Great Resort. Mediocre Food. Grumpy Staff

The layout and location were great for the kids. The water slide area and pools were excellent. The free access to surf boards, boogie boards and kids beach toys was an added bonus. The food was mediocre at best and there was not a buffet that was opened throughout the day, so snacks for the children between meals was difficult. Half the staff were friendly but much of the staff at the resort were surprisingly grumpy. Many guests were upset that Palladium members were allowed to book reserv [... read more]ations at the Al a Carte restaurants but non members could not. For my next trip I will spend the extra cash and go to a Dreams/Secrets again.

We'll be back... :)

This was our first visit to GP Vallarta and we want to return there again :) Food - great, tasty, fresh, wide selection. Burgers on the beach for lunch or dinner at El Dorado - everything was awesome. Mexican restaurant was our top pick. Compliments to the chef and the team of servers. Very nice and relaxing atmosphere. Kevin "Costner" is awesome :) Buffet - 10 out of 10! The lady making pizzas is fantastic cook. I can go on and on about it but you must try it yourself :) Service - dinner,  [... read more]lunch, breakfast or wedding on the beach - Nelida is there to help out anyone. Antonio at the buffet will go an extra mile to provide the best service and make you a little rose. Antonio at the pool bar is the true leader and awesome bartender. Gracias to Mary for keeping our room nice an clean. Accommodation porter (don't know his name) was such a great guy. Always with a smile and a song :) Night shows - amazing, those dancers must have endless pool of energy. But the true STAR is Yesica! Service with the smile every night! :) Activities - non stop action. There's so much to do for everyone. Spa, pools, bar's, beach, tennis, football etc. There's always something happening and everyone is welcome to join in. Try archery with Ali. And follow his instructions :) One last reminder. When packing your sunscreen and swimsuits - don't forget to bring some respect with you. Front desk, service staff, guy blowing leaves or a lady mopping walkways - everyone is working hard to make your stay as pleasant as possible and they deserve utmost respect.

Easy surfing

Nice hotel with a surf break right off the beach. Friendly staff go out of their way to make sure you are looked after. The beach crew, Eder and Jimmy are most helpful with surf tips and lessons. This was our 3rd trip

Great time!

The hotel was beautiful. All areas were kept very clean. We stayed in a deluxe room with 2 adults and a 6 year old. There were a lot of stairs as the resort is on a cliff but I believe they also had ramp access to most areas. I definitely got my steps in. The bars were good. Sometimes you had to wait a bit for a drink, just depended how busy they were. I wished I had brought an insulated bigger cup and would next time. The cups are small in the pool area and seem to be a magnet for a 6 year  [... read more]old splashing pool water. The pools were great, well maintained, got quite busy mid day. Our son liked the kids area with water slides. The adult pool was quieter and was a nice break, also breathtaking as it is an infinity pool over the ocean . Our son loved the kids club. So that was a bonus in giving us, the parents a break. The buffet was really good I thought and we ate there the whole time. My only negatives would be I wish the bed and pillows were more comfy- that is the minor one. My major issue was access to bottled water. I drink a lot of water and my body is used to that. In our mini bar we would get 4-6 600ml bottles of water each day. That is for 3 people. I found myself strategizing to get enough, drinking as much as I could at meal times. Likely my downfall was drinking alcohol at the pool all afternoon then being very thirsty once back in my room. You can order water at all the bars but it is usually a bit of a wait and the little cups again. We tried to tip and request extra water bottles, but didn’t seem to get far with our limited Spanish. If we return, I would actually check a bag on the plane with just water bottles. But as I said I drink a lot of water and this likely wouldn’t be an issue for everyone Oh yeah, and the lattes in the Hemingway bar in the morning are delicious!

Great Family Resort!

Hotel was good! We got upgraded to family selection for a good price. Pool service at the private pool area in family selection could have been better! Loved the bar at the family selection. Bartender Arturo was awesome and made incredible drinks for us!

