Meliá Puerto Vallarta — Hotel in Jalisco

This place makes most everything difficult. All inclusive vacations should be relaxing, schedule free and easy.

Grounds-Out dated is okay but deteriorated is not. There is a lot of work needed. 1. Rooms were musty and seemed like a mold smell. Two friends moved rooms from this smell. I had to move rooms due to mosquitoes eating us alive. I had a one bedroom but don't bother with the spending extra cash on it, it's a little partition like a dojo. Sheets and towels scratchy. 2. Pool closes at 7p and no jacuzzi. Pool water was low so not sure about the filtration or cleaning. LOTS of kids so take note if you are looking for an adult like experience. Pool bar was great. Bartenders were fun and service was good. 4. Repairs needed on grounds with some safety concern areas, so watch your step.

Food-1. Snack Bar is okay-ish. A 10 yr old will like it. Questionable pizza, steamed hot dogs and stiff hamburgers. French fries were good. Nothing great here. 2. Buffet is okay with a decent variety. You can make this work. Not going to blow you away but its good. There can ve a long line to get in. 3. Fish house is good. My group seemed to like the dishes and staff was great. Mellow rice was my favorite and the shrimp tacos were excellent. 4. Mole breakfast was better than the buffet breakfast, but must have a premium wrist band to get in. Staff is stretched thin, so the service suffers. 5. Mole dinner was good but salty. Food was enjoyable and it was not crowded.

Restaurant Process- Reservations can only be made between 10a and 2p and a ticket must be submitted for the reservations. This system makes it difficult with a small group or even just two couples trying to eat together. They want reservation tickets from each room, so if you are trying to eat together or celebrate something you have to run around and collect tickets from everyone and try to submit for the same time slot and then they will tell you they can't accommodate. My group was 12 people so I'm not talking about 30 people. As we turned in our tickets they wanted to give us three different reservation times and there no way could we be at the same table. We show up and the place is near empty but we need to sit at different tables? Day two I tried to have a four person reservation. Couldn't accommodate that either and communication was very difficult. Just gave up. Everyday you stay after the first night you have to retrieve ticket from the front desk.

Alcohol-1. Premium bar good though lots of limitations. No madori or other basic alcohols to make a nice cocktail. So, not a complete bar. There is a giant bottle of Gray Goose on display but the best you can get is Absolute. Bartenders are great but but they are limited to what the got. This bar has real glasses which is nice. 2. Pool walk up bar. Bartenders are nice and quick. Only negative is they "wash" and reuse the plastic glasses. If you get a whisky, you may be tasting salt on the rim from the last drink. They do run out of the known alcohols line Malibu.

Room Beverages - Every day, the fridge is stocked with two waters, one coke, one diet coke, one orange Fanta, one Tecate and one Tecate light. Anything beyond this is a charge. So if you are two adults that would like a can of diet coke on the same day you have to pay for the second one. No replacements. Can't trade an orange Fanta out for a second coke. same with the beers.

Front Desk and Management- I know it's Mexico, and the language is Spanish but communication is almost impossible. It is real difficult to navigate when there are issues beyond basic check in or out. The manager offered to make it right with a massage 45 minutes before my departure, so not really sure that...

All around a decent resort. Although pictures are a bit misleading. Wouldn’t say the price is worth what we received.

The pros: extremely close to the airport, walking distance to the marina with lots of shops and restaurants, in a safe area, it’s right on the beach and has its own beach area for their guests only. Large pool, pool bar with consistently good drinks, we had a nice garden view from our balcony with a fountain and wildlife. Friendly staff walking around the resort. Great water pressure in the shower. Comfortable mattress. Limited food choices but majority were very tasty. Also kept hot and would refill frequently. Fruit is perfectly ripe! Lots of healthy and fresh options. Rooms are cleaned and restocked everyday. Nice air conditioning in the room. Pretty plants and trees throughout the property.

