The Fives Azul Beach Resort is a five star resort which is situated just outside Playa Del Carmen in Mexico. The transfer from the airport is around 40 minutes. The resort is on the beach and has an enclosed area for swimming. We booked our holiday through First Choice. This was not gifted at all, the holiday was paid for by a member of our family.
The accommodation
We booked a two-bedroom suite because we thought it would give us the most comfortable accommodation for our holiday and also the most relaxing. When you travel with children, it's often difficult because you don't have your own space. Many a time we have all squashed into one room, with the children on a sofa bed. When we checked into the hotel we realised we had been upgraded to a suite with a roof terrace with a jacuzzi which was an incredible extra space. The suite itself had one main front door, then two further doors leading off it. One door led to a twin room with two double beds and a large shower room. The other door opened into a large kitchen/dining/living area, with a further king-size bedroom and bathroom through sliding doors. We had two balconies with the larger room, and another balcony with the small room. It is honestly the best family accommodation we have ever stayed in.
One really nice touch was that the fridge was filled daily with soft drinks, snacks and beer, which was all inclusive with the room. We also had bottles of water which were re-stocked daily. The only negatives with the room were that, for the first week, the water in the room smelled of sewage, which was really unpleasant. Also our room was a little noisy as we were relatively close to the centre of the complex. On the plus side, any problems (aside from the noise), were sorted by the hotel within an hour of us calling up. The staff were fantastic. Every day we had fabulous towel animals in each of our rooms and the attention to detail was amazing.
Food
The resort is Gourmet Inclusive, which means there’s no limit to the number of times you can visit each restaurant, most of which are à la carte. There are nine different restaurants to choose from, which gives you a huge amount of choice. Some of the restaurants you need to book into, which does limit you slightly. We only made one reservation during our two weeks and it didn't have much impact on us. Lizards was our favourite place to eat lunch. The food is so fresh and you can watch it being cooked in front of you. The staff are always incredibly helpful and willing to adapt or change dishes to suit your needs.
We also enjoyed Flavours, the international restaurant. We ate there every day for breakfast and it was nice to have a buffet option for dinner occasionally. The defined areas for gluten and dairy free food was also really useful as we had two coeliacs in our party. We ate in the Mexican restaurant Mestizo on four different occasions and loved it each time. The only disappointing thing about the food was that there was nowhere to pop and get an ice-cream in the day. There was a smoothie bar with frozen smoothies, but ice creams would have been really nice in such hot weather!
Wildlife
The hotel is home to a host of wildlife. The spider monkeys are often found roaming through the trees, and occasionally swinging up to the balconies of the rooms. One day they even came down to the pools and caused a huge commotion stealing some food! There were also incredible lizards, which my daughter enjoyed feeding flowers to. The birds around the resort were incredible too and it was amazing to watch them. We encountered a couple of cockroaches in our room, but moved them quickly. We even spotted a Scorpion on our final day. I was quite grateful we hadn't encountered them earlier on.
Pools
One of the best things about this resort is that all of the accommodation surrounds the pools which sprawl through the resort. The pools were all warm enough to swim in and we all really enjoyed how close they were to our rooms. There are also two large infinity pools down by the beach. One of these is used for the water activities on site such as aqua aerobics. The only downside to the pools were that no matter how early we got up, we were never able to get a sun lounger by the pool as they had already been reserved. We used to go down to the loungers on the beach instead and we never had any trouble getting those ones. The pools by the beach were occasionally a little crowded, but the pools by the rooms were often empty, so we made the most of using those! There are also a few pool bars and it was nice to be able to swim up and get a cold drink.
Kids Club
The kids club was a bit of a flop with my children, who both usually love going, which was a little disappointing as it meant we had to entertain them all day and they got bored easily. It also meant that my husband and I didn't get to spend any time together on holiday which was a shame as it wasn't quite the relaxing holiday we'd anticipated. I don't think there was anything wrong with the kids club, but the activities were not very varied, which put my children off going. I felt that perhaps they could have separated the age groups slightly better so that there was more for older children to do.
Activities
The resort had many activities and celebrations whilst we were there, including an incredible street market as a celebration for International Women's Day. During the day there was aqua aerobics and many other activities on-site which were free for guests. The spa there is an additional cost, and it was out of our price range, so we didn't visit it at all. There are also plenty of trips and tours you can do away from the resort. We went on a tour with Edventure Tours and swam with turtles in the sea and zip-lined through the jungle.
Overview
This is a luxury hotel with fantastic facilities. The accommodation is perfect for families and we have never stayed in such an amazing hotel where we weren't all squashed into one room. It really felt like a home-from-home (with the added bonus of the heat)! The pools were the perfect temperature to jump into and play with the children and the pools around the rooms were never crowded. The food was fabulous and the restaurants catered very well for food allergies. It would be good if there was a little more variety in the children's menu, but we all ate very well for the fortnight.
