We traded our timeshare to stay at the Royal Sands. The trade was confirmed almost a year out, so we were surprised to be put in a villa that overlooked a large patio open to all guests, with no view of the pool and only a minimal view of the ocean. We returned to the front desk to be told that we would have to wait until Monday when Interval International, the timeshare trading organization, was open to make any room changes. Since we were checking in on Saturday, this was not acceptable and we spoke on the phone with a Royal Resorts manager who got us into a much better villa.
The rooms are spacious and nicely appointed with marble floors and mahogany woodwork. The furniture is not very comfortable, but it is hard to maintain these items.
We got the inevitable timeshare pitch, but it was very low key. There was a party on Sunday afternoon, another Sunday evening and a lunch on Monday.
If you go, plan to visit some of the Mayan ruins that are nearby. You'll get a chance to see a more accurate version of Mexico that what is represented in Cancun.

My wife and I just returned from a weeks stay at the Royal Sands (Apr 5 -Apr12). We had a bonus week from Interval we used to book a lock-off room.

We arrived at the resort at approx 10pm Sat, at which time there was only one person checking people in even though they had 3 others behind the counter working on who knows what. After traveling all day the last thing you want to do is have to wait to check-in. There was some sort of problem with the people's reservation in line ahead of us so we had to wait around 20 minutes for our turn. Once you check in, your room key card can be used in the restaurants, market, etc. By the way, they don't accept American Express, only Mastercard or Visa.

The Royal Sands timeshare check-ins are on Sundays. A nice feature of the Royal Resorts is that they assign a personal concierge to you. Another nice feature is daily maid and towel service. On Sunday morning you'll receive an invitation to attend an orientation meeting at 9am. We left our room to have breakfast really early so we missed the invitation but stumbled up on the meeting and later found out about the personal concierge and met him. It's always a good idea to attend these orientation meetings at timeshares as they're quite helpful.

The Veranda restaurant is the main restaurant of this resort and the food there is good to very good. They have indoor and outdoor dining and we had some breakfasts, lunches and dinners there.


There are four Royal Resorts in Cancun and there are shuttle buses that travel throughout the day between them all on a regular schedule. We took it one night to the Royal Mayan resort and had dinner at the La Palapa restaurant, the food was average to good (large portions like a diner) and the cost was fairly low. They gave us someone else's dinner check which we were able to have them correct pretty fast. They don't seem to be as well organized as The Veranda restaurant.

We took the shuttle to Captains Cove which is a Royal Resorts (RR) off premise restaurant. Next door is Poncho Willey's which is also a RR property. Poncho Willey's is a Nightclub and they have a live band on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday nights. The other nights their DJ (Chubby) plays music videos on a large screen and people sing Karaoke. The live band, "Flashback" is awesome so you really should make it a point to see them. Speaking of Bands we had dinner one night at the Hard Rock Cafe and the band playing there was purely hard rock and while good, not as good (in my opinion) as Flashback.

To get to the Hard Rock Cafe simply take the bus which costs 70 peso which is 70 cents. The buses run every 5 to 10 minutes so there's never a long wait. The Hard Rock cafe is located in the Spring Break Party Central area, you can't miss it, even during the day. At night the area is all lite up and packed with kids.

We also ate a Bubba Gumps which is closer up the strip and there's a small mall and other nightclubs and restaurants (Outback). I think this area is called "Flamingo shopping center".

Even closer by bus (2 minutes) is La Isla outdoor (shaded) shopping mall with lots of stores and restaurants. We ate a Mr Papas (good-very good), Chili's (Good - very good) and Come"N Eat (Good - very good). There's also an small Aquarium at this mall that has a daily 6pm Dolphin show. The entrance fee is approx $11-12 and the show is around 15 minutes. They have a large Shark Tank with a huge glass wall and they feed the sharks after the Dolphin show to entertain the crowd.

Back to the Resort - There's a HUGE main pool in Phase one and that's where all the action is. There are also nice pools in Phase two but that area is more quiet. Phase one has two pool bars and phase two has one.

There's not much beach left because of the Hurricane they had in 2005 and the water was rough for the entire week we were there. Every time I went into the water the waves pounded me. The natives told me the ocean is calmer in the summer months.

