Hi there everybody.

My family and I got back from HVWS on Mon 1st Sept we had a fantastic time. The hotel was great. The staff are really friendly and helpful. The room was ok, maybe not 4star but it was fine. The cleaner was lovely she made a realy effort (the $2 a day prob worked). All the pools are open. The kids pool is great, my 3yr and 6yr old loved it they spent most of their time there. The middle pool only was in use from the second week but beware the chemicals in the pool tend to turn white swimwear a yellow/green colour. If you rinse them using the shampoo available in your room it seems to get the white back. The activity pool is ok but it can get busy.

The sun was really hot and on our first day we all burnt using factor 40 sunblock. There is a shop in the hotel which sells sunblock from 6-70. They are about £8 per bottle. They also sell crips and chocolate but the pringles are really expensive so we bought mexican brand.

They have a phone you can use in the reception but the machine keeps breaking for the phone cards you need. They are £5 per card and there are 2 different types. Get the one with all the flags on and not the one with the bird. You get 12 mins with the flag one and about 3-4min with the bird one.

Hope whoever is going soon has a fab time just like we did. We are going to go again!!!!

The beach/sea is lovely. The sea is very very clear and there are lots of fish swimming around you. Near the jetty you can see on a daily basis a stingray which comes morning and night. There is a diving company on the beach and FC say it has nothing to do with them. They are good, we would recommend the glass bottom boat trip. It is $29 each and you go out on the reef for 2hours and snorkel to 2 or 3 different places. It was one of the best things we did whilst we were there.

We went on the dolphin trip with FC which was amazing. If you have young children like us you will have to do the encounter trip where you touch the dolphins, kiss them, dance and sing. The next package is the Adventure, we found a lot people did this one but the age is a little highter (about 7or8 I think). The top package is the Royal, a lot of people did this one but they said the Adventure one was cheaper and more value for money.

Thank you Nicole for your review. We go in just under 3 weeks now and cant wait. Did you see a cash machine in the hotel?

Many thanks Nicole!

I'd be grateful if you'd copy your review HERE when you have a moment

Pippy

Hi danielle i cant wait either, we fly from manchester on 28th, from all the reviews it sounds great.
you takin any kids

ema80,

nah no kids its just me and my boyfriend although our friends fly out the same day as you to join us!! what about you?

ye me my boyfriend an our 5 yr old son james.
soo maybe see you there, two weeks on sunday for us

ok then, hope you have a great time. Maybe see u there

It deffinately sounds to have improved alot since I was there in may, I am so pleased as even then you could see the potential. Have a fantastic time all who are off soon.
Karen

Hi there

There is no cash machine but they will change travel cheque and I think I heard some people getting money off their credit cards. But you will have to ask the rep (poss not Simon, ok but a bit lazy!!).

Anybody going soon have a fantastic time. My family and I want to go again.

Thanks nicole Glad you had a good time, we just want to get there now only 9 days left to wait!

We got back last weekend and had such a great time. Will post review soon.

We are even thinking of going back next year just waiting for the price to go down a bit!

danielle did you not get eaten alive by mosquitos?

We did get bit but it didnt bother us that much! During the last week they had someone spraying the hotel to try and get rid of them which didnt work that well, did it? We had some sort of mossie spray killer that a neighbour gave us to us to kill the ones in the room!

We still would go back though! did you have a good time?

yeah we had a good time, but my boyfriend was bitten really bad, he had over 140 just on his back, they only really started doing something about it when the americans started to arrive, did you see the show they put on for them on the sat night or did you leave on the sat?

oh no thats not good. I saw a few people with really bad mossie bites on their backs. Nah we left on the saturday, was it an american show then? I noticed in our last week loads of americans arrived! It looks like we are going back there next year!

Anyone booked for 2009 at all?!

no i meant the reps an hotel staff they had a band an singers greetin the americans with glasses of tequilla and the had loads of little market stalls , they even asked us to all move out of th theatre sat night while they came in an fumigated it. if i went again it wouldnt be at that time of the year and id only go if that first choice rep *Edit to remove member of staff's name. Pippy* wasnt there

we have just returned, after 6 days we had so many mozzie bites we moved to iberostar cozumel, i must say you dont realise how bad hvws is untill you try somewhere else...Oh and by the way we booked vip royal suits too, dont think you got much extra for the cost, children running around adult only areas as they were only sectioned off by rope, sandles which were left out by the door to dry went missing,hotel said balcony was a public area..so if you dont like your view just go and sit on someone elses balcony lol....

thats a shame goodie2 that you moved and didnt enjoy the HVWS. We personally loved it and had no problems at all. Heard the Vip section wasnt worth the extra £ aswell. Hope you had a good holiday at the iberostar though.