The cons: Our room was very old and outdated having only one electrical outlet being in the bathroom, so the only place we could charge our phones or plug anything in was in the bathroom lol. The electric also shorted out when we used the small wall mounted hairdryer on low for about 5 mins. The tv was very small and only had 1 or 2 shows with English subtitles. There was also this odd couch/pull out bed thing in the room that had lots of questionable stains on it but didn’t have any kind of removable covers so it could be washed or cleaned. Minimal bed covers. Pool is very warm like bath water, normally that would be nice but in 90 degree humid weather it would’ve been nice for it to be colder. Lots of leaves on the bottom of the pool. Wait staff at the buffet restaurant sometimes took a very long time to take our drink order, a couple times they just didn’t take it at all. Not a very large selection of food in the buffet. Front desk staff gave us the wrong information about our scheduled ride back to the airport which lead us to miss our ride which we had already paid $60 in advance for, so we had no choice but to get an Uber last minute. Floors can get extremely slippery when raining. Lots of areas taped off with caution tape?

Some things to note: beach is small and softer on the left side and more rocky on the right side. There are people on the beach who will try to get you to buy things. If you’re looking for a quiet relaxing resort probably this isn’t your best bet. Lots of kids screaming and jumping and splashing right next to you. Get to the pool early morning if you want an umbrella or lounge chairs. Be careful on floors they can get very slick when wet. If you get there early they store your luggage for you so you can enjoy the resort before check in at 3pm. If you’re not into nature or animals this isn’t for you. There are always many birds flying around and landing very close to people. The green iguanas can be huge and look intimidating but are typically peaceful. There are many and they get extremely close, it’s common for them to be in the trees above or right under your chair haha! It’s pretty easy to get lost, the layout of the hotel can be confusing, ask the front...

My friends, family, and I all just returned from 9 days at Melia PV. I must say that it was a massive disappointment. We stayed here in 2019 and while the resort was in need of upgrades, they made up for that with their customer service and pleasant demeanor. Unfortunately, this positive aspect is now gone. Upon arrival we were greeted and welcomed and from there it went downhill. Repeated calls to complain about the air conditioning unit were met with assurances that someone would take a look at the unit. These generally took about 2 hours for a responding technician. The first tech complained about "Americanos llorando" or "crying Americans" when he first called down for a new AC filter. Nobody seemed to care about that insult. Eventually on day 3 of this, we requested a fan since they said the unit would not blow any colder, and the fan was delivered 3 hours later. For reference, the temperature outside was in the mid 90s with 80%-90% humidity, with the room in the mid 80s but with slightly less humidity. The shower broke on day 1 and again repeated requests to have it fixed resulted in an explanation that even though you are using the shower some of the water will come out of the faucet, thus reducing water pressure. Eventually after days of complaints we were given a new room with an even worse air conditioner. Our children were supposed to have a room with a pull-out bed in the couch, but it was just a normal couch. When we asked about it, we were told that this is what they had. We requested a roll-away bed, that was delivered more than 3 hours later, after midnight. Restaurant staff were nice at times, and incredibly overworked and short at others.Some of them were flat out rude. Alfredo at Tacos and Mole was always a bright spot. He was very nice and helpful. Despite having an armband that showed we paid for upgraded food and liquor, the bartenders routinely tried to pass of the cheapest tequila they had to us. Esteban in the Lobby Bar was great and we never had to worry about him. He took great care of us. Similarly, Jose the waiter at the poolside bar was another star, and really made a lot of extra effort. Javier, the guy in charge was always very dismissive of our issues, despite always wandering around asking people how they were doing. No matter how many times we complained he would say "We are aware of it and working on it." but that was always as far as it went. When asked about a refund or staying somewhere else, I was assured I would not get my money back. They were all very nice, but there was no follow-through. Furthermore, the treatment seemed to be aimed only at Americans, as other Americans mentioned their negative experiences when we began discussing ours. The upgrades we were promised were not given. The service was empty in many cases. The gym was in disrepair. The food at times was inedible. The staff was nice, but that was not enough to make up for the way we were treated. Save yourself a headache and stay someplace else. This is a shame because it is in a...