Nickelodeon Hotels & Resorts Riviera Maya — Hotel in Quintana Roo

We visited this resort as guests of Exotic Travelers members. This allowed us to have a connecting king/2 queen swim-up ocean front suite at a discounted rate. Nevertheless, this resort is indeed very expensive. Given the price point for this resort, I was surprised at how subpar many of the amenities were. Our children had a fantastic time; nevertheless, this resort is not on my top places to return to.||FOOD|Overall, meh. |Breakfast at Le Spatula was the best. There is a wide variety of food. Be on notice that the booth seating with televisions has an additional cost. The staff was top notch (as they all were across the resort). When we checked in, there was NO mention that breakfast at Bikini Bottom is an option! When we found out, we went there for breakfast. The pancakes at this restaurant are the best at the resort in addition to their side items. So please be on notice you do NOT have to go to Le Spatula for breakfast; Le Spatula has exponentially more food options than Bikini Bottom.|As Exotic Travelers guests, we had the option to eat at a small restaurant inside the Exotic Travelers lounge (5th floor). However, nobody told us about this. We found out after we decided to wonder into the lounge and ask about the amenities.|The food at Bikini Bottom for lunch was not spectacular. The food at Nick Bistro was close to awful. We had a rice pilaf that made everyone immediately spit it out after one bite. This is the ONLY resort in Mexico we have ever been to (and we go to Mexico on average 2x a year over the past 10 years) that had NO clue to how to make rice. Mexico. And they cannot make rice. Even worse. The Mexican rice was the worst. It was water and undercooked. It looked disgusting. This was the same for Yacht Club. Do yourself a favor. If you go to Yacht Club, ask for grilled shrimp. This was the best meal in the restaurant. They cook it to order. The red pozole always had mussels. Why - en el nombre de Dios - would you put mussels in red pozole (or ANY pozole)??? I asked a chef at Yacht to make some red pozole with pork and no mussels (how it is traditionally made) and it was good. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE STOP with the nonsense of putting mussels in red pozole!!! The made to order tacos at the far right end of the restaurant are pretty good. The tamales were small and SEEECCCOOOOO (dry). I mean, seriously. This is Mexico. Bad Mexican rice and dry tamales? Sinverguenzas. The food at the Aqua Nick is just ok. The french fries are greasy. The quality of the meat used for the burgers is pretty mid. The pizza stand - they take FOREVER to make one pizza. And when they do...it's like "where's the meat?" And be on notice that (as with many resorts in Mexico) what is considered sausage in the USA is not what they consider sausage in Mexico. Sausage in Mexico varies from being hot dogs to who knows what. And the quality of the peperoni is also mid. If you eat at Good Burger, do not expect a good burger. This restaurant should be called What?A-Burger? This spot tries to do too much and be too fancy. There isn't a single basic hamburger on the menu (you need to know how to QR code menus before you go to this resort just fyi; there is one or two printed menus floating around if you ask for one). Nobody in our family liked anything we ate here. The burgers were not good. The spaghetti was bad. Just overall not good food. I am not talking about anything special. Just a basic hamburger or basic spaghetti. It is like this resort employs cooks who do not know how to cook. If they would just boil a pot of store brand spaghetti, buy a bag of frozen meatballs from Walmart, and open a jar of Ragu and put a little basil and paprika in the sauce, they would be doing WAY better than the junk they serve at Good Burger. I can say that the ice cream truck was on point!! The food here is the antithesis of gourmet. Gourmet must be Latin for garbage. And room service. Not much better. There are a few items that you can order that are just o.k. And do not bother ordering any of the desserts - they are not tasty. Just ask for a few packs of Oreo cookies (not on the menu).