I stayed at the Riu Tequila from 24 April - 8 May 2008 with my boyfriend and we both had a great holiday. We booked through Thomson and had no problems with the flights or the reps.

Arrival - When we arrived at the hotel we were given our all inclusive wristbands, a drink, and a pack with our room key, safe key and map of the resort, and then left our cases in reception for the porters to take to our rooms whilst we wandered off to find the room. We had a ground floor room near the back of the complex which was a pleasant walk through the pretty grounds with the occasional wild animal around, including bats at night as we got further away from the main hotel!

Room - Our first impression of our room was that it was big! Two double beds pushed together! A few reviews have said the beds were hard but we had no problems sleeping at all. There was separate bathroom area, with curtains that you could pull across, including sink, shower, wardrobe, fridge, optics, and a separate room with toilet in. The balcony door had a separate bug screen which was nice but we tended to keep the balcony door shut so that the air con would stay on. The air con was very good (occasionally got a bit cold and needed to go out of the room to warm up!) and there was also a ceiling fan. The room was lovely and cool to come into after a day outside in the sun. The maid did a great job cleaning the room and filled our fridge every other day with water, pepsi, fizzy orange, 7up, & corona. She also left us towel animals every few days which were pretty cool and nice to come in to! Great having the optics in the room too.

Food - The food was lovely. We didn't bother to book to go to the Mexican or steak house and just ate at the buffet for the whole holiday. There was so much choice and we always found something that we wanted to eat! Breakfast had more choice than I have ever seen - cereals, cooked food like bacon, sausage etc, fresh fruit juices, pastries, salads, donuts, pancakes, boiled eggs, fried eggs, and an omlette station where you could get an omlette made with whatever you wanted in it. Amazing! Lunch was served in the restaurant by the pool and offered a good selection. We had lunch a couple of times at the Yucatan when we were at the beach in the day, and once at the Riu Cancun when we went there for the day, and although they were all similar we much preferred the Tequila as the food just seemed better and had more variety.

Pool area - The pools were lovely. Yes there is paint peeling off as some reviews have said but that really doesn't make any difference! It's lovely and cool to get into in the hot sun and they are always around with a net getting the leaves and things out of the water. The loungers right in front of the water tended to be gone by the time we got there at about 11am but we never had any trouble finding loungers and parasols a bit further back which was actually nicer as you then don't have people walking past you all day. The pool area was nice and lively with bingo, salsa dancing, water polo & beach volleyball, table tennis etc on the adjacent man made beach, but they don't harass you to join in which was great as I prefer to just watch (apart from the one day when I got dragged on to the "beach" to join in some dancing!).

Towels – You have to hand in your towel card when you want a beach towel and you get the card back when you give the towel back. I thought this was great as I didn’t realise this would be the case and had actually taken my own beach towel! However you are only allowed one towel each per day which we weren’t told until we tried to get another one in the afternoon after taking ours back earlier. Luckily they let us have the extra ones in the afternoon that day but bear it in mind and keep hold of your towel all day if you think you will need it later on!

Beach - The beach was beautiful, soft white sands, which doesn’t get hot, and turquoise water. Yes it has eroded quite a lot but that's just nature and they are trying to stop that with the huge sandbags which really didn't spoil the beach for us. The beach is located a short walk away from the hotel through a shaded walkway which was a nice walk. Probably took about 10 mins and we never bothered with the golf buggy to take you there as the walk was nice. The only problem for us was that we didn't tend to make it to the beach very early (not before 11am) and so most of the loungers with parasols or shade from trees closer to the main section of beach tended to be gone. As the beach has a lovely sea breeze and the sun is above you all day it is too easy to get burnt without a parasol and we tended to have to sit right at the back where it seemed like they had extended the beach backwards so it wasn’t the same white sand and you couldn't really see the sea from there! Still great though. One day we went out on one of the catamarans that you can use for free which was a lot of fun!

Entertainment - this was great. Lots of different shows, mostly consisting of dance routines and some miming to songs, but also karaoke one night and a variety show with members of the audience. Lots of fun. My only complaint would be that the entertainment was only on for about an hour and a half.

Location - The hotel is in an all inclusive resort surrounded by other hotels so it feels very safe. There was a small complex of shops located just a short walk away from the hotel which were nice to browse around without being pressured into buying anything. There were also phone boxes located here. Playa del Carmen was about 5 mins away in a taxi and only cost a few dollars - a bit of a long walk in the heat if your not very good in the sun like me! We walked there near the beginning of the holiday and I nearly died! Had a massive cocktail from a bar on the beach at playa del carmen though which was great! Playa del Carmen has lots of shops, and in a couple of them you do feel slightly pressured to buy things but it wasn't too bad. Also numerous bars if you fancy a change of scenery in the evening. We only made it out one evening as I didn't want to miss the shows in the hotel!

