music seems inappropriate for the dinner crowd there, and we find it very off-putting. At both the Caribeno and Cap bars, we feel that the bartenders do not want to, and perhaps do not know how to make proper cocktails; rather they just want to open beers and serve margaritas and pina coladas. When we have ordered cocktails, they act like they are doing us a favor to make them. The bartenders are not very friendly at El Caribeno (despite Yazmin's best efforts), and the guys at Le Cap are downright surly. As an example, on our first night, we ordered gin & tonics and presented the "free drink" coupons we received at check-in, and the bartender was downright hostile in stating that the coupons didn't apply to the drinks we ordered. We would have much preferred to simply buy our drinks than to be treated so rudely. The hotel would sell more drinks if the bartenders put forth more effort and were pleasant to their guests. At Faro Blanco, we always have wonderful meals, and the service by David and the young guy with black glasses (sorry I can't remember his name at the moment) is outstanding. They are very well-trained, accommodating and appropriately friendly and helpful. ||We have very much enjoyed our many stays at the Presidente, although we feel that, post-renovation, IHG has priced the rooms such that the value proposition is not what it once was. I don't know if this has negatively affected your occupancy rates, but if so, a review of your pricing model might be in order.||If you have any questions regarding our observations, please don't hesitate to...

A few things could make this perfect but overall great

The property is gated which is a nice security feature and the beach is private. This is a large resort but we didn’t feel as if that was the case. The beach areas were very clean and offered a variety of choices. Details: EATS The food choices were varied. (David best staff ever) the food seemed to decline in greatness each night- I had lobster tail 3 times and the last time the tail was the size of a small shrimp. The staff was great here. The Italian place- eh ok but the lasagna was very dry and kind of inedible. But staff was great, calamari wonderful. The “beach restaurant – do not recall the name but will do separate reviews of each later . Service poor. We ate dinner there twice. The first night they brought out a choice of two fish for my husband’s dinner. The next night (he had the same thing) there was the fish he decided not to take the night before (this was shown raw, precooked if you will) so no selection. The guac was great but you’d expect that. I ordered the Myan appetizer and it was dropped off with -0- explanation (what was what) so most of it stayed on the plate uneaten. The most disappointing item was the flank steak (or something like that) which came out grey and smelled kind of off. I returned it and that seemed to really upset the staff who pretty much vanished after that point. It can get very windy sitting out there! The Mediterranean restaurant was very good – pizza and hamburgers were fantastic as were the pom frittes. The brunch was very good and well managed so no wait for new or more food. However, one day my daughter was turned away because we didn’t have a reservation. Which was odd because we had tried to get a reservation the prior day and were told they don’t accept them. So I called down and was told oh no, who told you that? Yasime said there are no reservations required so we went back down. We were there 6 nights and ate at the hotel every evening. ROOMS There was a huge fiasco when I tried to book this room. I called the hotel about 5 times, mostly being put on hold for 40 minutes or more. I did get some responses via email but often they were wrong. Checking is in AWFUL and you can be stuck in a long wait. There is NO line for ambassador club members (which I am accustomed to at other brands) so we had to wait a while to check in. Turndown service is offered and was a nice touch. The room fridge not so great. The overall ambiance of the room was serene and peaceful with wonderful elements of wood, stone and water. The bed was very comfortable and sleep quality (outside of noise problems ) was great. I had told the concereige months before we came that we were celebrating three birthdays. However, none were noted as promised, we were shuffled along like other guests. Staff around the hotel were very friendly and again, I would give extra kudos to David who worked in Blanco. The larger rooms near the reef had many guests staying and partying so I'd avoid being near either of the larger suites which hold many guests. These were on each end of the reef wing. That was very disruptive and kind of ruined our stay but the great thing was the rooms were kind of expensive so they didn't stay long. It would have been nice for someone to tell these guests not to blast their horrible country music all night. That was awful. Overall we will go back but most likely attempt to secure a room in the “tower” on the far end of the hotel or another ocean front but not near the bigger Party suites. Having the little jacuzzi pool was nice but not really worth the extra. There needs to be more attention or perks for being an ambassador – felt absolutely no...