Good Hotel, Nice Resort- Watch for Upgrades

This was our 4th time at this resort. We like it a lot and haven't had many problems.....until this time. We booked over 3 months ago, upon arrival, they indicated that they did not have any rooms with twin beds and that was "at the resorts discretion" and they were at 94% capacity. If we wanted twin beds we would have to pay the $210 USD upgrade. Well they were at 94% capacity because they had closed one of the three buildings and I'm pretty sure they could have converted a queen bed room t [... read more]o two twins since we had booked 3 months in advance. So I looked at this as a blatant way of making you pay for a room upgrade. I indicated great displeasure and indicated I would complain on social media and cost them a lot more than the $210. They said "go for it".

Absolutely wonderful resort

Lots of stairs , not a resort if you have mobility issues. Brand name liquor at all bars, food was wonderful at the steak house and Japanese restaurant, buffet was average. You should check if your package includes reservation for the specialty restaurants, you can go and ask if the have room and you may have to wait. Entertainment was pretty good, and it was nice to see that the children could preform before the main show. Rooms were a great size , balcony was really small. Grounds could have [... read more] some work done around the rooms and pool area.

Great resort for families with kids

The hotel rooms were great. Some rooms did not have a great view, i.e., back of kitchen hut, but staff was very accommodating to switch us to better room with an amazing ocean view. Poolside bars were hit an miss with making good drinks. Some bar tenders just rushed making the drink and were poured all over the glass making it very sticky and the quality of taste of same drink varied bartender to bartender. Food in buffet was good and lots of variety. The evening entertainment was top notch [... read more]. Kids pool had 4 water slides and great life guards they helped kids. It was fairly easy to find a place to sit pool side as security guards removed towels of people who claimed many chairs too early. Beach was sandy with lots of waves down the shore for surfing.

Wonderful Family Resort

The Grand Palladium Vallarta is an excellent family orientated resort. The pools are wonderful and the beach great for boogie boarding or beach combing depending on what you prefer. There are numerous food establishments but time your dinner time as depending on how busy the resort is you may have a wait. We upgraded upon arrival to the Family Selection area of the resort. The rooms are a bit larger, the pool area quieter and the restaurant and bar/snack area are both great. This was [... read more] our first all inclusive experience as a family and we highly recommend the Grand Palladium.

Very nice trip

Very pleasant staff. Excellent food. Weather was perfect. Comfortable bed. Room was cleaned and fridge stocked daily. Overall a very nice resort and good trip. It seemed to be a great choice for people with kids. Lots of stuff for them to do.

The staff were always pleasant. The grounds were impeccable. Also we wanted to move to another room No problem.

The staff were always pleasant. The grounds were impeccable. Also we wanted change rooms, no problem. They had us in another room in less than hour. We enjoyed the beach under the wonderful straw umbreallas protecting us from the sun. We had fun parcipati ng in the water aerobics and dancing in the lobby. We hope that we return to Paradise.

3 stars at best

The positive is that the resort and rooms are clean and the staff are pleasant. Also, the nightly entertainment was good. Outside of that I don’t have many nice things to say. The resort is small, the pools are small, the rooms are tiny. The A/C in the rooms barely worked. There are no elevators anywhere in the resort. The door lock to our bathroom didn’t work. I had to call every day to have the room cleaned as they always forget. When the room was cleaned, they always forgot something.  [... read more] The resort is NOT stroller friendly at all with no ramps anywhere around the rooms (again, no elevators either). There are many nice looking restaurants but the food is tasteless and mediocre at best in all of them. I definitely would not go back.