||SHUTTLE|This was probably one of the most annoying aspects of this resort - so much so it makes me not want to return. The main building is located to the back of the resort complex near the sea. As other reviews mention, the beach is only worth looking at and not going to. The lobby, Le Spatula, Aqua Nick (with Main Stage's nightly entertainment) are all located near the front of the complex - which would require a (not super) long walk. The issue with walking is that you would have to traverse a route that is not very populated with other walkers (thus feeling isolated), you would be walking through dense jungle and the signage is (seemingly intentionally) poor. Thus, one could easily get lost. Thus, it seems as though walking is disincentivized and discouraged (though not verbally). It got downright annoying to have to hop on a shuttle 2-3 times a day. The frequency of the shuttles was fine. If you see a digital sign that says "Next Shuttle: 20:01" pay no attention. The digital sign said that the whole time we were there. But be on notice that if you go to one of the shows at night or plan to leave the water park at closing time, you will want to be one of the first people in line for the shuttle. We left every show at night early because we didn't want to be in a line of 200 people waiting for a shuttle (and the vans hold about 16 people). The food and the shuttle construct are two factors alone what make me not want to return here (our lovely daughter is begging to go back! Yikes!)||MISC ITEMS|We had a maintenance issue almost daily. Televisions for some reason lose connection frequently. We finally discovered that you can unplug the t.v. and re-plug it and it seems to fix the problem. One of our bathroom sinks was clogged. A lightbulb in the bathroom burned out. Whoever decided to build a resort with swim-up pools with non-heated water should be ostracized. The water in those swim-up pools is FRIGID - and the ambient temperature outdoors when we were there was about 88F/31.1C. The swim-up pools are almost impractical. And by the way, who the heck decided it would be a good idea to build a resort aimed at younger children and make almost every building have steep, monolithic staircases!! The prices for shirts, plushies, the arcade...you name it...was just ridiculous. Our daughter wanted a Gary the snail plushie. She saw the price in pesos and when we told her the price in US$, even she said "that's ridiculous." So we ordered it on Amazon for home delivery. Saved at least 65% off the price at the resort. Personal gripe - when we go to Mexico, we want to be in Mexico. These resorts pipe so much non-Mexican music. Every now and then there will be a live band that plays traditional Mexican music. But far too many resorts in Mexico, this one included, do not play Mexican music. This is YOUR country. Embrace your music. It is something Mexico should be proud of.||The staff at this resort are all wonderful. Not a single...

I don’t often write reviews, but Nickelodeon Resort exceeded every expectation so I wanted to help anyone on the fence about booking here hopefully decide to give it a shot. ||Starting at arrival - we had to wait a little longer than we would have liked at the airport for the transfer, but the transportation is free so I can’t ding anyone for that. I might suggest booking a private transfer if you have the means, it would be less time in the heat waiting for the shared shuttle. The Lomas Travel employees were very nice, helpful, and easy to find. The hotel is less than 30 minutes from the Cancun airport so it’s a pretty easy trip. ||Once you arrive at the hotel, we did not have to wait for check in and it took about ten minutes. We did not receive the kids slime slushies or welcome drinks but I’ve seen others get them. It probably depends on when you arrive. They did try to upsell us on a nicer room but we politely declined and it was not an issue. They also want you to go talk to the Lomas Travel desk and concierge, but we passed on both and went straight to the room. My guess is that this is where the sales pitch you see on other reviews comes from, but this was not our experience. Even at the Lomas Travel desk, the gentleman let us know what they had to offer but was not pushy at all. The lobby is amazing and there is a play area to drop the kids off while you check in. ||The room was fantastic for the most part. We had a king suite and the partition is very nice to have. The pool off the room wasn’t heated, but in July the temperature of the water was pleasant. If you watch any of the YouTube/TikTok reviews, that is exactly what you can expect from the room. The Murphy bed slanted down a little bit which caused one incident of falling out of bed, but otherwise the king bed was comfortable and the finishes were very nice. It’s a little noisy but nothing out of the ordinary. The mini bar is well stocked but you do have to request replenishment. The hotel portion doesn’t seem that big and the resort never felt crowded