We visited the Iberostar Cozumel three years ago and enjoyed it so much that we decided to loop it into our winter vacations again this year. We are so glad that we did! The Iberostar one again provided us a wonderful week with great food and superb scuba diving.
Room Number:
5113
Arrival:
We booked through Air Canada Vacations – it’s nice to have a bit more leg room than on the charter flights. We arrived at the resort at 8:45pm. Check in was very smooth and we dropped our bags in our room and were enjoying a glass of wine with dinner in the main dining room by 9pm. (That was even with a quick call to the front desk asking for a mattress pad and receiving it before we left! Now that’s service!)
Rooms:
Our room was clean and comfortable. I know that some people comment on the rooms being small, but for my husband and I, it suited us just fine. We hardly spent any time in the room anyways!
Restaurants and Bars: The Main restaurant always had a huge selection of appetizers, salads, main courses, fruits, and deserts. In the morning, you could find anything and everything that you need to create the type of breakfast that appeals to you. We often enjoyed yogurt with granola, etc added to it, with fresh fruit on the side, but we also enjoyed a couple of hot breakfasts with eggs to order, and plenty of garnishes. The nice thing about the abundance of selection was that you could have a light meal, or a huge main course at lunch or at dinner.
We opted to make our two reservations at the Steak and the Mexican restaurants. I loved my meal at the Mexican restaurant. We ordered a bottle of wine (which was charged to our room) and we both opted for the tacos which are their specialty. I strongly recommend the "Mexico City Tacos". Delicious!
Beach/Pools/Grounds: The grounds at the Iberostar Cozumel are lovely. They are kept immaculate. We were very happy to still see the flamingos, iguanas, lizards, and peacocks still roaming the property. (Ok, there are cats too…but that doesn’t sound very exotic, now does it?!?) We even spotted a few humming birds and bananakeets! The pool was very busy at this time of the year, so for the most part we stayed on the beach, but we did go over a few times to cool off and grab a drink at the swim up bar.
We scoped out the beach for a few days and tried a few different spots to find an area that was best suited to us. Again, the last week of March was a very busy week, but we simply adapted and found a spot that worked for us.
Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel: One of the main reasons we chose to return to the Iberostar Cozumel was for the scuba diving. Dressel Divers runs a great outfit and everyone at the dive shop was super friendly. The actual diving was amazing! On every dive we saw another fascinating creature…turtles, giant lobsters, giant crabs, enormous parrot fish, beautiful coral formations and so much more! We did most of our diving with Bjorn who shared a wealth of dive experience with us and was so very pleasant. But again, from speaking to everyone, they were a all a great bunch.
The crew on board the dive boats were wonderfully helpful. When a mask fell overboard, Luis jumped straight in and free-dove 60 feet to retrieve it! We were all amazed, and he just smiled, laughed with us, and carried on with tending to everyone and just doing a bang-on job!
Other Comments: Once again, we really enjoyed our stay at the Iberostar Cozumel. We could see a number of significant improvements that they’ve made since our last visit. It is very obvious that they are listening to their guest’s feedback and making improvements as they go. The staff is wonderful and is always smiling!
We would definitely return to this resort, although next time we will probably avoid "March Break". But, as Jimmy Buffett sings, that was our own fault!