The accommodation
We booked a two-bedroom suite because we thought it would give us the most comfortable accommodation for our holiday and also the most relaxing. When you travel with children, it's often difficult because you don't have your own space. Many a time we have all squashed into one room, with the children on a sofa bed. When we checked into the hotel we realised we had been upgraded to a suite with a roof terrace with a jacuzzi which was an incredible extra space. The suite itself had one main front door, then two further doors leading off it. One door led to a twin room with two double beds and a large shower room. The other door opened into a large kitchen/dining/living area, with a further king-size bedroom and bathroom through sliding doors. We had two balconies with the larger room, and another balcony with the small room. It is honestly the best family accommodation we have ever stayed in.
One really nice touch was that the fridge was filled daily with soft drinks, snacks and beer, which was all inclusive with the room. We also had bottles of water which were re-stocked daily. The only negatives with the room were that, for the first week, the water in the room smelled of sewage, which was really unpleasant. Also our room was a little noisy as we were relatively close to the centre of the complex. On the plus side, any problems (aside from the noise), were sorted by the hotel within an hour of us calling up. The staff were fantastic. Every day we had fabulous towel animals in each of our rooms and the attention to detail was amazing.
Food
The resort is Gourmet Inclusive, which means there’s no limit to the number of times you can visit each restaurant, most of which are à la carte. There are nine different restaurants to choose from, which gives you a huge amount of choice. Some of the restaurants you need to book into, which does limit you slightly. We only made one reservation during our two weeks and it didn't have much impact on us. Lizards was our favourite place to eat lunch. The food is so fresh and you can watch it being cooked in front of you. The staff are always incredibly helpful and willing to adapt or change dishes to suit your needs.
We also enjoyed Flavours, the international restaurant. We ate there every day for breakfast and it was nice to have a buffet option for dinner occasionally. The defined areas for gluten and dairy free food was also really useful as we had two coeliacs in our party. We ate in the Mexican restaurant Mestizo on four different occasions and loved it each time. The only disappointing thing about the food was that there was nowhere to pop and get an ice-cream in the day. There was a smoothie bar with frozen smoothies, but ice creams would have been really nice in such hot weather!
Wildlife
The hotel is home to a host of wildlife. The spider monkeys are often found roaming through the trees, and occasionally swinging up to the balconies of the rooms. One day they even came down to the pools and caused a huge commotion stealing some food! There were also incredible lizards, which my daughter enjoyed feeding flowers to. The birds around the resort were incredible too and it was amazing to watch them. We encountered a couple of cockroaches in our room, but moved them quickly. We even spotted a Scorpion on our final day. I was quite grateful we hadn't encountered them earlier on.
Pools
One of the best things about this resort is that all of the accommodation surrounds the pools which sprawl through the resort. The pools were all warm enough to swim in and we all really enjoyed how close they were to our rooms. There are also two large infinity pools down by the beach. One of these is used for the water activities on site such as aqua aerobics. The only downside to the pools were that no matter how early we got up, we were never able to get a sun lounger by the pool as they had already been reserved. We used to go down to the loungers on the beach instead and we never had any trouble getting those ones. The pools by the beach were occasionally a little crowded, but the pools by the rooms were often empty, so we made the most of using those! There are also a few pool bars and it was nice to be able to swim up and get a cold drink.
Kids Club
The kids club was a bit of a flop with my children, who both usually love going, which was a little disappointing as it meant we had to entertain them all day and they got bored easily. It also meant that my husband and I didn't get to spend any time together on holiday which was a shame as it wasn't quite the relaxing holiday we'd anticipated. I don't think there was anything wrong with the kids club, but the activities were not very varied, which put my children off going. I felt that perhaps they could have separated the age groups slightly better so that there was more for older children to do.
Activities
The resort had many activities and celebrations whilst we were there, including an incredible street market as a celebration for International Women's Day. During the day there was aqua aerobics and many other activities on-site which were free for guests. The spa there is an additional cost, and it was out of our price range, so we didn't visit it at all. There are also plenty of trips and tours you can do away from the resort. We went on a tour with Edventure Tours and swam with turtles in the sea and zip-lined through the jungle.
This is a luxury hotel with fantastic facilities. The accommodation is perfect for families and we have never stayed in such an amazing hotel where we weren't all squashed into one room. It really felt like a home-from-home (with the added bonus of the heat)! The pools were the perfect temperature to jump into and play with the children and the pools around the rooms were never crowded. The food was fabulous and the restaurants catered very well for food allergies. It would be good if there was a little more variety in the children's menu, but we all ate very well for the fortnight.