during our stay. The rooms on the pool level cost extra but I honestly don’t know why. People can see right into your room if they’re using the pool. The beach isn’t anything special but the view is great. They have character meet and greets in the hotel building which is nice, and there is a secondary front desk so there is always staff there. ||The food was good to very good across the board. We went on a Royal Caribbean cruise last summer and I went to an all-inclusive in Cabo last winter, and the food here was MUCH better than both. Good Burger was a hit with the kids but the better food for dinner was at Piazza and Yacht Club. Piazza is a family style experience where they send out food for the table without you ordering, however you can order a la carte if you’d like. Yacht Club was the favorite of our group which offered Mexican cuisine and a ton of variety. Le Spatula is essentially the only breakfast option but it has a huge selection and we were very happy eating there daily. Bikini Bottom Bar was also a lot of fun with a great indoor/outdoor vibe. Snick Lounge had the best service aside from Yacht Club. We never tried the room service but heard from others in our group that it was good. The buffets are appreciated with young kids. If I had to nit pick, you do run out of options after a few days so if you are here for more than three nights you will need to repeat dinner spots. That being said we were still happy to eat at Piazza and Yacht Club twice each for dinner. There was also a steakhouse that we did not try. I think there was an up-charge for it but even if not, we wouldn’t have taken kids there because it looked pretty fancy. ||The absolute highlight was Aqua Nick. Our kids had never really been to water parks so we were a little skeptical, but the resort really knocked it out of the park with Aqua Nick. You can easily spend 4-5 hours here. The drinks aren’t quite as good as the resort but the food is good and the process is very streamlined. There is another buffet here that we did not try called Nick Bistro. It’s a great water park and did not feel crowded until Friday, but even then it wasn’t bad at all. The slime time at 1:30 is a highlight that everyone got a kick out of. Everyone loved Aqua Nick!||There are two kids clubs on site that are for ages 4+ if you want to leave them there. One is in the hotel building and opens at 2 PM, the other is at Aqua Nick and starts at 9 AM. They have activities all day (ninja turtle mask making, cupcake decorating, slime making etc.) and the staff is wonderful. They are strict on the age limit, but for kids under 4 they can stay as long as an adult is with them. Our kids had a great time in both kids clubs and it’s such a valuable amenity. ||There are some drawbacks which are mentioned in other reviews but I will reiterate here. The first is the shuttles. It’s a little annoying that the two main areas are so far from the hotel rooms, but the shuttles come fairly often and we only ran into issues a couple of times where we had to wait more than a few minutes. You could also walk if you really wanted to, it’s only about 1km from the rooms to the action. The price of souvenirs and anything not included is pretty shocking. Plushes are easily $70+ and even a kids rash guard (size 2) was like $140. This is obviously not a reflection on the hotel itself, but if you’re a golfer, the golf options in the area are limited and very expensive. It’s also hard to find a lot of information about the hotel ahead of time on their website. We needed to call a couple of times and you can’t even really find info on spa treatments. They have a website when you get here but there isn’t a lot of paper and almost everything is on their app or via QR code. ||None of my criticisms take away from my five star rating. At the end of the day, our kids had the time of their lives and they slept so well at night because they were wiped out from all the fun. The service across the board was spectacular and we felt so welcome. I’m not dismissing anyone else’s experience, but we did not have anyone approach us for a timeshare pitch nor did anyone else really try to get us to spend any more money. I think the concierge might have, and they were starting down that road a little when I stopped by once, but they stopped when I said I had to go get my kids from Club Nick. The hotel has activities and character meet and greets all day so you really have a lot of options that are already included. ||I can’t recommend this resort enough so if you’re on the fence, I was as well and I’m glad we booked this as our family’s big...

