Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Pro’s and Con’s with this Resort

The grounds of the resort were amazing. Very jungle like/rain forest atmosphere. Lots of wildlife running all around. Eco family Superior room was nice, updated, comfortable. I agree with many others that the food was not a strong point here. Buffets didn’t seem to change much each day. Food was tolerable, but more like high end Cuban Buffet. Drinks seemed to be pretty weak. The a la cartes were quite nice. Japanese was amazing and the only restaurant that you can make a [... read more] reservation for. All the others, you just show up and stand in line. There were some different fun activities at the resort. Jade River snorkel tour, Cenote swims, walking tours, photo safari, romantic boat tour. We paid extra for a Segway tour around the resort, which was fun. And of course the water slides were fun for the kids. Lots of slides for all age groups. Beach had a HUGE amount of sea weed so we didn’t spend much time there. All in all, if the food quality doesn’t matter, you’ll probably enjoy this resort. Definitely different from the standard Caribbean resort.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Terrible Resort

My vacation at this resort was the most terrible experience. The horrible customer service, poor quality food, lack of cleanliness and the unprofessionalism of management was like no other. We arrived to two dirty rooms, sand on the floor and in the sheets of the bed, hair in the shower, dirty bathroom counters and no towels. The restaurants do not accept reservations. Instead you wait for more than an hour in line, then another 1.5-2 hours to be served very unpleasant tasting food. Management o [... read more]ffered to “help” us with reducing wait time but never followed through. We contacted tripcentral abs air Transat in attempt to move resorts after the first night but no Indy would take accountability to help even though we purchased the optimal cancellation plan. Completely dissatisfied and utterly disappointed in the resort, air Transat and trip central

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Great time had!

My family and I returned to Sandos Caracol for March break 2022. We loved our initial experience in 2019 and were delighted to return. Our children are aged 7 and 9 presently. The resort offered a LOT for our kids: the amazing water park (slides! games! ice cream!), the cenote to swim in (do bring your own snorkel equipment to avoid buying at the store), the beach with the amazing coral (do bring water shoes ) , the various animal sanctuaries among more! We loved the variety of restaurants and m [... read more]ostly ate the Mexican for dinner (must try the Tortas appetizer, and the fajitas) and do ensure you book the teppanyaki restaurant with the concierge upon arrival to ensure you get a spot! The resort was clean, the food variety was great, drinks were great and the overall experience was wonderful. The sports bar was a huge hit with my boys who loved playing ping ball and learning how to play pool. I would recommend this hotel to others as it is really “different” in a cool way, with the Cenotes, rivers, mangroves, and rain forest! A really great time! Lastly, my kids and I loved seeing the monkeys and the coatis: made the experience extra special to see the animal life ;)

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Do not recommend

WE WERE ASKED TO SIGN A NON DISCLOSURE AGREEMENT AS TO NOT PUBLISH NEGATIVE COMMENTS,WE DID NOT SIGN IT OBVIOUSLY This resort is laughable at best! Cons - -patio infested with ants on 3rd floor -Timeshare pushy on arrival -Food cold and sub par (ill usually eat anything) -Smell of sewer coming from multiple areas -Walk ways not maintained -Machinery is used in middle of night making loud noises and preventing people from sleeping Side note to that noise coming from machinery! We complai [... read more]ned about it the first night at 3am as it woke us up and kept us up. Second night, they use said machinery again, but this time at 5am. This time they told us, "we saw the report, but we must work at night as to not bother clients during the day" How does that makes sense? You rather keep people from sleeping? - WIFI is super unreliable - NO more beach as seen in brochure and pics, erosion has destroyed their beach Pros - most staff is friendly and nice when not on their phone - a lot of animals on site I was here 3 years ago, and I would of gave it 5 stars back then. This place has gone downhill quick. I do not recommend this place to anyone at all

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Great Resort!

We had a great vacation! The resort is huge with lots of stuff to do.I only have 2 small complaints. When we first arrived the hotel may have been a little short staffed due to covid. The rooms all have jugs of bottled water in dispensers which I think is great! We did have to wait for water to be delivered.I had to ask 3 times.We also had to wait an hour to be served at the Italian restaurant but when we said something we were served right away and the food was good. We were treated like royal [... read more]ty for the most part. We tested positive at the end of the week and we were a little afraid, we have heard stories of people being moved to terrible rooms with bad food. That was not the case. We were moved to a very nice room with a big balcony and we were taken very good care of. We were called daily to see if we needed anything and the food they brought us was very good. Esteban the concieage was the best. He was so helpful and was willing to help in any way he could and came and checked on us regularly.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Great resort for families with kids!