Nice place

We had to stop at four or five different resorts on the way there to let people off on top of our already 45 minute drive there so that was long when we got there checked in they tried pushing us for a timeshare recommend don’t do it service at the adult pool was fantastic buffet was good service on open their side Was so so lots of stairs room were very nice over all a great place to stay

Pleasant stay

Enjoyed our vacation, amenities were good although we did not take advantage of everything available, we lazed on the beach with our books, walked everyday once the tide was out far enough to get safely around the point and swam frequently in the ocean. Not pool people, we come to the beach for the natural ocean swim (if we liked the pool, we may as well go to Arizona LOL) Had intended to get out in the kayaks but a persistent shoulder injury advised me against. The boogie boards we did play o [... read more]n were in kind of rough shape, scratched my legs up a bit. One day we went to borrow snorkel equipment but there was no one to assist, and although there was some equipment sitting there, we did not know if it was clean or if we had to book it out. Took advantage of the free Catamaran ride, but made sure we booked it right at 9 am. Food was nice, reasonable variety, salsa and guacamole daily lunchtime staple. Did find that an awful lot of salt is used in everything! We ordered a Caesar a few times, which are already loaded with salt, and had to ask that salt not be added to the drink NOT the rim, I'm talking the Drink itself. Enjoyed the Bambu restaurant and had dinner at the Mexican Adelita restaurant twice Have had many all inclusive vacations over the years and know what to expect. We are at a point in our lives where we actually don't mind doing our own cooking, liquor selection etc but opted for a week of complete relaxation instead The one thing i wish all inclusives could provide a step up in is WINE. Several options of hard liquor are available for cocktails (although sometimes i swear the same stuff just goes into different labels) but the house wines that are served in AI's are SOOO BAAAD. I did order a bottle one night to accompany a nice Italian dinner, it was a bottle that cost $12 at home, and was $50 CAD. The wine served tasted like it was watered down, with vinegar. If there is an effort to make the food delicious, why would you want to destroy it with crap wine? Sorry, i just can't drink tequila or cocktails at dinner. Facilities were clean, room was serviced nicely although i did ask twice for a top up of the snack size peanuts we had on day 1 in our room, but never received any again. Would I recommend this resort? Sure, but it is essentially the same as any other, no huge standouts.

Beautiful resort

Grounds and ocean pool were amazing. Service in the Family Section was amazing as was one particular older gentleman server in the pool restaurant by the slides. Food was mostly a 3.5 star. We had an excellent time, third visit. We were actually married here and went back for our ten year anniversary with two little kids in tow. Made some great new memories. The servers treated our 8 month old baby like royalty!!!

You need to be in good shape

Its a nice Place but would not go back again too many Stairs and had to change room because they could not fix AC unit and room in lower area the WIFI did not work well. we had the Air transit Imperial club package and only got turn down service tell we had to move rooms on day two of our trip

Relaxing vacation

The hotel grounds were beautiful, well kept. There are beautiful views of the ocean from all over. Alcohol selections were superb. Great variety of food at buffets. A la carted good, Except with the first come first serve, it’s a bit difficult to plan your night if you have to wait hours for a table. Everything was very clean.

Grand Palladium

Great areas to relax was nice seeing the animals daily and the food was very good. Also was cool seeing the whales offshore from the pool and beach. The resort is a great size which makes easy to find your way around

Great Resort, Good Food, Not Accessible

A group of friends and I recently spent a week at the Grand Palladium Vallarta. The resort was on the smaller side, but great for relaxing days at the pool and ocean. The food was good but not very much variety from day to day. I personally do not have accessibility issues, but there isn't a single elevator at the resort, and stairs to get pretty much anywhere. I often saw parents carrying strollers up the stairs, and occasionally motorized wheelchairs left behind at the bottom; not a good look. [... read more] The Resort should have better disclosure during booking time to ensure accessibility issues are properly disclosed.

Staff are the key to this amazing resort !!!

Amazing staff !!!! I would like to personally thank: Ormondo - beach bartender Raymondo - beach server Antonio - beach server Omar - adult pool bartender Bernardo - adult pool bartender Edder - surf instructor Jessica - main bar waitress Kenni - main bar waitress Russel - main bar server Biggest dude bartender (forgot name sorry) - main bar Lifeguards on beach Isabella - entertainment choreographer & her staff WOW!!! Security Many many more Thank all of you for  [... read more]another amazing trip (best ever!!!)and i will see you next year :) David Mckenna Dear management, please recognize these wonderfull people as they are the reason i am coming back for a third time and hopefull for many years to come.