We just returned from a 8 day stay at the Melia Puerto Vallarta!

Great staff all thru the hotel system, from the bell boys to the bar tenders! They are all very professional, friendly and always helpful!

The restraunts are good! Lots of variety, but I was tired of it by the end of my stay! (8 days) The dessert bar could be a lot better!
Breakfast is the best meal of the day, loved the omelet bar. Great green juice served at breakfast!

The rooms are clean, the beds comfortable (to me), maid will stock fridge with beer, soda and water if you leave a note with small tip!

The Gardens and the ponds are beautiful! So is the lobby.

Pool is huge, lots of lounges and shade areas. Activities are fun at the pool. Great pool for the family with small kids.

Did see the presentation for the vacation club-- did not buy! It is an attractive price in my opinion! Just not the right time for us to buy. Not pressured to go see it. Not pressured to buy either.

I really dont know where to start !!

I always use TripAdvisor to help me find my holidays and after reading ALL the reviews on this hotel I had an open mind that it was a fairly good hotel and that some people were more critical than others. I am lucky enough to be a frequent traveller and have visited most parts of the world and stayed in some pretty wonderful hotels, but I have to say this is the VERY WORST HOTEL I HAVE EVER STAYED IN.

I travelled to Mexico last minute with my husband and two young girls (3 and 5) for one week. I wanted somewhere that the kids could go to while we releaxed and the Kids Club sounded ideal.
When we arrived we were upgraded to an Ocean View room which was dark and dirty. The view was great but thats where it ends. The beds are SO HARD and old you cannot possibly get a good nights sleep on them. Our comforters were so badly stained with old faeces, blood and alcohol we had to ask for new ones (no covers on these!). The floor was dirty and the paintwork peeling off. The bathroom was Ok except the hot and cold water did not regulate, so you either had a freezing shower or it scalded you. Your only option is to have a bath. The sink was constantly plugged and did not drain. This was repaired twice to no avail. The complimentary water in the fridge was always warm and never topped up by the maid.
I think our bed had fleas as we all woke up the first morning COVERED in bites (literally hundreds) and there were no mosquitos in the room !!!

Then it gets worse.......... the food is the most DISGUSTING I have ever had to endure. I paid for an all inclusive but ate out at each meal as I couldnt bear my kids having powdered milk with their cheap cereal. The fruit was bitter, the bread stale and sweet !! The desserts were unreal, nothing I have ever experience before.

The pool was ok, if you like very LOUD music blearing in your ears. Dont bother bringing a book, you wont be able to read it.
The pool had plastic cups and straws floating around in it and had some kind of scum building up on the shallower parts. Maybe due to all the drinks and food being dumped into it ?!?!

The kids club was OK, my 5 year old enjoy it, but the young one had to go into a room which was dark and smelly. It was an old suite at one point. Also note that you CANNOT leave the kids there to play while you leave the hotel. They make you check on them every hour so you dont forget them ! (as if !).

The music DOES not stop until 1am. They have shows every night and its so loud that its booming through the windows. I stayed in block 3 on the 7th floor and that was bad enough. They said that this was the quietest room. I pity the poor people that were in the rooms closer.

This hotel is for kids on summer break who want to party all night and its very possible here.

Its CERTAINLY NOT A FIVE STAR more like a low THREE. The staff dont really speak much English, so be warned if you want to complain ! Get your Rosetta Stone out and brush up before you go.

Joseph at the front desk was charming, as was our babysitter called LaLa who I cant compliment enough. She was AWESOME, but came at a price of $10.00 hour. Even if your kids are in the kids club. You have to have a babysitter with them if you leave the premises, so going into town during the day gets pretty expensive.

All in all, I would give this advice. If you want a pretty budget holiday and arent expecting much, then stay here. On the other hand, if you like good food and a relaxing peaceful holiday DONT STAY here.

I heard that the Los Arcos in downtown area is much nicer and the same price.

I also want to point out that it gets pretty expensive paying for taxis to and from the hotel. Its a pretty long walk to get to anywhere thats worth a look.

We visited the Waterpark which is a MUST if you have kids. THEY LOVED IT. Its a perfect day.

Good luck !!

This hotels is great for small kids, it has a lot of activitys for them. Theres also agraden with games and a flinstones club forthem.

The hotel is kind of 70's. The Rooms are ok but need some mantainance. The food is above average for an all inclusive, break fast it great. The beach is very windy in the afternoon so if you plan to use the beach do it in the morning because arroung 12 oclock it gets very windy. They have some kayas that you can use.

Service is very good, we went on a long weekend in mexico and the hotel was full, but you could no notice it in the service.

Near the hotel is marina vallarta were you can stroll in the evening, it also close to downtown (less than 10 by taxi).

Just returned from a 5 night stay. Overall a good value for the money. Just remember this is not a 5 or even 4 star resort. This is truly a family place. Kids galore. I saw a few couples and few singles.

Check-in. We arrived early and I think the standard response is "come back at 3". We were able to change into bathing suits in a hospitality suite. I think it was someone'e room who checked out. Dirty towels all over, beds unmade, toilet not flushed. Pretty gross. Everyone just got changed and didn't touch anything. At 4pm we went to get our keys. First problem: we are traveling with 4 children and requested connecting rooms. They said we can have rooms on the same floor. Sorry, that won't work for us. After 20 minutes of typing on the computer and talking to a supervisor, they found 2 rooms next to each other, not connecting. Garden view. We could come back in 2 days and get connecting rooms. We would have to bring our luggage down to the lobby at 12noon, check out, then return at 3pm for the new room keys. Two days later, we packed up and moved to connecting rooms. This time we got a partial ocean view. Very nice. Never got acousted by timeshare people.

