bumping up in case anyone has any questions

Did you travel with any children?

How do they treat kids?

Did you go AI?

Were you bothered by the time share people?

Were you a member of the Omni Club and did you try to up grade your room?

How was your room (Clean)?

Hi SunnyDey,

Glad you had a great time. My husband and I are interested in snorkeling while there (leave in 2 weeks). How much did your snorkeling trip cost? Did it include snorkel equipment? Did they pick/drop off at your hotel? How long did you snorkel? Where did they take you? How do we get in contact with Cancun Mermaid? Is the trip worth it or would you recommend something else?

Sorry for so many questions

Counting down...10 days to go. :)

I did not travel with any kids, but there were many families at the Omni during my stay. One couple even had two year old triplets with them. From my observations, it looked like the families were having a great time. The pools are a great depth for kids, as they are only 3.5 feet deep. There is also a more shallow pool area for toddlers. The restaurants and snack bars had all sorts of frozen tropical drinks without alcohol for kids, and the menus looked kid friendly with burgers, pizza, etc. They also had a place to paint pottery and several children looked like they were enjoying doing that. I think the resort is a good size for people with children as it does not involve a lot of walking to restaurants, snack bars, or the pools from the rooms.

I did go AI, and I am glad we choose to do that. It was nice not to have to stop and think, "Oh, I shouldn't order that. It is too expensive." With AI, you can get room service, which is fun for a late night snack or a breakfast out on the balcony. Plus, you feel free to order all the food and drinks you want. We weren't big drinkers, but still we figured we got our money's worth out of the AI. A soda was $2.80, as was water. Alcoholic drinks were around $6-8. The dinner buffet was $25 (without drinks), and breakfast and lunch buffets were not much less. Snacks at the pool/beach seemed to run about $9 or more. We ate at DaVinci's (the fancy Italian restaurant) twice, and our bill was about $110 for two each time.

The timeshare people were not bothersome at all at our hotel. Initially, the Omni host sits you down when you check in and tells you about the dining options and the resort. The host only mentioned once that if we would like to go to an informational breakfast we could get more information on their vacation club. We politely declined, and it was never mentioned again.

I am a member of the Omni club. We had already booked an oceanview room, and I tried to use my coupon to upgrade to a better room, I guess it would have been a junior suite. They said they had none available (I hear this is a common occurence) and I kept my upgrade coupon, but they did give us a wonderful upper level floor with a balcony (which is nicer than a terrace) right in the middle with a great view of the ocean. I highly recommend the oceanview rooms on the upper levels, as it is really spectacular to sit out on the balcony and look at the beautiful sea.

Our room was spotlessly clean. The Omni staff seemed to work really hard to keep the place clean. A man was even out scrubbing the tile in the pools with a brush at 5 a.m. to make sure the pool was spotless. I thought the restaurants also looked very clean, and I was very happy with the care they took of the hotel.

Hi Luckygirl,

We really enjoyed our snorkeling trip with Cancun Mermaid. We booked our tour through their website. I don't know if we can give out web addresses on Trip Advisor, but do a google search and you should find them. The tour was $50 a person plus a $2 fee that was a national park fee. You pay the van driver when you take the tour.

They picked us up at our hotel in a small van that had two other couples. We then drove down to Puerto Morelos (23 miles south of Cancun). They provided snorkel equipment, but we brought our own that we purchased prior to the trip.

Their boat took us to two different areas in the reef. The water was very clear and calm. We snorkeled at each area for about an hour. Two guides snorkeled with us, and they were helpful in pointing out the different fish. We saw a variety of fish from trumpet fish to eels to stingrays. The reef itself was very pretty to see, and we were so close to all the coral. There were probably about 14 people on our snorkeling boat.

After snorkeling, they provided us with a lunch. It included drinks, alcohol or soda/water, and fajitas, rice, beans and chips and salsa. Following lunch, the van driver took us back to our hotel.

We had a great time. This was the first time my boyfriend had been snorkeling, and he absolutely loved it.

Thanks alot SunnyDey.

Hey SunnyDey,

My hubby and myself will be staying at the Omni the 1st week in August and I am interested in the snorkel tour to Puerto Moreles. I am not sure about booking online though? How did the reservation process work? Also, do you know the e-mail address at the Omni? Thanks

The reservation process with Cancun Mermaid was pretty simple. I just went to their website (cancunmermaid.com) and e-mailed them telling them that I would like to go on the snorkeling tour to Puerto Morelos. I gave them the date I would arrive in Cancun, and they called me at the hotel that day. They confirmed that I still wanted to go on the trip and told me what time they would pick us up. They seemed pretty flexible with days, so I am sure you could switch days when you get to Cancun if you wanted a different day for snorkeling from the one you earlier told them in your e-mail. You don't pay anything until you are actually on the trip, so you don't have to worry about sending them a payment online or anything. They were really nice to work with.

I found the address for the Omni on their website. If you belong to the Omni Select Guest Club, go into that part of the website and hit the contact button, there should be a list of the Omnis, and you can e-mail the Omni Select Guest host in Cancun directly if you want to give them room preferences, etc.