This was my second trip to Cancun and this holiday was the best I ever had.

Grounds

The place is so clean and the grounds are kept so neat and tidy, pool was clean. The staff work so hard to keep the place looking so nice they deserve a medal

Rooms

Rooms are of a decent size, the bath takes up a lot of room but its so nice just to sit in the bath after a hard days sun bathing. Rooms again very clean and the maid was very good and looked after us during our stay. Mini bar was restocked on a twice a day basis, so we never run out of cold beer and water.

Meals
The waiters never see you glass go empty and looked after you well, food was very good . So many places to eat and the variety of food on offer was very good and they offered something for everyone. In our week there not once did we have a bad meal.

During my stay I celebrated my 40th birthday and the hotel left a birthday cake in my room which was a really nice of them.

The bellboys deserve a special mention our transport was one hour late to collect us and they were busy on the phone trying to sort out this problem, which is more than the Virgin holidays reps did.

Overall excellent hotel with great foor and excellent staff who could not do enough to help you and make sure that you enjoyed your holiday. I never seen hotel staff work so hard before and they are a credit to the Moon Palace.

My husband and I were at the Moon Palace from the 4th to the 18th of June, we had intially booked to visit the Azul Sensatori but decided to change hotels, we are so pleased that we did. Do not let the swine flu put you off, we saw no illness of this nature, and it worked to out advantage, during the first week the hotel reported only 27% occupancy
Arrived at the hotel to be met by a lovely member of staff with a chilled, scented towel, just what was needed. Check in was very smooth, the reception staff are very helpful. Our luggage was taken to the room by a bellboy, we went with him and he proceded to tell us about the hotel.
We were staying at the Nizuc side of the hotel, Jaguar block room 7421 ( i think that was it but it was top floor, corner room, husband constantly amazed that I could not remember the number!) Lovely view over the Catholic chapel, we saw lots of weddings, and a great sea view. Not a huge balcony but who wants to sit there when you have a fantastic hotel?? The room was very spacious, large comfortable bed, excellent pillows, large jaccuzzi, tiled shower with a bench to sit down, flat screen tv, optics and a mini fridge with mixers. The room has a coffee machine, if like me you like to have proper milk and not coffemate, ask room service to bring you a carton of milk and keep it in your fridge, worked for me!! Plenty of storage space but we were glad that we had brought some additional clothes hangers from home. Your are provided with robes and slippers for your stay.
Room service are wonderful, always said that they would be thirty ifive minutes but always turned up in about twenty. Good choice of food on the menu. Table and chairs in the room for you to make it easier to eat your food, not having to balance on the bed as with other hotels I have stayed at.
Pool is wonderful, well it looks wonderful, both my husband and I are beach people so we never went in. Every morning we walked past on the way to our spot on the beach saying 'we will have to go in there today, it looks so inviting' but we never did. Plenty of beds and shade on the beach, one day we were the only ones there until later in the afternoon. Yes there is seaweed on the beach but they are constantly cleaning it up. All you have to do is walk one foot from the edge and you are into clear water. The water is not the same colour as you would get in Cancun but then they do not have much of a beach. Balthazar on the beach will keep you watered with his regualr drink runs, he did not understand that we did not want to have tequila all the timeand kept laughing at us!!. We witnessed people asking him to bring food down, don't be lazy walk up to the restaurant!!!
We did not visit all the restaurants because we found some favourites. The Italian at the Golf Club was exceptional but do get there early. The Chinese / Japanese at the Golf Club was good but not as good as you would get at home. The Italian at the Sunrise was lovely, ask then to make the mexican coffee, it's a show in itself, and does taste very nice. The Brazilian at the Nizuc was exceptional, best we have ever been to but again go early. We visited the Beach Hotel in Cancun one evening and went to the Steak House restaurant, it was good but make sure that you are visting when there is not much of a breeze because you will not be able to keep hold of your salad or bread roll if you do! The coffee shop in Nizuc hotel is great, good selection of cakes and sandwiches, they also make good coffee, perfect if you just want a snack
The hotel has a courtesy bus which will take you to Wet and Wild, I beleive that Moon Palace guests get free entry but check that out, and the sister hotels in Cancun. Get there early if you want a spot on the bus, it does get busy. We wanted to visit two of teh shopping malls so got off at the Beach Hotel. The Isla and Luxury Ave are within easy walking distance
We have stayed at the Iberstor Hotels a little further down towards Palya Del Carmen, they have one thing that this hotel was seriosuly lacking, an air conditioned cigar lounge. My husband likes to have a cigar in the evening on holiday, he said having one outside meant that the breeze got 50% of it!
The staff are fantastic and will do everything to make your stay comfortable, please make sure that you do tip, these guys are on very poor wages. We saw lots of people who were very demanding, you know who you are, and did not tip for the service they received. You would not got out to a restaurant at home and walk away without tipping don't do it here!
Would we go back to this hotel, yes if it was under occupied as it is now but I do not know what it would be like at full occupancy