Location: Walking distance to the marine. Safe. Bus to downtown is literally across the street. 55 cents each way, but must use pesos. Safe, fast, friendly. There is an ATM just outside of the hotel to the left. Safe and easy.

Rooms: Clean but dated. Think old Holiday Inn or HoJo. First set of rooms: one smelled terribly of mold, one shower didn't work, one tv's buttons were broken, one remote didn't work even with a change of batteries. We didn't bother to complain as we were changing rooms in 2 days and didn't want to waste more vacation time at the front desk. Second set of rooms were better, but still dated. One odd thing: NO CLOCKS in the rooms. That's right,, no clock radios. Bring your own. 3 stars for the rooms.

Food: We knew we were not going to be getting 5 star cuisine and its not. Breakfast is a large buffet. Something for everyone. For picky eaters, be advised that the dry cereals are not "American" brand names and don't taste exactly the same. Think "fake" fruit loops. Waffles, pancakes, omelets were all good. Lunch is a buffet. We didn't eat there, but it looked good. Our family loved the outdoor snack bar. Hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken nuggets, good fries, fresh chips, salsa, fresh fruit, cut up veggies. Fries and nuggets went fast and took awhile to replenish. Chips and salsa were excellent. Some days it was extra hot. Dinner buffet was ok. You could always find something. They even had a couple of dry cereals out for the really picky eaters. It came in handy for us one night. I even saw bolony sandwiches with the crusts cut off. Dessert selection was very large. Cakes, cheese cake, rice pudding. One night there was a liquid chocolate fountain to dip fruit in. We went to the grill restaurant twice. Food ok. Desserts not so much. Bland. We went back to the buffet for dessert. Mexican restaurant was good. In both ala carte restaurants, there are a small number (less than 10) of entrees and a childrens menu. You can even order 2 kids meals for a bigger child. We didn't make it to the reservation only Italian restaurant. You won't starve here and you might enjoy all of your meals too. Still a 3 star on the food. For kids and my teenagers, its 5 stars.

Drinks - ok. Very weak. Frozen drinks were very sweet. Mass produced. Beer is Corona on tap. Several canned beers. Wine is Gallo. We are not big drinkers so this did not affect us too much. We usually like 1 good drink by the pool. Had to settle for the Corona. The kids loved loved loved the frozen virgin fancy drinks. 3 stars from us, 5 stars from them.

Staff and Service - This is where the hotel excels. Everyone is super friendly and polite. We were always greeted with a smile wherever we went. Tips were never expected buy always appreciated. 5 stars.

For the kids - We don't have little ones, so I can't comment on the kids club. Our boys range from 12-16 and there was always something for them to do. Beach volleyball was a big hit. Bingo was played almost everyday by adults and kids. No need to leave your pool chair. They come to you to give you a bingo card. There was a daily fun game like kick the soccer ball into the net in the pool. Daily list was posted by the towel hut. There are pool tables, foosball, ping pong, water basketball. You have to sign out the balls at the activity hut. There was supervised rifle shooting and archery. The batting cages were closed because the pitching machine was broken. This is a cart with ceramics that you can paint for an extra charge. Small bowl was $15. You paint it, they fire it up, and its ready the next day. The man will "fix" any mistakes if you want and it comes back really nice. Boys, girls, and adults were making things. Glad my son did paint one. There is a photographer who takes pictures daily at sunset. You sign up near the towel hut during the day. He takes several poses and if you don't like the pictures, you don't pay. $10 for a 6 x 8, $35 for the next size. I saw couples, families, kids. Pictures ready the next day. One afternoon they brought out a big skillet of seafood and rice. Served with sangria. Excellent. 5 stars for activities.

Chair saving - Always easy to get a hut and pool chairs at 10am. Never had a problem. Maybe by 12 noon.

Entertainment - We went to the nightly show one night and it was too artsy for my boys. Other really liked it. Changes nightly. Lobby bar had a live band every night. We would go with the kids for a drink before going to bed. Large screen tv. Be warned that at night while lying in bed, you can hear the boom, boom, thump, thump from the music.
One night they brought in a few vendors to set up and sell their wares. I only stopped at a jewelry table. Good prices. Able to bargin with them. Another night they were making cotton candy (free) outside of the buffet .
Most days from 3 -5pm there is a mini bungee jump with a trampoline. $3 for 1 jump, $5 for two jumps. Each jump was about 5 minutes.

Grounds are beautiful and well kept. Pool tiles need some work, but overall very nice. Lobby is open air and huge. Elevators are tiny. Our family of six were smashed in there everytime. Forget having luggage with you.
There is a small hair salon on site. Boys haircut is $8, mens $10. They did a nice job. There is also a cyber cafe. $2 for 30 minutes of computer and internet use. There was usually someone working there as you need to pay $2 cash to them and they will give you a card with an access number on it. You can then log on to one of the computers.

We did the canopy tour. Pick up was by the marina. Bought our tickets at the hotel tour desk. Not for the faint of heart or those with fear of heights. Lots of fun. In case you freak out, the guides will clip on the zip line with you to take you over the really high parts. Read the forums for info on these types of tours. Well worth doing.

Beach is rocky and I mean baseball sized and larger rocks. Really not swimable. We were not expecting Cancun blue water, so no disappointment here. There are a few vendors. They are friendly and don't bother you.

Our family had a wonderful vacation at Melia and in Puerto Vallarta. For the money, it was a good deal. Just don't expect a 5 star. Even if we ate dinner out every night, it was still worth it for the breakfasts and lunches. Our boys can really eat. I can't imagine kids not having a blast here. If they are happy, then the parents can relax and enjoy themselves. It's a winner.