We arrived at the airport June 28,2008, went thru the timeshare shark tank with no problem. The cabs in this place do not have a meter so you are the mercy of the taxi drivers, if you do not know how much it cost to go from point A to B. We were offered 240 to the hotel but we haggled it down to 200 pesos and later found out that it only cost 120.00 . After the registration, we were asked to visit another desk with to get our gold plastic hospital bracelets, which must be worn at all times during our stay at the Grand Mayan. The reps at the counter proceeded to tell us about all the extra goodies we were going to get for attending a timeshare presentation. Since we had a few idle hours to spend the following morning, we agreed and signed up. The sales rep showed us the resort for 1-1/2 and we spent the rest of the 4 hours in the grilling room. The rep told us that its our our lucky week because it was MARKET WEEK!!! and they have a buy 1- 2 bedroom suite and get the 2nd 2 bedroom suite for free. We could have a total of 4 weeks if we split them up , and if we only use 1 week, they were going to give us 1000 for each unused studio and 1,500 for the 1 bedroom suite. He changed the tune after we signed the initial papers to trade in my RCI timeshare from we will pay you 5000.00 for the unsued rooms to WE CAN SELL IT OURSELVES. At this point, we were already in the midst of signing all the papers. We were then shuffled downstairs to confirm what we signed and we were told that there are brokers who can sell our timeshare for us, which was never mentioned upstairs. To make the long story short we went back to our room and decided that we made a stupid move and the worst mistake to the tune of 59,000. We decided to call them the nex t day to cancel the transaction and YES, FOLKS YOU HAVE 5 DAYS TO CHANGE YOUR MIND. We made an appointment to cancel out the next day and we went through hell with 4 of their closers. Each of them dropped the price from 59,000 down to 29,000 ,down to 3,900 and down to 1,500. YES, you can get a timeshare real cheap if you sign up and cancel because they will DROP THE PRICE REALLY LOW TO KEEP YOUR BUSINESS. We obviously said no because they are LIARS and no matter how good of a deal they offered, you can't trust that they are telling you the truth.

It does..... all depend what you are looking for..? We have nothing bad really to say, it has everything and almost anything you are looking for as far as water fun goes. My kids (9,7,4) loved all the fun to be had!! As far as my husband and I we would probably not go back only because it kind of gave us more of the feeling of being at Disneyland which is not necessarily bad BUT not the experience we are looking for. We like to be able to hear the waves of the ocean but forget it unless it is 3:00 am and all is quiet. There is a lot of noise from people, poolside music, exersize classes in the pool, a choo-choo train blowing it's horn every 20/30 mins; the noise of wave pool/ rapid machines on, etc. All a little more noise than I like but that is just my personal opinion. Food is expensive and it rather isolated. I liked that we could walk and use other hotel beaches and pools. Big iguanas over at Mayan Palace hotel that was really cool to see in the trees and swimming in the lagoon. You can kayak over there too!
We had an oceanview 2Bd/2Bth, 9th floor and it was awesome and very comfortable accomodations. Great big balcony which was enjoyable too. Great service from the staff - trained very well. They are aimed to please for the most part.

The Grand Mayan in Nuevo Vallarta is a beautiful but extremely large resort. We booked our 2 bedroom unit on exchange with RCI.

When we arrived at 3:00, there was a long line to check in. We waited in line for about 30 minutes just to learn that our room would not be ready until 7:00. They did, however, issue our pool towel cards and allow us to get into our packed baggage so that we could use the pool. It also took about 30 minutes to get our resort bracelets - not because the line was long, but because the timeshare sales staff tried so hard to pressure us into their breakfast presentation and deals. We declined. Not too much of a problem although they did call our room several times to see if we would change our minds.

The rooms were beautiful... extremely clean and nicely decorated. Only complaint here is that the daybeds that are used for sofas are not at all comfortable to sit on. They are fine to sleep on. The beds are extra firm, but we still slept well. I'd rather deal with hard beds that the broken "taco shell" beds that I've encountered in other resorts! The maid was very trustworthy and did a very thorough job every day.

The pools are clean and beautiful. They did not seem too over clorinated like many pools are. I do highly recommend wearing flip flops while walking around the pool areas and the complex as the grounds have a rough surface that are guaranteed to hurt even the toughest of feet. The food and drink service at the pool is expensive but good. The entire pool area is crammed with lounge chairs but it is still somewhat difficult to find places to sit unless you get there early!

The beach was far less crowded. Very clean and the sand nicely groomed each day. Did not see any litter at all and plenty of lounge chairs and palapas to relax under. The resort staff came around about every 20 minutes to take drink orders. The currents in the Bay of Banderas is a little stronger and more rough than other beaches that we've been to. The kids (teens) enjoyed the boogie boards that we bought at Wal Mart - kept them entertained most of the day.

The restaurants are very expensive for just so so food. Better to go into town for meals. We went to both Mega and Wal Mart and stocked up on food for the week and only ate out one meal each day.

Like I mentioned, this resort is HUGE and it is expensive (when you take cabs) and not really easy (by bus) to get into town. In order to catch the bus, you need to walk off of the resort property. Then there are tourista information booths that will try to tell you which bus to take and what to do. They sometimes will hold you there - trying to sell you a daytrip deal or timeshare presentation - and then you miss the bus! However, the traffic in the area is completely crazy and I would not recommend a rental car either. We will stay in Puerto Vallarta for our next trip.

During our visit, we did the Outdoor Adventure with Vallarta Adventures, The Signature Dolphin Swim, and a snorkeling tour (a.k.a. booze cruise). The Outdoor Adventure was completely awesome (and I'm deathly afraid of heights) and by far the best activity that we did. It was also by far the best value for our money.

Overall, this was one of the funnest family vacations that we've had and if this resort were in a better location it would have been close to perfect.

Our travel dates were 6/20/08-6/27/08. Our party had 9 travelers. Check-in was smooth. The timeshare person invited my wife and I to a "free" breakfast in return for a "short' presentation. She was very nice to us as she was giving us our bracelets for the hotel. But as soon as we said we were not interested, her face changed from being nice to being "you've offended me". They did not bother us once we made it clear to them that we were not interested in their "free" breakfast.

Many of the previous reviews mentioned construction noises. We did not notice any construction noises. We barely noticed any construction going on unless we looked at the golf course view. We had two rooms, same floor, but one had the ocean view and the other had the golf course and construction view.

The food at the resort was very expensive!! We managed to save a bundle of our budget by going to Walmart to shop and stock up on groceries. We had a lot of money left to purchase gifts for our families back at home. I would totally recommend people go this route if they are looking to save money.

The staff there were wonderful. Very friendly and helpful. Our rooms were very spacious.

The pools looked very clean, but if you pay close attention, it is actually dirty. There were stuff (dead bees, dead insects, and other small trash floating) floating in the pools. The pools were very open and we had no problems finding seats or areas to swim. Be careful about swallowing pool water accidentally. The wave pools were nice. The lazy river was awesome. The ocean was great. I noticed that the shoreline on the beach was a bit brownish in color due to a close-by rivier flowing into it. The beach and pools were quite a trip. If you don't mind walking, then it should not bother you. But I recalled a couple of times when we reached the beach and looked back at our rooms, the thought of the travel back to the room after a long day of exhaustion from sun bathing was not fun.

The peace of mind we got was priceless. I've been to the Flamingos del palmar and I would rather return to that one. Don't get me wrong, this was a very nice place and I'm glad I was able to experience it with my family.