We did a Thomas Moore day drip to the Mayan ruins in Chichen Itza where the pig pyramid is. It cost $99 each and it goes on Weds. morning at 7pm. It took a couple of hours to get there and the tour guide spent about an hour showing us around. (No one is allowed to climb the Pyramid or other ruins any more). Afterwards they gave us around 45 minutes on our own to explore the ruins which wasn't much time as it's a large site.
When we got back to the bus it was past the usual launch hour and everyone was hungry and hot. Before feeding us they took us to a sink hole where you could swim if you felt like going down 100 steps and then you had to jump in as there was no shallow part. We and some others only watched but it looked refreshing. We were finally taken for lunch at a Mexican type cafeteria that included traditional Mexican dance show at 3pm. We ate there and left around 4pm and were back at the Royal Sands by 6pm.

I complained later to the Thomas Moore desk in the resort that we didn't have enough time at the ruins to explore on our own and that it was ridiculous to be given lunch so late in the afternoon. In addition we were told we'd be back at the resort between 7 and 7:30pm so it's obvious we were rushed out of the ruins site. If you book this tour at the resort you may encounter the same issues so be warned. By the way I wouldn't recommend you drive on your own to the ruins because at one of the tolls on the way back we had to go through a military checkpoint with armed soldiers and one manning a machine gun on top of an Humvee! The cars ahead of us were stopped where as we were waved through on the bus.

The best restaurant we at at was the Laguna where the food was excellent. The prices were somewhat higher than the other restaurants I mentioned but not too bad. You can take the city bus heading towards the direction of Poncho Willey's and it's half way on the way (5 minute ride).

There's a Wal-mart in the downtown area and you can take the bus there too. It's two blocks from the bus stop. People buying food because they had units with kitchens typically take the bus there and take a taxi back for approx $10. There's also on permanent flea market type market near Walmart called Mercardo 28 where they sell tourist items. Only thing is the vendors are annoying as they are constantly trying to get you to buy something. This area, downtown Cancun, where Walmart and the Mercardo are located looks like an economically depressed area and walking though it made me a little nervous. So be sure your concierge gives you a street map an explains to you where you should go. It's easy to get lost there.

At the resort they have wireless internet access next to the market near the lobby area. There also a very nice laundry-mat with a full time attendant on the other side of the lobby area. They even have an on-site doctor just in case. I think the biggest complaint we had was that the beds were hard. It took some getting used to but you do get used to them.

A 5 minute walk (north) will take you to very nice indoor shopping mall. In addition to stores there's also a place for bowling,shooting pool and playing slot machines. We spent time in this mall on our last day because we got sunburned and had to stay out of this sun.

Lastly, the Royal Sands concierge will try to get you to attend a sales pitch for surplus units in the Royal Sands (not that many) and units in their new resort, the Royal Haciendas which located south of Cancun in an area called the Mayan Riviera. We did have lunch with one of their sales reps., Jennifer, who is a lovely young lady and it was a pleasure to meet her and have lunch together. We weren't looking to buy another timeshare at this time. Lunch was about 60-70 minutes and then we spent another 50 minutes or so looking at the model units. So if you don't mind spending a couple of hours in the afternoon the resort will probably buy you a nice lunch even if you're not ready to buy. They also had other group sales events (parties) which we didn't attend.

BTW, every day was sunny, hot and humid.

Part of this hotel's deal is that it's a time shared property and so many of the people who stay here purchased time shares or are renting from people who own time shares there. It's a nice hotel but the features aren't all it's crack up to be. The owners house next door is sweet in comparison :-). But really the good does outway the bad here and you get a pretty good deal. The food in the hotel is okay but the long lines to get a seat will discourage you from waiting. There isn't much to do down on this end but it's not too far to walk to the main attractions, which really should be the beach I guess, but here the water is really rough so opt for the pool or to sunbathe. It is a very family oriented hotel so if your looking for to go here for spring break this is not the place to party. The rooms are very basic in accomodations with some nicer features then you would find at the holiday inn. The most impressive features here are the pool, the convenience store downstairs and the lobby.

We are a family of 6 who have limited choices, and of course the Royal sands comes to the top with 2 BR villas. It was a great experience. Many have said that spring break in cancun is crazy, but we found it to be quiet and quite relaxing. Royal sands service is great. Our housekeeper has been there 4 years and was proud to be there. It was the same everywhere in the property. We always go different places, but this was absolutely great. We appreciated 2nd floor accomodations as it was easy to run up and down the stairs as opposed to elevators...the "loud" pool was not loud at all.
Great place