I would not stay here nor would I recommend this hotel unless they had a deal where the food is optional. Accommodations, features and services of the hotel were great however... customer service speaks volumes and I was just not impressed. Read on for details

Accommodations were awesome.
Great Facility... we had the Jr. suite and it was beautiful.
The hotel/resort offered services which were great. You are offered red wine or a fruit drink when you check in (great customer service as far as the front desk)

-The staff was not as helpful as expected.
We waited 7 hours to get pillows and a mattress pad (needed for the hard beds) which we requested at check in (2 pm). We called the front desk at 5pm, visited the front desk at 7 pm, and received a call from the manager at 8pm, by 10 pm the items were in the room.

- Communication to the staff was hard especially when I spoke Spanish (i.e. our room was cleaned 3 times in one day) It was a bit irritating because I talked to two maids and their manager....I just wanted to take a nap.

- Food was decent, however the meat (beef/ pork/lamb) questionable. Since we were in Mexico I expected to try Mexican cuisine ...no such luck at this place. The hotel offers food from continental food /buffet style in Don Rafael or Flamingo to gourmet food at Sr. George. The 24 hr sports bar is a joke and was stocked with hamburgers and hotdogs (again the meat was questionable).

- Good Luck to those persons who speak Spanish...
Let me just say I look Mexican but that is not my country of origin. I would rate my Spanish as conversational rather than fluent. I got a lot of looks when I decided to talk in Spanish... some folks welcomed it and some folks where a bit baffled. The comments I received where like "wow u speak it so well" or "are u fluent". When I switched to English... I got the most disturbing looks. At one point the waiter was just astonished and treated me as if I were a snob that refused to speak my supposed native tongue or not knowing my supposed heritage. The folks took it as an insult if I switched in mid sentence to English. My suggestion would be to save the Spanish for when you go to the flea market to barter.

- Noisy hotel
The hotel had several families and it was very noisy in the hallways. I would suggest the Jr. suite because our suite faced the ocean and you were at least shielded from noisy patrons from 3 sides.

A bit dissapointed with tours.
Trafic tours and other tour groups are located in the lobby. we noticed an increase in price thats on the internet vs.what they offered in person. I noticed that some of the tours were were using third party tour groups. What ever the website advertised was not the same as what was being offered at the hotel.

Stayed at Riu Vallarta for Seven nights. We were 5 families total of 18 adults and Kids. At the check in, four families got nsolicited Upgrades to Master and junior
Suites except my famuily. When I asked for an upgrade, they claim that they were full. I just wanted to be treated the same as the rest of the group.
The management Was very rude and un helpful (Typical for Mexico). The room we got was on top of the Disco and I have a four year old who goes to bed at 10:00 PM.
It took them two more days to give us a similar standard room on the upper floors. The worry free rep couldn’t do any thing about it. The hotel is only two
years old but it’s already run down. It’s extremely crowded and loud. You could easily hear next room noise.
The pool is not very clean. This Hotel is Over rated and too expensive for what you get. The Beds are etremely uncomfortable. The entertainment was great. The food was O.K but Not much Sea food at all.

I booked this vacation on the spur of the moment for the fourth of July weekend through worryfreevacations.com. Total cost? $800 for the both of us for three nights. The Riu Vallarta is located about 20 miles north of the Puerto Vallarta airport. The outside of the hotel is quite magnificent, but that's the only thing that was impressive. Our room was large and we had a balcony and a nice view. The bathroom reeked of mold and the shower was absolutely filthy. Each room has a mini bar - our mini bar was empty when we arrived and despite us calling several times to have it refilled, it was not refilled until our last day. How convenient. There were tons of loungers on the beach - but no huts and therefore no shade. The beach was also filthy and after swimming in the ocean I was covered in liter. The pool was the main area of the hotel during the day - the pool was also in need of being cleaned. I would like to point out the hotel staff did a great job of interacting with those individuals at the pool by convincing the hotel patrons to participate in games, pool exercising, etc. There were plenty of loungers (and umbrellas) situated around the pool. Also a plus - there were two pools - an adult pool with a swim up bar and a kids pool. Our biggest problem with the hotel was the food. It was absolutely miserable. The husband and I are used to all inclusive hotels and we do not expect gourmet meals. We do, however, expect food that is edible and this food was not. (Finally, our last night there and per the suggestion of an individual working the front desk, we decided to go into the old part of Puerto Vallarta for dinner and found an amazing restaurant, El Panorama - we highly recommend it.).

The husband and I do not consider ourselves to be high maintenance travelers and I certainly do not consider us to be picky eaters. We normally stay at Dreams or the Divi - these are low rise, very small hotels with a large staff to accomodate their guests and because they are so small, they have incredible food. The Riu is a very, very large hotel (I believe this Riu has over 600 rooms), which results in the hotel being over crowded. And of course, cooking for that many patrons can not be easy. Regardless, knowing what we know now about the beach being filthy, the food being nasty, etc, we would have booked a room in a little boutique hotel in the old part of Puerto Vallarta, nixed the beach and hung out at the pool, and tried out the many amazing restaurants in the area (El Panorama, Le Kliff, Vista Grill, etc).

Just returned from 7 night stay. We had 18 people in our party in 8 separate rooms. Four of 8 rooms had items stolen over a 4 day time period. All were reported to hotel management who refused to take any action. What is interesting is that all items were identified as missing after a maid had been in the room. The rooms were not all in the same wing or on the same floor.

The beach area, unlike surrounding properties, was filthy; everyday. Same for the pool water.