We just came back from the El Cid Castilla. I was thinking it would be less crowded than Cancun during the week before Easter. WRONG! We were told that it is a tradition that Mexican families go to the beach before Easter and the city and beach was a complete mad house and very crowded. The city grows to more than a million. Wall to wall people and also very loud. It would be nice if they would have had an adults only area.
The beds were very hard, but all beds in Mexico are hard. We did the time share tour and got 3 tours out of the deal. The two restaurants that you can make reservations at are both very good.

the place is nice but the people there are soo rude i never want to go back. you can tell they barely get payed anything. and work off tips which i dished out alot of money for by the way. very poor service. jesus is awesome. sara is cute;).

The El Cid is great! Don't listen to all the bad reviews! I think some people are just too picky. The lady who talked about having to pay for bottled water didn't mention that all proceeds from the sale of said water were donated to the El Cids Childrens foundation. Also, the water in the resort is all purified! I've been going to Mexico for over ten years and this is the first time that I've gone and not gotten Montazuma's revenge!
The wait staff were excellent, sometimes as many as 3 or 4 would come to our table to make sure everything was all right! We allways left a tip for all meals, an average of $2.00 for buffet and $5.00 for ala carte dining. The only restaurants that are not available with the all-inclusive are thePrime Rib Grill & La Concha, the seafood restaurant. All other ala carte are in the all-inc. and there is no limit on reservations. I was just there in March and booking dinner was never a problem. The grounds of this hotel are immaculate!

We are a family of 4, including two young children (1 1/2 and 3 1/2) and we stayed from Feb 8-15 (yes, a bit late. Sorry). My perspective is how we enjoyed our stay from a young family's point of view. My kids loved it, and so did my husband and I. We had the all inclusive deal (which I highly recommend when you have young children) so we always had food and drinks available to us (without shelling out for cash everytime, I mean) and there was always fries, hot dogs, hamburgers and fresh fruit at every lunch and supper that we were there. There were a lot of other things too, which varied from night to night, but for picky eaters like my little two, the standards (fries, etc., already mentioned) was such a relief! And there was alway milk and chocolate milk, as well as juice and pop at the breakfast and supper restaurant (and lunch too, you just have to ask your waiter). The lunch restaurant overlooks the beach and is just covered with a tent-such a beautiful view. And it's a different location from the breakfast/supper restaurant which is nice-you don't get sick of eating in the same place all the time. The pools are nice and vary in depth from 3ft to 6ft. What was really nice for my kids was the pool in front of the El Cid Castilla because it was a bit warmer (they like slightly warmer pools). The pool infront of the El Moro was cooler (we found) but it has a neat rock platform/waterfall that people jump off of. The other nice thing is there is a playground right between the Castilla hotel and it's swimming pool. It has two levels, multiple slides, a small rock wall, rope climbing wall, and ramp. There is also another (smaller) playstructure that is a couple of levels, a slide, and three swings. Also a pingpong table nearby. My kids played there every morning for at least a couple of hours. The sand is a bit dirty though-my kid's clothing was filthy and it took a couple of rounds of washing before getting out the dirt stains. The sand on the beach is much cleaner and softer to touch. The kids loved the beach (we spent a couple of hours there every afternoon after lunch and there was always two loungers under a palapa available for us!). We broght a few beach toys with us (shovels, rakes) and they loved playing in the nice, soft sand and looking for sea shells. My oldest loved the waves too. The waiter on the beach was very attentive to us (actually, all the staff were great. They were always helping me with carrying my food, drinks, etc. because I had little ones with me). Lots of vendors, which, for the most part, would stay on the other side of the rope. We always said "no, gracias", sometimes twice and then they would leave us alone. Not a big deal actually. There's a kids club there, but my kids were too young (it starts at age 4). I noticed that they sometimes have field trips to the zoo (or something like that) for the older kids (age 7 and up). There was a list of activities listed for the kids club everyday, but in the actual kids club room (which is small) there was some crafts set up and a tv/game console which was always being played by someone during the supper hour. My kids loved watching the video games being played on the other side of the window. And about supper, there is a show everynight at 8pm in the dinner restaurant (there is a stage there) and the kids liked it (except that it was too loud for them). But the best show was the Festiva Mexicana which happens every Wednesday. If you have young kids make sure they participate in (or watch) the pinata game which starts at 7:30 (not 8:00) on the stage. They get candy that comes out of the pinata. One last note about the timeshare presentations-we were asked several times to go so we eventually did. I had read that El Cid promises 90 minutes for their presentation and that they stick to it for the most part (I mean, if you say no) and they said that they would take care of our kids. We had breakfast at the really nice La Concha restaurant (which is not included in the all inclusive pass) then went on a small tour in the El Moro tower, and then had a talk while the kids played blocks right beside us (there was a nice lady playing with them and keeping them occupied). We eventually said no (2 hours later), and without a fuss, we got our free gifts: a city tour (about 4 hours) on a official Trolley Bus tours (incl. some drinks), a boat ride (it was a nice boat) to Stone Island including lunch and drinks (4-5 hours long), and 4 passes to the Aquarium (the Aquario they called it). Those were absolutely great activites we did as a family, the kids and I loved it and would of easily cost the four of us well over a hundred dollars to do those things on our own. Absolutely worth it! So, if you can stand it, go to the presentation. Before going I got all my information off of Trip Advisor's reviews of El Cid, as well as the Forum of Mazatlan. The Trip Advisor's forum has a whole bunch a great information so don't miss it! Yes, we would stay here again-we all really liked it! Hope this review helps.