Excursions – We spent a lot of time around the pool area and the beach, where it was good that you could use the Yucatan's facilities, but also went on a few trips which were also fun. I recommend Xcaret, Coba and Aktun Chen. If you do go to Xcaret then paying for an xcaret plus ticket is well worth it as it includes the entrance fee and also a towel, locker hire, snorkel, flippers, 2 drinks, and lunch with another drink. Staying for the evening show which was really good meant that we were out for over 12 hours – great value but very tiring! Chichen Itza was also cool to go and see but a very long journey and I preferred Coba as you can actually climb up the main pyramid and you can get a lift from a bicycle taxi to get back across the site! We went into Cancun one day on the bus from Playa del Carmen which was a bit of a nightmare as we didn’t know where to get off and ended up just wandering around in the sun until we found the Riu Cancun where we could get our free food and drinks in the air conditioned hotel! We didn’t really like what we saw of Cancun and it made us happy that we had chosen the Tequila, though the Riu Cancun did look very nice. Playa del Carmen seemed much nicer. Although having said that I would go back to Cancun again for a day or an evening, just on an organised trip as it is far too big!

All in all we had a great holiday, I would love to go back to the Tequila and I'm sure it will be even better once the refurb. has been done. The staff were all so friendly and it was lovely getting a “hola” from everyone who passed you. I would recommend this hotel to everyone as it has something to offer everybody no matter what type of holiday you are after. You can join in the activities or chill out as much as you want and there are lots of other things to do in the area.

We booked our vacation on the internet through a friend recommended website. It was a monday to monday trip meant to avoid weekend delays at check ins/outs. It appeared to have worked.

I booked this trip for my girlfriend and I, we are 24 and 28. We spent most of the spring trying to get other friends to commit to a week in anywhere from Cabo to Aruba. We settled on Playa del Carmen because of the value. This was a also our first time at an All Inclusive resort. We settled on PDC because I wanted to do some excursions, mainly seeing some Mayan ruins. I read every review on the site we booked from as well as another "cheap caribbean..." site and many traveler reviews on tripadvisor. I picked the Riu Tequila because it was the highest (tripadvisor) ranked AI resort in PDC that was in our price range ($1300pp with airfare from Richmond, VA). If I could have convinced my girlfriend to spend more money, we may have stayed at the Riu Riviera Maya Palace that was right up the street. To stay there for the week would have cost us another $300 per person, and in hindsight, I’m glad we didn’t.
I think the reason Tequila ranked higher than the other Riu resorts in the vicinity was because of the food. Some places may claim better beaches, pools, bar scenes, entertainment etc., but if you think about it, are you going to use those 3 times everyday? The food was so good that we still ate the buffet our last night and the morning of departure. More on the food in a minute.

I am rating our overall trip as 4.5 out of 5. The reasons it wasn’t perfect were very insignificant to us. If you're a high maintenance fussy type of person, getting two queen beds pushed together instead of the king you requested may be a big deal. I have definitely stayed at much finer accommodations (THEHotel Mandalay Bay in Vegas for instance) than the Riu Teq. The beds were as firm as I expected them to be (thanks again fellow reviewers). Every time we opened our door after dark 3 tiny mosquitoes would fly in. No drinking the tap water. There was a screw missing in the handle to our storm door. The safe locks are pretty low tech and require you to keep up with a key on a rope, which I lost and had to pay a $50 charge to have maintenance drill it out. Also our travel rep failed to meet us two separate occasions (not to be attributed to the Riu Teq though). Despite all of this, if I could choose to redo any vacation I've ever been on, ClubHotel Riu Tequila in PDC wins HANDS DOWN!

