Blue Diamond Luxury Boutique Hotel

Such a beautiful place, surrounded by water features and lush nature all around. The room was lovely, though it could use a bit of updating. The service was outstanding, every staff member went above and beyond.

The place is truly beautiful, surrounded by incredible natural scenery that makes the whole experience feel special. What really stands out though is the warmth of the staff, they make a huge difference and elevate the entire stay. The food is also very good, and even with just two restaurants, there’s a surprisingly nice variety. The only downsides were that the property feels a bit worn in some areas, and the beach wasn’t quite what we expected but of course, that’s just nature.

We stayed in a Junior Suite from March 18-28th. We have been to a number of other resorts in Mexico over the years and I would definitely say this was our best experience yet. No place is perfect but I will break down our experience and observations by category. Food – Blue Diamond has this nailed. By far the best food experience ever! 5 star dining three meals a day if you want it. There is no buffet and no reservations needed to any of the three restaurants. Breakfast is served only at the Aguamarina restaurant each day. Fantastic healthy juice and smoothie offerings, and a wide array of breakfast options that would satisfy anyone. They also bake their own bread and pastries and so each breakfast starts with something warm out of the oven that day like chocolate filled croissants. For lunch you can have another fine dining experience at Aguamarina with options like sushi or gourmet tacos or enjoy simpler options at Ceviche Bar at beach level. For dinner they alternates each night between Aguamarina and Ambar. At Aguamarina there is usually excellent entertainment celebrating some part of Mayan or Mexican culture (never anything cheesy) and Ambar I would describe a more of a high-end steak house vibe with a singer performing more mellow recognizable songs on guitar. Again, the dinner menu has a good range of options for anyone’s pallet with additional themed on some nights such a Mexican night, BBQ night, etc. Again, the food presentation is excellent, the flavours are amazing and deserts are all made in-house. There is a “Special Menu” available for each meal that includes a number of additional high-end cuisine options for an additional cost. Honestly, the standard menu that comes as part of the all-inclusive package is so good I saw very few people order from it. We did order the wagyu ribeye steak from the Special Menu two nights in a row. The first night because I just really felt like a nice steak and it was unbelievable. As good as anything I have had at most high-end steak houses. As a result we ordered it the next night as well. Cut it with a butter knife. It is a pricey added cost but the value was there. My only complaint would be that no standard sides you would get in North America was available such as mushrooms, garlic mashed potatoes, etc. You got grilled vegetables and baby potatoes which were good but some other standard steak options would have been great. Finally, my wife is sensitive to gluten and she had no issues here. The servers ask every time and did a great job of steering her to the menu items that were safe. The menu does indicate what menu options include gluten, lactose, shellfish, etc. but we learned it is not always accurate and some menus conflict with each other on labelling which was concerning. However, the servers were all very well trained and when you told them your allergy they knew exactly what was safe and communicated well with the kitchen who went to great lengths to make you feel safe. Over ten says we had no issues but you do need to tell your server every time. The host asks you about allergies before you are seated but interestingly this does not get communicated to the server which is why you need to tell your server every time. Shout out to servers Christian, Luis Pat, Dagroberto, Roman and all the others I wish I could remember the names of for treating us so well. Every single one of them was amazing. Service – You can tell when employees are happy and treated well from their energy every day. Everyone at this resort from the servers, drivers, concierge and people watering the grass are very nice and friendly. Again, Blue Diamond has this nailed. Every interaction we had with every staff member was positive and significantly enhanced our experience. Room – We were in a Junior Suite. It was very nice, spacious and well appointed. Nothing was broken or in disrepair like I have experienced at other resorts. One day one of the wood slats on our patio lounger broke and I told the concierge. He had it replaced within hours. Cleaning staff came in daily and did a great job refreshing the room. One complaint was the towels. For a “luxury boutique” hotel the towels provided did not live up to this expectation. They were clean and replaced daily but I would have expected towels a bit softer than what was provided. Pool – No loud music and drunken idiots. This resort is for someone who wants quiet. There is music but it is not loud and the music selection is just background noise. Loved it. In 10 days I did not see one rowdy, drunk or obnoxious person. Not a place for the big drinker crowd who want a swim up bar and get wasted daily. If you want to chill by the pool this is the place for you. There were some younger people at this resort but I would say the general crowd is aged 40+. One surprise is that there is a very large construction project underway next door. From one side of the pool you are staring at a large and loud construction project from Monday to Friday. Big cranes, cement being poured and lots of hammering. We were not told about this construction and I think we should have. With the beach being unusable this did take significant enjoyment out of the pool area. What we ended up doing was going to the pool that is part of the spa. Very quiet, no sargassum smell (see below) but also no bar. We just packed drinks from our room. Beach – Very small and largely unusable due to the daily influx of sargassum (seaweed). At first they tried to clean it up daily but they did not have the people or machines to do it. The three people they had simply piled