A beautiful resort with lots of fun things to do for children and families. The grounds are lovely - surrounded by nature; flora and fauna of all kinds! Monkeys, coati, deer, birds and other wildlife roam the grounds. Great waterpark area and Kids Club. However, the select club area is quite far from the adult-only beach section (rocky so wear water shoes) and some of the dining locations, which made for a lot of walking. For an older couple this made it difficult to get around with ease.  [... read more]A "shuttle" service within the resort would have greatly helped! Our room was clean in all the obvious areas but clearly not cleaned for some time in the closets and corners. We had a ground floor room and had to deal with some creepy crawlies that must have got in under the door. Our ground floor balcony was not usable - furniture too big for the space and not cleaned of animal droppings & spider webs. The staff were lovely, helpful and friendly. We enjoyed the hydro-therapy pool and relaxation massages. Food was good - enjoyed the Brazilian BBQ and the Mexican restaurant.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Beautiful resort

Really enjoyed all the included activities. So much to do you don’t even need to leave the resort. Everything very clean and well maintained. Room was nice, clean, fridge stocked, water bottle in room. All restaurants had good food, buffet had good variety. Restaurant at pool also good, almost same thing everyday ( hamburgers and hotdogs etc). Did free shopping tour, pretty interesting. Have to stay 45 minutes at jewellery store, 30 minutes at Tequila store (free tequila tasting which was ac [... read more]tually interesting and fun) and then they leave you in Playa de Carmen for a couple of hours with access to a beach club ( where we had a delicious lunch on the beach) would recommend this. Or just a taxi to 5th avenue in Playa de Carmen. Just walking thru the paths in the resort was great, vegetation and natural beauty of the mangroves, the cenote, the jade River, the Mayan ruins, lots to explore. I would recommend this resort for anyone, children will love it.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Sandos Caracol

The resort was OK but was very dated. The rooms were not the ones we booked and they could not change because they were full. Covid protocol did not exist. The food was not very good. The best part of the stay were the trips away from the resort.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Great resort, it has a great balance of activities and amenities!

I've been a number of resorts and this one beats all the others from the great balance of things that it offers "aspect". First of all I booked this resort because we needed a family oriented vacation. The addition of our daughter as a new family member made me look for resorts that offer a variety of choices for things to do. Sandos did not disappoint in this area! From the start we liked the grand picturesque entrance that the resort complex offers, it is spectacular from when you enter the [... read more] hanging vine arches. Inside is a mixture of jungle meets beach, which we loved right from the start. The resort offers many activities to do such as: watch the wildlife, hikes, bike rides, the flora is diverse, nightly entertainment, it offers daily entertainment by the pool (which we were never really a part of), water activities, kids water zone (this was great, with slides and many size pools), restaurants of various types and buffet, snorkeling through the cenotes, romantic boat ride, water activities. It really has a wide caveat of things to do and enjoy. One of the things we liked and disliked at the same time is how far our room was from the beach, we liked it because we would take a different route every day and check out the wildlife as well as the hanging bridge. I recommend booking all of the dinners the first or second day you are at the resort as these get reserved fast, we never got to see the Japanese restaurant as apparently it was booked solid throughout the week. I enjoyed the beach quite a bit, but we found you had to go at certain hours because the beach would get filled up with a sort of floating seaweed that would make enjoying the beach impossible. (if it was windy chances are that the beach gets completely filled with the stuff). There are multiple bars and snack bars around the resort complex and even though this is a huge resort sometimes it doesn't quite feel like that because of how abundant green spaces are within the complex. I loved the fact that there is shade literally everywhere around the resort, as many resorts are normally new and don't have any mature trees. (I know most people look for a sunny beach, but sometimes you get overwhelmed by the high sun that you have to run for cover between noon to 3, and this place offered this). Juan the concierge is a great person and facilitated our stay at Sandos. Our daughter was sick due to the weather and he made our stay a lot more welcoming, facilitating delivery for prescription medications for our daughter from a nearby pharmacy, giving us information about the resort complex and an all around nice guy. The downside as I mentioned is that the complex is huge and depending on what you like or your fitness level or needs if you are placed in the far end of the complex then everything is a long walk (reception, restaurants, play room, internet, the beach, pools). Most of my complaints are about the reception at the hotel. Because of covid it was unfortunate that we didn't get a copy of the map or any information at the reception. Also the reception always had huge lineups (every service at the resort was understaffed), reception would never have change for your currency (I was there every day in the morning and they would say that they were out of money, so on my entire trip I never had any pesos or smaller denomination to be able to tip), reception would also take clients at random sometimes from the line (I remember waiting 45 minutes to ask for something only to be turned to the concierge for that question). The first couple of days we were clueless, they don't give you any information on anything, internet is only available in few places and this resort is huge (big downside not having Wi-Fi, we could not get in touch with our other family members in the resort and the Wi-Fi was located very far from our room). The fact that the hotel is tiered based on how much you pay, you get privileges' for certain things (select club, adults only, elite, and so on).