Excursions-
We took reviewers advice and went for a stroll up 5th Ave and found discounted tours. We bought 3 days worth at once for a better deal. We did a 4 hour ATV tour that was $55pp because we shared one ATV. That consisted of about an hour and half of riding on heavily worn paved roads through the " jungle" (woods) to a spot where we stopped to rest then went through a an hour cave tour. That was pretty fun and definitely worth the money.
The next day we had booked a $105pp all day excursion to Tulum/Xel-Ha. Tulum was the ancient Mayan ruins I had wanted to see. Chitzen Itza is the huge spectacular one that has the temple you can walk up. That one was a 3 hour bus ride each way though. Tulum was smaller but only an hour from our hotel. It was cloudy when we got there, and pouring raining by the end of our tour. FYI Mayan mosquitoes LOVE tourists in the rain. We finished there around 10:30a then headed to Xel-Ha (pronounced "shell ha"). Xel-Ha is pretty much an outdoor water park that was built at the mouth of a small river that flows into a harbor then the gulf. The cost of this trip also covered AI inside Xel-Ha. There were at least 3 different options to eat all, all being feed yourself buffet style. The food was average, the drinks were free ;). There was all kinds of stuff to do there. You could pay extra to swim with the dolphin- we didn’t. There were bikes and a trail to ride on, they had a great lazy river to float on that started on a narrow stream up in a thicket, then flowed into a wider river which was blocked just short of the mouth of the harbor. It was blocked presumably to keep predator fish out and their fish in. They claim to be the largest outdoor natural aquarium...or something like that. You could also snorkel all you wanted. A $20 dollar deposit was required to use their equipment but no charge if you had your own. AND GET THIS, THEY HAD FREE LOCKERS, all sizes!!! I couldn’t believe that, I’ve been to many water/amusement parks and never have I seen such a lack of nickel and dimage!!! They also had 2 different cliffs to jump off of right off the Lazy river. They were about 2 stories high, I jumped both, pretty fun. There was also a rope swing hidden in the back of the resort. That was very lame by my standards. A rope swing requires a risk of SERIOUS physical injury to impress me. Call me a rope swing snob..oh well. By the time 4 rolled around we were beat- they even have hammock on the beach with a beautiful view of the harbor and park.
Our final excursion was was chartered fishing trip for 2 of us for 4 hours. We were told we could also snorkel if we wished. This was $200 total and did not include transportation to and from the pier. That caused a little confusion and resulted in me getting the captain return us to our hotel later so I could adequately tip the mate. Upon seeing the 25' glorified john boat we were going in, we were a little disappointed at first. I have been on a few chartered trips and know that they are expensive and that most of the $ goes to gas. The captain and mate were very polite and friendly. They were simultaneously professional and personable. We swapped fishing stories, and they helped my spanish for the first hour or two, then we started getting some bites. I caught 2 small "yellow tails" one other similar sized fish I think they called a "gullet"...? Then I got a good hit. It turned out to be about a 4lb red snapper. It fought pretty well for the 3-5 minutes that it took to get him in the boat. We trolled around for another hour or so then stopped for some snorkeling. I used my own equipment again and had planned on jumping in, swimming around a few minutes then calling it a day (my girlfriend doesn’t snorkel). I knew she was already bored out of her mind, hot and getting cranky so I didn’t want to leave her in a boat with two strangers. However the mate suited up and jumped in too. After we were both in the water, the boat left. I was nervous for a second then the mate informed me he was just going to the other end of the reef. We swam about 200 yards to the boat, and I have to say, it was BEAUTIFUL! Much more clear than the day before at the murky Xel-Ha. After we were done the mate cleaned my catch, walked us up to a restaurant on the beach, handed the waiter my catch and for $26 we had a few beers, a few sodas, chips and salsa, my fish grilled in garlic butter (with its head still on!!) rice and a salad. We both ate as much of the fish as we could and still threw away about a 1/3. This was one of the two meals we ate outside our resort and it was cheap and GREAT!
One other “excursion” that we did that wasn’t offered as a package was Cozumel. For those not already familiar, Cozumel is a small island about 20miles off the coast of PDC, visible from the beach in good weather. There is a ferry that runs every hour from the harbor ($5 cab ride from the hotel, about 2-3 miles). The ferry is $24 round trip per person. It takes about 45mins from the time you get on the boat to the time you get off. Upon arrival we were met by a bunch of people trying to rent us anything they possibly could. We settled on a red 1967 red Volkswagen Beetle Convertible. It was $40 for the day plus $50 deposit because I didn’t have my driver’s license with me. You can drive around the whole island (that’s open to tourist) in about an hour by car. The coastal route is 65km or about 40miles. Many people rent scooters and they are much slower on the open parts of the road. We drove south to the first public beach- San Francisco Beach. It wasn’t as large or as nice as the one at our hotel. But it did have a few water toys- a three story tall inflatable “iceberg” that had handles to climb up and a few water trampolines. There were also a few bars that had waiters bringing your drinks to you on the beach. We did not have this service at our hotel. Then we rode around some, and stopped at the Bob Marley Bar at the southern tip of the island. If you like reggae music at all, this is a must! No doors, all open patio bar ON the beach. Go early though; they close at six due to…electricity? Our only bad experience in Cozumel was when we returned the rental car. The renter told me to put $10 (USD) in gas in the car. At the full service only gas station, I repeated that same amount. They filled it up and said I owed $24USD. I argued with the attendants and said they can un-pump $14 if they want, but I’m only paying $10. We eventually settled on me paying $20, them giving me a receipt and getting reimbursed the other $10 from the renter. This sounded logical to me since he would reap the rewards of the extra gas. When I tried to get another $10 back with my deposit, I was met with a repetitive “Eez no my pro’lem”. Then we had a crappy meal at an authentic Mexican restaurant. The service was outstanding, the food was gross. Thank you very much Cozumel, see ya NEVER.