it up at water’s edge and tried to wheelbarrow it out. They needed 30 people, not 3. Then it sat for days, rotted and smelled. If you were on the beach the smell would make you nauseous and so most everyone stayed at the pool. If you sat pool beachside (a story up from the beach) you would still smell it but other areas around the pool seemed to be saved from it. Some of the other resorts along the beach looked to have much better strategies for managing the sargassum problem. Blue Diamond seemed to have largely given up. For the last few days of our stay they had these three people on the beach simply shoveling the sargassum back into the water because the smell was getting so bad. This helped manage the smell but made the water not swimmable. It was disappointing to not have a beach experience. Big fail here. My recommendation is walk to the beach at the resort next door who seemed to be managing the sargassum problem much better and jump in the water there. Cultural Activities – Special mention here to Dayana who ran all the cultural activities on the resort. She is amazing. My wife and I did the free Spanish lessons with her which were great. Only recommendation would be make this more focused on conversational Spanish you could use on the resort and little less focus on explaining grammar. We also did the cacao ceremony which was derived from a Mayan tradition. You could tell this took significant effort to set up and Dayana did an excellent job of explaining the importance of cacao in Mayan culture and allowed us to take part in a special little ceremony. It is a free activity and highly recommend it. We also did a Mayan cleansing ceremony which takes place in a brick dome built on-site. If you are familiar with a North American indigenous sweat lodge experience it is very similar. Dayana does a great job with all the preparation work and then took us through a 1 hour ceremony where she takes you into the brick dome which is heated with hot rocks, the door is closed and you are in a pitch black environment where Dayana leads a meditative experience which includes reflection and ancient songs while she sprinkled water on the rocks which creates a steamy environment. My wife and I found it very transformative. This experience is an extra cost which you book through the spa. Finally, we did the patio tour with Dayana. The property was originally built by another company that invested in different outdoor patio art installations across the property. In many cases the blocks of suites was built around them with the idea that when you open your door you are looking at a beautiful art piece. These are hidden from the main path and you would not even know they existed unless you walked into each block of suites. Dayana explains the artist’s vision for each and here is where I felt sorry for her. The web site shows these beautiful patios being fully maintained with water being a significant component of most. In our tour it was obvious that the patios are not being maintained. In almost all cases the water was not running and it was obvious this had been the case for some time. “The water pumps are broken” was the answer given. For example, the patio when you first enter the resort consists of four special trees that were sacred to the Mayan people arranged in a special way to represent the north, south, east and west. These four trees are practically dead with no water or care provided. Very bad first impression. In addition, if I paid extra money to have a room that looks out onto one of these patios I would be very disappointed to see the water not working and the art installation being neglected. This is inconsistent with the “luxury boutique” experience. This resort does many things well but this again is a big miss. It is Dayana’s job to do these tours but I am sure it is difficult for her to have to face these questions from guests each time because she has no say in these maintenance decisions. Bikes – Depending on where you room is the walk to the beach can be 15-20 minutes. There was golf carts transporting people all day between the rooms and the beach. My wife and I enjoyed getting 5km of walking in daily. There are also peddle bikes available across the property. People leave them in place when they reach their destination and then you simply hop on it and go. They are widely available and a brilliant idea for getting around faster and easier. We did take a bike twice ourselves. My only complaint here is the bike maintenance. Some of quite rusted, the tires are often flat, bike chains are often hanging, etc. This did make them often feel unsafe. A weekly bike maintenance program would go a long way to making guests feel safer using them. Overall, we honestly enjoyed our time at Blue Diamond. The food, service, rooms and largely quiet atmosphere made up for many of the other shortcomings. These guys do so many of the small things very well. If you are a "foodie" you will be in heaven. It is surprising that there are so many big misses on the bigger items like property maintenance that take away from the “luxury boutique” experience. The construction next door is not in their control and likely did not know where construction would be at when we made our reservation. However, any construction that close to the property is going to impact the enjoyment of your guests not matter what stage they are at. We would definitely consider coming back when the construction next door is complete, they start investing in maintenance of the patios and they have a better sargassum management program.

We had such a great time at this hotel. The facilities are beautiful and well kept, everything feels super relaxing. The food was honestly one of the highlights, so many good options and everything tasted amazing. The service was always friendly and attentive without being too much. We also tried the spa and the massages were incredible, exactly what we needed to fully unwind. Snorkeling was another favorite, really fun and worth it.

If you’re looking to relax and reset, this is the place to go. I love how they’ve integrated the resort into the forest. The nature is absolutely stunning, and the staff is top notch. There’s definitely an emphasis on health and wellness with the yoga classes and sauna. I will definitely be coming back.