We just came back from a one-week family vacation to Los Cabos, Mexico to celebrate my husband’s 40th birthday. We had a wonderful seven days filled with lots of family time, sunshine, and beach time!

After doing some research and reading the reviews, we ended up booking an all-inclusive package at the Grand Fiesta Americana Resort; an oceanfront resort located in the touristic corridor linking San Lucas and San Jose. The resort was around 30 minutes drive from Los Cabos International airport.

The hotel grounds are beautiful, with a total of six swimming pools, four spa tubs, nine restaurants and six bars, fire pit, beach cabanas, and a whale-watching deck. We stayed at a Delux Oceanfront Room located on the fifth floor (Fiesta Rewards floor). The view from the room was fantastic as we were able to see most of the resort and ocean from the balcony. The room was clean and spacious, and the double beds were quite comfortable. The bathroom was roomy as well with a tub and separate standing shower. The one thing that was very limited in the room was clothing storage space. The only option was a small dresser in a corner with two tiny drawers. A larger dresser would have been useful, especially when you have small children sharing the space.

Grand Fiesta Americana Los Cabos Travel Review

Grand Fiesta Americana Los Cabos Travel Review

FOOD & DRINK

With six different restaurants on site, the resort has some great food options. All the restaurants are a-la-cart except breakfast, with a brunch buffet until noon.  Our room was pretty centrally located, so it was easy to get to most restaurants with the exception of “Blu”. For some reason this particular restaurant was not marked on the map in our welcome package and we had to ask the staff about it. Once we finally located it we found it to be quite fantastic and worth the visit. The ribs were to die for, and they had a donut plus ice-cream dessert that we ordered more than once.

The view at Peninsula restaurant was spectacular, one of the best views in the resort. It was a nice place but could get quite busy at times and we found the service was a bit slower there compared to the others. Other favorite places for dinner were Bodega, the steak house and the breakfast buffet at the Mexican restaurant on the 3rd floor. We prefer when resorts offer buffet options for all meals since we have two small children and it usually means less waiting for food and it is easier to pick exactly what we know they will eat. We have seen this work well at many other family-focused all-inclusive resorts.

One thing that bothered us a bit was that the menu in each restaurant always had a page with expensive items that could be ordered but would not be included as part of the all-inclusive package. I have never experienced this in an all-inclusive resort before, especially not a five-star rated one where our per night costs were already extremely high so it seemed a bit stingy.

Our three year old still requires a high chair to be able to reach the table so we requested one at each restaurant.  Unfortunately, we only received one part of the time as they did not have enough for all the restaurant locations. I think they definitely need to invest in more chairs and also more cutlery suitable for kids (less glass and metal) if they truly want to cater to families with young children.

POOLS & BEACH

The pool area was beautiful, and there was a dedicated “Adults only” pool in the resort. The main larger pool was an infinity pool with a beautiful view of the ocean, and it had a nice shallow area perfect for young children. We spent most of the time at that pool.

We found that even though there were signs asking people not to reserve lounge chairs with towels when not at the pool, the lounge chairs were mostly gone if you arrived in the pool after breakfast. To get a lounge chair with an umbrella people were leaving towels reserving the chairs very early in the morning before going for breakfast and then not coming to use them until well after 11 a.m. We found this unfair, and we wished the staff enforced their rule of not reserving chairs if not at the pool. One morning we went down to the pool after breakfast to find the pool empty, with all the chairs reserved and nowhere to put our belongings.

We had an easier time finding empty lounge chairs with umbrellas at the beach. They have a natural reef just in front of the resort, so when the tide is low, there is an area where you can admire a variety of fish from the shore and even snorkel with them. The fish swim right up to your feet, and this is a super fun activity for kids and adults. The resorts provide snorkeling gear rental for free, and people took advantage of this. There is an under tide though so it is not safe to swim at that beach and there was a red flag up for most of our stay.

At the beach and the pool, there were servers who came to ask if you needed drink or food from 11 am onwards. The bars by the main pool also opened at 11 am, you could still get water if needed from there but drinks were only available after 11 am.

 

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GRAND CLUB AREA

With our Delux Oceanfront Room reservation, we had access to the Grand Club area, where there was a small private pool available that was often quiet and had lots of empty lounge chairs. We used it on a day when the main pool was very busy, and there weren’t any lounge chairs available.  That area also had a dedicated concierge and a quiet spot with some snacks and a nice coffee machine.  This was a relaxing quiet spot that was a bit more exclusive but we felt like we might be annoying the other people there with our kid’s horseplay, so we did not end up spending too much time there.

CELEBRATIONS

We had a celebration during our stay as my husband turned 40th one of the days. I spoke to the concierge after arriving and asked if it was possible to have a small cake or cupcake with a candle on his actual birthday for a special dinner. I was told they were going to take care of the surprise and on the day of his birthday, they did bring a small chocolate cake with a candle on the side for his birthday. I was hoping they were going to sing “Happy Birthday, ” but they just left the cake and said congratulations. Maybe not something they do there. They had our table decorated ahead of time with some stones and wrote HBD on it, so that made it feel special.

They also came to our room after dinner and wrote “Happy Birthday” out of rice on the room’s table. They were supposed to go while we were out for dinner and they were going to write it on the bed, but since we were in the room they wrote it on the table. A few days later, after asking the boys about their favourite characters, we came back from a day at the beach to find a lady setting up a Paw Patrol and Star Wars rice drawing on our beds. The boys liked the drawings, but we found the rice difficult to clean as they wanted us to keep it on the bed.

It felt like they had good intentions with these “surprises” but the practical reality was that they were kind of odd since you can’t really use them and they are in the way (had to clean them off the bed before the kids made a mess). In a luxury resort like this one,  it would have been more traditional to have left a small bottle of wine/champagne or some chocolate and a small card instead.

GENERAL

We have traveled to all-in-inclusive resorts in Mexico multiple times, including another one in Cabo before, and we are used to having family entertainment during the day in the pool area or at the beach and then evening shows or entertainment. We enjoy those and we were surprised that the resort was very quiet, and didn’t have any shows or other entertainment happening daily.

In general, the resort had impeccable grounds, the rooms were bright and clean, the beach was beautiful, and the weather was perfect. We experienced friendly customer service and enjoyed our stay. We truly had a wonderful time while staying in Mexico.

If you are celebrating something be sure to let the staff know as they can help make it special for you. The staff was all super friendly and polite, and we experienced excellent customer service wherever we went in the resort.

We also booked an excursion and went on a glass bottom boat to see the fish and explore the famous Arch in Cabo San Lucas with the boys and we enjoyed that. We used the shuttle from the hotel as well, (extra charge) to visit Cabo San Lucas and explore the town. I highly recommend a boat excursion if you are in the area.

Disclosure: This is not a sponsored post, all views and opinions are 100% my own.