Sandos Playacar Beach Resort: Great buffet

We stayed last week in the family section. Nice large room and double sink bathroom. It’s about an 11 minute walk to the beach or you can take a cart. The path is lined with beautiful gardens and trees. The family area has a nice pool with a swim up bar. There is music but it’s more chill than the pool down at the beach. The family area is also close to the nice breakfast buffet at El Gaucho. We enjoyed the fresh omelette at breakfast, at the big buffet you can get fresh fruit smoothies. [... read more] I loved the fresh mango and papaya. The small buffet at the beach is great for lunch and you sit outside with a view of the ocean. I would make myself a fresh taco salad with their amazing guacamole. The dinner buffet had a lot of variety, grilled meat and a pasta bar. I like that the pasta bar sautéed toppings like vegetables. The beach was amazing, I enjoyed walking far out on the sand bar. There are lots of chairs and some shade. Note the sun is very strong there. The burritos at the Mexican place Chitya (sp?) were also nice. The cupcake cafe was great for an early morning latte. Great place to walk around and see coatis, iguana or the resort cats. Sorry cat lovers some of the cats are shy but one let me rub their belly. Service was always good. I enjoyed water aerobics with Judith in the infinity pool. She made it fun. We took the cab ride over to Sandos Caracalla. It has a nice gentle snorkeling adventure. Nice vide in the lobby, I like how it has the open bar area.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Manuela Romeiro

I will be really short, Manuela Romeiro mislead me, she Told me so many lies, the truth is she never been in this resort and this resort is not for kids in wheelchair and doesn’t have elevator, for example snack are by the main pull by the beach is not wheelchair accessible...like up for breakfast was like 45 minutes long, no bananas ...resort and doom really dirty, horrible service .... I just want to say thank you for your advice Manuela Romeiro and waist my money!!!

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Good time

This was our second trip to the Sandos Eco Carcol. We love the grounds and the nature and of course the main feature, the monkeys !! Unfortunately this time we upgraded to the Royal Elite Penthouse being told we could use the Infinity pool and Swim up bar section by tht travel agent and as advertised on the website however Royal Elite are not allowed and we were told when we arrived. For a family of four the Eco Family section would have been way better. The Royal penthouse is basically a large [... read more]r room made for two. It was very crowded with 4 and our luggage. The balcony was large and nice however the ocean front means nothing. There are no views of the ocean. Just the tops of the palm trees. Food was fine. The restaurants are great. As mentioned in all the posts the beach is not great. Very rocky and dark and more for snorkelling however very wavy most of the time. I’m not sure we will ever return as the room was so disappointing and the very expensive upgrade to Royal Elite was a waste of money. The service from the staff is great however our request to lower grade our room to a more comfortable fit was not met. We did see others get upgraded and we were not allowed to downgrade. Over all a fun place for families but don’t waste your money. Stay with the eco family section for the same perks when travelling as a family.

Sandos Playacar Beach Resort: only average

Rooms need desperate updating. Food was average, not good but you can always find something to eat, the same stuff every day. I wouldn't call this a 4-star resort, we paid for the select club upgrade, to access premium drinks etc, don't bother because the upgraded drinks were not always available they seem to run out on a daily basis. The staff at the front desk never followed through with our requests, they say yes no problem, but nothing happens, very disappointing. The premium buffet rest [... read more]aurant never opens for breakfast or lunch, the main buffet was so crowded you get in and out, very poor service due to crowds. The only thing that was great was the beach, it's beautiful. We were supposed to get bar service on the beach, it didn't happen. Wifi in the room is hit and miss very poor. For the money, we spent not worth it. There are much better resorts that are true to the star rating, I will never return to this place.

Sandos Playacar Beach Resort: Large Dissappointment

Want to start with our group of 13 are experienced travellers, have been to Cuba, Dominican, and especially Mexico (10 times) So I am extremely familiar with the level of service and what is to be expected. 1. no service whatsoever, get your own drinks, even though we were club select adult area 2. 10 of 13 got food poisoning and spent the day in their rooms. 3. Monkeys although cute left feces that took days for the staff to clean up on the hand rails 4. Lawn sprinkler system uses stagnant  [... read more]lagoon water (strong sewage smell) and was sooooo bad it woke us up in the middle of the night on 2 occasions, absolutely brutal! 5. Pool was dirty. 6. Staff constantly ran out of premium alcohol and hid it below the counter for black wrist band folks. 7. Was lied to at the reception, told if I wanted a king size bed, I could not have a balcony, this is not true. 8. I could go on for hours, overall the resort is nice, food was good, beach is amazing but too rough for any snorkelling, but your money is better spent on resorts with much superior features and service. No one in our group intends on ever coming back.

