Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel

After almost two years of no international travel, the boyfriend and I took a much-needed trip to Playa del Carmen in Quintana Roo, Mexico! Read about our day trip to Playa del Carmen here.

Of the many trips we’ve taken together, this was one of our favourites, mostly because of the amazing all-inclusive resort we stayed at. Now I know what you’re thinking. All-inclusive resorts in Mexico are usually synonymous with massive Americanized buffets, where the emphasis is on quantity and not quality… This was definitely not the case at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel.

We stayed at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel for ten days in late November and it was truly an amazing experience. Several times during our stay, my boyfriend and I remarked that we really lucked out with the hotel and that it was a great decision to stay there. Of course there are pros and cons with every hotel, but overall I would recommend this property to everyone.

To summarize our stay at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel, here are the pros and cons:

GETTING THERE

After scouring reviews on TripAdvisor, we decided to book the adults-only Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel. I found a Sunwing package that was an amazing deal, about $3,000 CAD per person including roundtrip flights for 10 days. Sunwing is a Canadian airline that is operated out of Toronto and they have great deals, however I personally would avoid booking a flight with them again. I’ve expanded on my negative experience with Sunwing in the last paragraph.

The location of the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel was perfect. It was about a 35 minute drive from Cancun Airport (depending on traffic), and 15 minutes from Playa del Carmen. We took a taxi to Playa del Carmen for dinner twice and loved the city!

GETTING AROUND

The Blue Diamond property is HUGE! To get from the check-in desk to the beach, it’s about a 20-minute walk. There are bicycles scattered around the property on a first come first serve basis, but they are quite old. We didn’t use them because we weren’t able to adjust the height of the seat and I have short legs! However, golf carts that shuttle guests around the resort come pretty frequently. On rainy days, we opted for the golf cart shuttle. Our “Palafito” or bungalow was located right by the beach which was mostly convenient, but it was also about a 10 minute walk from the spa and gym that we visited every day. We are quite active and didn’t mind the walk at all, but we did hear complaints from other guests.

THE PROPERTY

My boyfriend and I both felt that the reason we enjoyed our stay in Playa del Carmen so much was because of our experience at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel. I had some hesitation about booking an all-inclusive because of previous experiences at giant, touristy resorts. We really noticed the difference at this boutique, adults-only hotel. We had so many unique experiences on property, which included a Mayan sweat lodge ceremony in a temazcal, followed by a dip in the hotel’s private cenote. We also enjoyed the daily activities, such as archery and yoga.

The hotel is located in a swampy area and we saw a lot of wildlife, including coatis foraging through the garbage (Mexican racoons). We were told that spider monkeys live in the trees too, but sadly there were no monkey sightings while we were there. One of my boyfriend’s favourite parts of the trip was what he called his “private crocodile”, also known as Esmerelda. Esmerelda enjoyed swimming by our balcony and we saw her every day. Don’t worry, there are partitions that ensure she is not able to get to the guests. However, on our last day we did witness her swimming around with a coati carcass in her mouth. (we though it was super cool, but those who are sensitive to these things may not have appreciated this).

We spent most of our days at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel enjoying the sunshine by the pool and using the gym and sauna in the spa. The beach was nice, but on the smaller side so we opted to tan by the pool located at the spa. However, I highly recommend taking a long walk from the beach along the shoreline. We walked for over an hour along the beach and the sand was beautiful. Plus you get to peek into the other beachside properties 😊

Pro tip: The pool at the spa is not as busy as the main pool by the beach. Though you don’t have ocean views, if you want some peace and quiet, this is a great spot to camp out.

DINING

The food at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel was truly outstanding! We were not expecting an all-inclusive resort to have such amazing food, but we were very impressed and looked forward to our meals every day. The hotel has three restaurants: Aquamarina (breakfast, lunch and dinner), Ceviche (lunch and dinner), Ambar (dinner only). The staff members were wonderful and accommodated our dairy allergies at each restaurant. Of course there were certain dishes that could not be modified, but we still had a large variety of dishes to choose from.

AQUAMARINA

We dined most frequently at Aquamarina which has a daily breakfast buffet, but we mostly opted for a la carte. The restaurant is located right by the main pool and beach, with a beautiful view of the ocean We were obsessed with the chicharron tacos here and ordered them multiple times.

CEVICHE

Ceviche is located right underneath the Aquamarina restaurant and only has outdoor patio dining unless you are in the private room (reserved for larger groups). It’s a great spot to grab a quick bite after spending the day on the beach. We loved the burger here!

AMBAR

Ambar is the property’s most up-scale restaurant, serving Mexican inspired dishes. The restaurant does have a dress code (no flip flops), but they didn’t seem too strict about it. There were specials every night and one night we went there was a pianist playing classical tunes. My boyfriend was obsessed with the chia pudding dessert here, often ordering more than one in a sitting.

ACTIVITIES

We loved the daily complimentary activities offered by the resort, which included yoga and archery! There are printed schedules at the Aquamarina restaurant that list activities for the week and they can be booked through concierge (first come first serve). I highly recommend booking the complimentary sweat lodge experience in the temazcal. This was one of the highlights of our trip and such a unique experience that is not offered by many other resorts. Tour bookings are available on-site and we found the pricing to be competitive and reasonable. We booked a tour with a local eco-tourism company called Alltournative to see Chichen Itza.

SUNWING DISCLAIMER

This will likely be the last time I book a vacation package with Sunwing. Their airplanes are not the most comfortable, old and small, which means you really feel the turbulence. In addition to this, I booked a specific vacation package which indicated “non-stop” flights, but as soon as my payment went through, the booking revealed that the plane stopped in Calgary. I immediately called Sunwing and asked them for a refund, but they refused. We sucked it up and went on the trip anyways, which ended up being amazing solely because of the experience at the Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel, but the stop in Calgary added an extra 2-3 hours to our travel time. There were no issues on our way there, however on the way back our flight was delayed by more than 6 hours. Not only was it delayed, but we received no notifications on the Sunwing app or via email. We waited for our shuttle for over 30 minutes and only found out about the delay after we had the concierge assist us with contacting the airline. After the initial delay, we waited again for the shuttle that never showed up. This resulted in us scrambling to find a cab to the airport, where we waited another hour in line for check-in. After this experience, my boyfriend and I both vowed never to book a vacation with Sunwing again. They have good discounts, but it’s really not worth the trouble.