Pool/Beach
From what I read about all the beaches in PDC, and from other reviewer’s photographs, I was pretty sure the beach would be crappy and we would spend most of our time at the pool. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Riu Tequila is not on the beach, or even on the beach side of the road. Every 5-10 minutes from 7a-1p, then again from 3p-6p, a member of the hotel staff drives a stretched 3 row golf cart that can seat about 8 people to and from the beach. If you miss the ride, it’s maybe a total of 200 yards from the entrance of the hotel to the sand (5-7 minute casual stroll). From where the sand starts to where the water breaks is about 70 yards- plenty of sand. The first 20 yards is under palm tree cover. The beach is beautiful white sand that no matter how hot and sunny it was, never got too hot to walk on. Directly in front of the hotel’s entrance to the beach, (where the water breaks) you could see that some sandbags had been buried. But they were mostly covered with sand and no where near as noticeable as other parts of the beach. Also there was a lack of slippery moss coating on these sandbags compared to those in front of other hotels. About 20-30 yards out there were other HUGE black sandbags that sat about 5ft above the water line. With a little practice, you could climb on top of these and sit and rest. The depth of the water approaching them was over 6ft, so you could dive or flip off of them without risking of hitting bottom. As we walked up the beach, I noticed some resorts had signs up prohibiting people from walking or climbing on the sandbags. Tequila is more lenient I suppose.
Another thing about the beach, if you’re American and have small children, be warned, a good portion of the rest of the world does share your reticence about covering skin. This applies to both sexes. Men in short shorts and women topless, and not just the beautiful. On our second to last day, I was finally able to talk my girlfriend into parasailing. It was $100 for both of us, and definitely worth it. We were up in the air for about 10mins and got to see a large portion of PDC as well as Cozumel.
We never spent much time at the pool. The first day, we had our bathing suites in our carry on so we could go straight to the swim up bar after check in. It was fun; however because of our lack of sleep the night before, we got too drunk too fast! The bartenders at the pool bar were a lot of fun. I regret not going back there anymore, but mild stomach aches kept my girlfriend from being in the mood to get hammered again 

Food
As I said, this was our first experience with an AI resort. I heard mixed reviews of AIs, some completely discouraging others ranged from mild to OK. I am a very picky eater. I can’t stand most crunchy vegetable, especially onions. These buffets were DELICIOUS! There were several regulars that you could find everyday; hamburgers and hot dogs (ehhh) and pizza. We never tried the hamburgers and hotdogs, but did eat the pizza twice. It was better than it looked and it didn’t look bad either. Some sort of rice could always be found, as well as some enchilada looking small wrap or tacito (they had onions- no thanks). The pasta station that was in the dinner buffet was so good, I ate it 3 nights in a row. And I’m not some weirdo that does that routinely back home either- it really was that good. There were several toppings bowls that contained mushrooms, onions, green peppers, zucchini, carrots, shallots, shrimp, and salmon all diced up in bite sized pieces. You put what you want on a plate then when it’s your turn (there was always a line-it was that good) you hand it to the cook; he fries it in front of you. There was 4 types of pasta to select from, then 3 sauces; white, tomato, and meat sauce. Two of the three nights I had this, I went back for seconds. I could write another 4 pages on the food alone, but I’ll stop here. If you have any questions you’d like to ask me about their food, feel free to drop me a line. Oh yeah, and eat at the Steak restaurant at least once.