This was my second stay at Moon Palace but my first stay at the Sunrise side of the resort. This stay surpassed my last visit in 2002. My visit this time was for a friend's wedding which was beautiful.

The Sunrise side caters to mostly families with children and most of the restaurants are on this side of the hotel. I roomed at Luna rm 1750 which was convenient and close to the lobby and beach. The room was nicely updated along with great amenities. The hotel had toiletry supplies as well like Biosilk shampoo, conditioner, body lotion, shavers and shaving cream, toothbrushes and tooth paste, cotton balls to nail filers.

There are many lounge chairs at the many pools as well as numerous beach chairs too. The waitress and waiters would walk around the pool area taking drink and food orders throughout the day.

I've got to try most of the restaurants during my stay like the Oriental restaurant at Sunrise, Barracuda, Mexican, Italian and Brazilian resturants but I must say the food in 2002 was much better. Although it wasnt a disappointment but I had a high expectation this time.

The beach is always not swimmable due to the many seaweeds along the shores but that's expected on the Riveria Maya side of Cancun. Moon Palace do have tracker trailers that would drive around during the day to clean up the seaweed but with so much washing up ashore how much can you clean throughout the day.

There are nightly entertainment on both the Nizuc and Sunrise side of the hotel. Dont miss out on the fireshow and the Circus show. It can get crowded so arrive early and hold your seats.

All in all I had a great time and didnt want to come back to reality. The weather forecasted cloudy and rainy weather for Cancun but it never rained the 7 days I was there. Basically it was high 80s and sunny the whole time.

What you pay for is what you get for the Moon Palace. My next trip would be to stay at the Moon Palace in D.R. That's newly open this year and would like to see if that hotel can meet up to Cancun's par.

Pros: The resort is gorgeous. The grounds are manicured. The pool is clean and huge. Lots of chairs and big towels. The beach is immaculate. The entrance into the resort is guarded so we felt fairly safe. The people that work at the hotel provide amazing service. The employees at the restaurants go out of the way to provide you with outstanding service. You never have to flag a person down for anything while dining--they are close by and attentive. The rooms are beautiful--tile floors and bath. Have great views. The gym is clean and the attendants are great. The spa is fabulous.

Cons: The resort is very secluded and there is little to do at night. If all you want to do is hang out at the pool or beach. this is the resort for you. You have to leave the resort for movies, shopping, etc. The room has a double jacuzzi in it. Felt like the space would have been better served as a sitting area.

The only thing I can say was dissappointing was the check in process and response from the hotel mgmt. At the time of booking, we asked for 2nd or 3rd floor room near pool. We called 5 and 3 days before and were told that the room was confirmed. When we got to check in--they were putting us in a building far away from the pool and ground floor. We asked the person to please get us closer to the pool and off the ground floor. Needless to say, it took 30 minutes to get a room closer to the pool. We were supposed to receive a golf/spa credit at check in and we had to wait another 10 mintues while the front desk got that fixed. Ericka, the person at the front desk, was not helpful or friendly. After check-in, no one offered to take us to our room . We hauled 7 bags across the grounds. We get to the room and the sink does not work right. We called the hotel mgmt who took another hour to find us a room. Finally, we were given the room that we had been originally promised nearly 3 hours after arriving at the resort. We spoke to the Asst Mgr of the resort who was so indifferent. He said we could not have been promised any certain room because they can't promise rooms due to availabiltiy. We told him who we talked to and it did not seem to matter. The hotel is only 40% full and he gave the impression that he did not care whether we stayed or left the resort. We found it interesting the the person at the highest rung on the food chain that we dealt with was less caring than anyone else we encountered at the resort.