We wanted to do something special for our kids before they got too old. As a family, we have gone on over 20 all inclusive vacations, including Cancun, Costa Mujeres, Puerto Vallarta, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, and Grand Cayman (although not all inclusive in Cayman), so we are not new to traveling and have plenty to compare to. |At over $1500 per night, we were excited to take this once in a lifetime trip. Our expectations were high. We all got our nails painted like slime and SpongeBob. My daughter was drawing Dora and Boots like crazy. We couldn’t wait!!|Got there and instantly you drive by the water park right off the Main Street. Looks nice. We check in and have to take a bus to our room from the lobby. They have 20 passenger vans there for the guests to transport people around. Golf carts only there as a butler service. But not a lot of them. |If you enjoy nice scenic walks thru the jungle at other properties, this isn’t for you. The rooms are in one building about a mile away from the lobby and water park. The only way to get around, is by these vans. For every guest. For every stroller and person. They have 1 door that opens in the van and everyone piles in and out of this thing. Not my vision in paradise that’s for sure. |We walked into the room to check it out. |Pro-hotel room had 2 bathrooms in it. That was awesome. |Pro-everything is clean|Pro-every room has a swim out|Con-our swim out pool was freezing, (it was middle of July) and about 4 feet wide. Kids didn’t want to swim in it cause it was too cold. |Con-the ocean view was horrible of giant concrete blocks all over in the ocean in front of the hotel room. |Pro-the main pool wasn’t far from our room and we could see it by looking down. |Con-it is ALWAYS deserted. No waiter service. Want a drink-get in the pool|Con-the main pool is so narrow and is connected other guests’ swim out rooms, that you always feel like you are intruding on others privacy. |Pro-it has a nice water park over a mile away from the hotel room, that is super clean.|Con-you have to wait in line for a bus to take you there. |Con-tough to get a seat cause it’s packed with resort and non resort day pass guests|Con-besides the water park and a 30 minute show each night, there is nothing else to do |Con-they try to upsell EVERYTHING|Arcade games-extra, face paint-extra, photos-extra, cabana-extra, steakhouse restaurant-extra, sit in a booth at breakfast-extra, character breakfast-extra, slime-extra. They also have plenty of gift shops selling their Nickelodeon products. |First morning there and about 9:45am. We come downstairs from our Room and want breakfast. There is a line with over 100 people waiting to go to either breakfast or the water park. The only breakfast buffet for all of the guests in the whole place, you have to take a bus to it. |Be ready to wait in line! For the bus and then again when you get to the breakfast buffet. |We counted over 22 OPEN tables with no guests using them. Yet it took over 30 minutes for our party of 4 to sit for the buffet. |We had enough. We weren’t happy. |The view, freezing pool, lack of main pool, lack of any entertainment (all of their fun kid entertainment staff is at the waterpark-where NON hotel guests also go with to spend their day pass), want to eat breakfast with the characters, $125 for each parent and an extra extravagant price for the kids. Wanna get slimed, wait in line and for $70 per family they will drop green water on you. There were extra costs and upsells for everything. We felt like we were tricked and getting ripped off the whole time. We wanted to switch hotels. We spent WAY more than any vacation to feel like we were getting ripped off and constantly disappointed. |Well, surprise surprise, they refused to let us leave. Well, of course we could leave, but they were going to still charge us for the unused days of our stay, if we wanted to switch hotels. |They gave us a “butler” because we weren’t happy. While the butlers were super nice people -we were still waiting as they had other families to tend to, and basically it was a golf cart ride to just shut us up. |The waterpark is the only draw for this place, and you can get a day pass and go there without staying in the hotel. |There are a million stairs at the waterpark too. |Pro-lots of lifeguards and waiters at the waterpark. |Overall super disappointed. Nothing to do besides waterpark and 30 minute night show, complete lack of any entertainment, constant upsells, huge lines, and overall a very inconvenient and disappointing property. ||We ended up extending our trip by a few days so we didn’t feel like it was a huge waste of time and money. We went to the Grand at Moon Palace. This was awesome. They had (ALL INCLUDED!!) waterpark, kids play place, multiple arcades with all games free, bike rentals, wave surfing machine, karaoke lounge, mini golf, tennis and basketball courts, huge bounce house arena, multiple breakfast buffets, large pools all over property, awesome shows and...