Our Vacation in Mexico

My family and I recently headed to Mexico for our kids Spring Break. We had such an amazing time. I received so many questions while we were there and wanted to provide all the details in one place.

I apologize in advance because this is going to be a LOT of information but I’ll break it down in categories. Travel, Hotel, Food, & Amenities. I am sure a lot of you are wondering how we even decided on Mexico so I’ll start there. Last year our family went to Hilton Head, SC (one of our favorite places) with our kids and then my husband and I headed to Maui, HI for our anniversary trip. While both vacations were amazing, we decided our next trip was going to be an all inclusive. We were over cooking, grocery shopping and making our own drinks. 😉 We truly love all inclusives and both have been to Mexico several times. Since it was our kids first time out of the country we wanted to take them somewhere we were familiar with. We have always felt safe, especially in the Hotel Zone of Cancun. There are TONS of America’s walking around every where. So that’s where we set our sights.

TRAVEL

I combed through tons of deals daily and tried to find the best option for our family of 5. (not easy to do!) We stumbled upon this hotel and with flights (we were able to even get a direct flight on the way home) it was cheaper than our previous trip to Hilton Head (which we drove 17 hours for!). So we booked it through Expedia and started the passport process for our kiddos. My husband and I’s passports ended up being expired but the government just launched a new program where you can renew them online. You can find that HERE. For our kids we found the closet local place and went together. It took about 60 days for their passports to come.

Before we left for Cancun Airport I booked a private shuttle through a company called USA Transfers. We had used them in the past and had a great experience. It was $80 total for the transfer to the hotel and then back to the airport when we departed. I loved that it was just our family and we didn’t have to make any other stops. I highly recommend securing your airport transfer BEFORE you arrive.

HOTEL

We stayed at the Crown Paradise Club Cancun. It is in all inclusive so all of our drinks, food and activities were included in the price. I would say this is a smaller resort compared to others we have stayed at but it was perfect for us. Upon checking in we had a few hiccups with our room, but it was actually my misunderstanding. (I thought we booked something else). They were super nice about everything. We ended up in Tower 2 and had a Family Suite 5.

It was so nice that our kiddos had their own area along with their own TV for when we came back to the room to rest.

FOOD

The best thing about an all inclusive is the FOOD. Crown Paradise has 5 al la carte restaurants, one buffet, and one Sushi Hut that would open between 12-4. All of the restaurants besides the buffet you needed a reservation for. Before we left we had read LOTS of reviews about how hard it was to get a reservation. They were not lying! Upon arriving, the reservation desk was were I headed FIRST. Booking with Expedia helped us because we were able to make TWO reservations in advance. If booking with Costco Travel you got THREE reservations in advance. We ended up with reservations 3 out of the 5 nights. Not horrible but definitely disappointing. The first night we had the buffet, which was okay but hard with 3 little kids. We got much smarter by the next night we didn’t have a reservation and just ordered room service. The night before we left our kids were at a Kids Club Party and my husband and I got to have dinner alone. It was amazing!!

Every day for breakfast we ordered room service. It was just an easier way for us all to eat at the same time since buffets with our kids were just too overwhelming. For lunch you can head to the buffet or by the big pool they would set up a “Snack Shack” with burgers, hot dogs, chicken nuggets, fries, and nachos every day. THE BEST LUNCH is at Fujiyama which was a Sushi Hut that opened from 12-4 everyday. They had everything from sushi, to egg rolls to beef and broccoli and it was all AMAZING.

Amenities

One of the main reasons we chose this hotel was because of the amazing reviews about the kids activities, especially the kids club. We went into this vacation NOT expecting our kids would like Kids Club at all and the first day they were there from 9am-3:30pm and LOVED it!! They continuously wanted to go back and not hang out with us. Kids Club was open every day from 9am to 4pm and then they usually had a kids party at night from 7pm-8:30pm. The ages were 4-12. They also did offer a “Baby Kids Club” with the same hours for kids 18months-3 but that was in a separate location.

While the kids were there my husband and I would hit up the adult pool that was full of cabanas, two hot tubs and a swim up bar.

We typically never had any trouble getting a cabana. We also got to chat with the other parents whose kids were at kids club.

They also had two BIG pools where every one was welcome. It was a little deep for our smaller kiddos so we didn’t spend too much time there. The beach area was also nice. They had several tents with chairs under them that you could grab.

Two other big hits were the BIG water slides and the putt putt course.

Every night they had a show. We took the kids the first couple nights but it was held in a conference room and it was a bit hot and stuffy for our liking so we skipped it the rest of the time.

The last night we also found an adults only bar that was kinda tucked away. We headed their for a drink while the kids were at the PJ party in kids club.