Sandos Playacar Beach Resort: Beautiful Resort

We stayed in the Adult Only Select Club section which was perfect for us as it is the closest to the beach. We never had any issue with chairs at the beach at any time of day. The food at the buffet was plentiful and wide variety. Our fav ala carte restaurants we Le Gourmet and Gormex. Lots of nature, animals and eco friendly. Bring a drink cup/water jug and enjoy the most beautiful beach.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Wonderful Resort

We stayed in January, which was our 2nd time at this resort. We love how huge it is, which so many options for things to do. We enjoyed all the food at the buffet, as well as the hamburgers by the pool. For the beach you definitely need water shoes to enjoy it. We had one issue with our door lock one night (battery in lock died) security was there within minutes to let us in our room, and also fixed the lock within minutes. We enjoyed watching for monkeys as we walked around the endless pathways [... read more]. We would definitely return again!

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Great Family resort

Beautiful grounds- very tropical & well maintained, lots of resident creatures wandering around ( peacocks, cats, Mexican raccoons & monkies ) Lots of walking & bike paths- definitely recommend bringing a stroller for young kids, you walk everywhere. We stayed in the older section of the resort- rooms were tired & in need of some TLC. Our cleaning Lady did a fabulous job of keeping things spotless. Food was mainly buffet style- OK but not great, lots of choices to keep kids happy though- h [... read more]ot dogs, pizza, fries, ice cream. I would highly recommend the Asian restaurant , show & food were excellent !! Book as soon as you get there, reservations book up quickly. The steakhouse was another favourite & a must. There are lots of activities for kids & this resort is definitely there to cater to their every whim. I would recommend it to young Families & teenagers. We travelled with 4 teenagers ( 13-18 yrs ) They found things to keep them busy for the most part & if they were bored they seemed to always be able to get on the internet- argh !! Not recommended if your travelling with an adult group.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Sandos Eco Resort

The maintenance of the property is beyond expectation; the grounds in particular are beautifully maintained. The house keeping staff go out of their way to make the rooms stay clean and comfortable. The rooms (room 4505) and other rooms in the area smell terribly musty. I wonder if air ventilation could be added as the mustiness is hard on people with respiratory issues. I had asked to be place in the newer part of the rooms but ended in the oldest and most removed part from the amenities,  [... read more]so it took a good walk every day, several times a day to go to and from the beach. We had chosen a place on the beach expecting to have to trek less.

Sandos Caracol Nature Resort and Water Park: Fun and Relaxing

We stayed for a week in February and enjoyed our time very much. We booked in a adults only section and really loved the adults pool and the beach club. The pool and beach for adults only are at opposites end of the resort and took about 6 minutes to walk from one to the other. The food I would say is a little better than ok. Some items are amazing and some are just so so however that really is a very individual thing. We loved the Japanese restaurant so make sure to try and book the moment y [... read more]ou are checked into the hotel all other places to eat do not need reservations. Our room was always cleaned and the fridge filled every day. It was a basic room but did the job however our beds felt like sleeping on a rock bed. We did not ask to move because the monkeys came to our balcony almost everyday. I loved hanging out a the Adults Beach club and they provide lite snacks all day. I was also able to snorkel off the beach and see some fun fish. Water shoes are a must at this resort. The beach is sandy but the water is very rocky. We would return as we did not get to see and do everything we wanted to and had amazing service.

Sandos Playacar Beach Resort: Sandos Playacara

A couple of hiccups. The wifi was difficult to set up until the resort “reset the system”. Several calls to Guest Services were useless so i went to see them and they couldn’t connect either. Several guests were standing around with the same issue, so it was not my general ineptitude with all things high tech. Secondly the room smelled like a swamp when we arrived. The room should be aired out 24 hours before a guest arrives. After the second day the smell was gone as we were able  [... read more]to air it out ourselves by leaving the patio door open and running the HVAC controls on high. The room and resort were quite fine and the staff were very nice. The food was mediocre but there was lots available . We are not “foodies” by any means. Beautiful beach and pool area that were always kept clean. Very happy with our interactions with Trip Central and in general the Air Transat experience. I wouldn’t go back but I would use your services again. gary and bertha