Service
The service from everyone in the entire country is like nothing in America. You get the sense that everyone from the bus boys, to massage therapist want you to be as happy as possible. Even the taxi drives are genuinely considerate. They would stop in the street and smile and let you pass in front of their car. Where ever there are rules, or “do not…” signs, you get the feeling they are more like request than prohibitions. The Steak restaurant had a sign that said no wet swim suites, I saw several people everyday violating this, never once was anyone reprimanded. This would never work in America, people would complain too much. But in paradise, it works wonderfully. I would suggest anyone who has ever griped about illegal immigrant workers spend a week in PDC. The sincerity they show Americans is bewildering.

In closing, if you have the extra money and prefer a big rocking pool scene, and a beach view, check out Riveria Maya Palace. We didn’t eat there, but assuming that the same ownership would entail similar food choices, this may better suite you. I booked the Tequila because it ranked higher on Tripadvisor’s ranking system. If I were to return to PDC with a group of friends, I might stay at the RMP. For just me and my girlfriend, ClubHotel Riu Tequila was PERFECT

I returned from the tequila 24/07/08 and am very disappointed.
ROOMS
My room was smelly and damp the air con didn't seem to work properly the vent was filthy. The mini fridge was rusty and couldn't say when the inside was last cleaned. The shower had a large chip out of the marble step. The bed had a leg that kept falling off and it bowed in the middle it was also very hard even with a mattress topper.
FOOD AND DRINKS
Be prepared to Que for drinks as this hotel has no waiter service
Drinks were served in the sports bar in plastic cups and if they ran out of clean cups you got your beer in a polystyrene cups.
Food was very repetitive and at times it wasn't very warm it was basically the same in the main restaurant every night with a different meat or fish.
24hr snacks consisted of leftover hamburgers, hot dogs,pizzas that you heated in the microwave in the sports bar and sandwiches made with hard bread. They ran out of snacks quite frequently.
POOL
There is a open restaurant there as well it was pretty much the same as the main restaurant repetitive You have to watch your plate as the birds will eat of it if you leave it to get a drink (they are a nuisance) there is also a lot of cats about this area also there is a strong sewage smell about this area. The sunbed area had a lot of plates and cups lying about it wasn't kept tidy. It was hard to get a sunbed in the morning as the towel game was played here. The pools had paint peeling off the bottom and frequently had dead insects floating in the water.
ENTERTAIMENT
The animation team tried very hard but in my opinion the shows were very cheesy it was OK if you were 10yrs old.
GROUNDS
The gardens were kept immaculate the gardeners worked very hard.
OVERALL
I felt very let down by the Riu chain as I stayed In the RIU Cancun last year the hotel had the same rating as the Tequila but it s standards and services were by far more superior than the Tequila I would not return to this hotel and would not recommend it. I certainly would not rate this hotel as 4T platinum holiday as Thomson advertises it more like 2+ or maybe 3 at a push

just returned from rui tequila late july and still mad!
ROOM. outdated, air con vents dirty what was i breathing ,
no wonder my asthma flared up,
bed hard and bed cloths old and smelt of damp infect so did my own cloths after a while,
towels had a bad smell and were washed done,
had to ask for mini bar to filled on several occasion"s,
had to ask to be moved to a new room on day 3 could"nt stick the damp fusty smell any longer,which wasted a day out of my holiday,

POOL. need to be up early for a sunbed,
not the cleanest insects and hair floating in the pool. was the filters working? actually seen people feeding cats of the plates that we probably ate of later, also a strong smell of sewage around pool area, paint peeling of the bottom of pool. 5 stars i question? your not on the beech not much of a breeze,

ENTERTAINMENT.they do try !a bit cheesey for my likeing,once you watched one week"s show you"l find it hard to sit throuhg another, the kids enjoyed it!
ran out of red and rosie wine on several occasions. corona on tap didnt hit the mark, the corona from our min bar tasted much better and stronger, four every two days was your qouta even with tiping the beer boy didnt seem to work.(i only drink beer or wine)
this hotel is selfservice no waiter service be prepared to que for drinks! again 5 stars i question??????

FOOD. steak house was nice getting your meal set down to you,
you had to be up and book it at 7am!
buffet restarant the food was quiet repetitive more or less same food night after night with diffierant meats and fish not the warmest. 24 hour snaks you could get pizza and burgers etc late at night in the sports bar you had to ping them in the microwave and also hard sandwiches, often ran out of food aswell!!!!

OVERALL.was very let down with the rui tequila standards! i stayed in the rui cancun july 07 was much superior and rated the same. would not recomend the tequila and wont be back!!!!