My husband and I stayed at the Westin the last week in July for our Honeymoon. Like many others say, we did a lot of research before selecting Puerto Vallarta and the Westin as our Honeymoon destination.

I should preface by saying both my husband and myself have travelled to Mexico several times before, always on the Pacific side. We therefore felt that we understood what to expect of our surroundings (i.e. this is not Hawaii or the carabien).

The Westin: We received excellent service, from the bellman to the checkin receptionist and the pool side bar. Our room was clean and the bathroom was large. Loved the dual head shower and the heavenly bed. The pools were great, although very busy. We spent most of our time by the "adults" pool, away from the activities pool and children's pool. Even though it was the adults pool, there were children, but we were on vacation and still found laying by the pool very relaxing. We only tried the restraunt once, it was expensive and I did not care for the food. But I knew this going into it. Overall, our experience at the Westin was very good and I would recommend it to anyone vacationing in PV.

Puerto Vallarta: We went at the end of July, so it was very hot. We were expecting this, but it was still so humid and hot that we did not want to be outside during the day. We spent our nights split between downtown and Marina (the marina is walking distance from hotel). Restraunts downtown were much better but we perferred our walks around the Marina as we were not hasseled for time shares. Our favorite restraunt was Barcelona Tappas. Loved this place. We also did canopy tour through Los Veranos, which we loved and highly recommend. The only real downside to our trip, was the time shares. The Mayan Palace reps were absolutely the worst and most aggressive. We avoided as much as possible, but it still puts a damper on things.

All in all, we really enjoyed ourselves. Each vacation is what you make of it. However, I did find that I spent as much money here as we did in Kauai, and if I had my choice between the two destinations, I would choose Kauai hands down. However, if you are going to PV, I would highly recommend the Westin.

We just came back from the Westin in PV (Aug 9 - 15). It is certainly not a luxury hotel anymore. The hotel is actually split into 2 halves - one is the Westin and the other is "Club Regina" for time share holders. The building for the regular Westin guests faces over the 4 pools (which is fine), but all of the rooms look right into the side of the Club Regina building. There is no direct view of the bay or downtown PV......the way that they built the Westin building, you look right at the side of the Regina building. It ruins the view and atmosphere that you want and expect in a hotel like this. All of the other 200 resorts faced directly out into the bay......but, not the Westin. The side of the Regina building is in each and every one of my photos! Such a disappointment.

The rooms were very aged. We had enormous mildew stains on our ceiling and the mildew on the ironing board cover was awful. The bathrooms seemed clean enough and the house keeping service was fine.

The pool was always so dirty on the bottom! You would actually step on stuff and reach down to feel what it was. We found rocks, pens, etc.

The concierge there was probably the least helpful woman I've ever met. She was annoyed during the 2 times we walked up to ask her questions - she apparently would rather be doing something else with her time.

The beach is very narrow and not of a good quality. Another guest said that the whole area of the marina is really a swamp and that they "made" the beaches.

We ran and looked at the Marriott down the street and the whole place seemed cleaner and the buildings were angled for great views.

I think next time, I will forego the whole big resort experience (which was disappointing at the Westin) and try somewhere quaint downtown.

We weren't unhappy with the location as much as we were with the Westin.

hotel was very nice,
had a room on the 8th floor, very clean ac worked well,
beds very comfortable, and loved the bathrtoom with seperate tub/shower.
great view from balcony.
4 pools all nice, 2 swim up bars,
one problem was there were lots of ants crawling all over by the pool and even on the room floor, i dunno if thats how it is in all hotels but that was the only negative,
check in was simple got our rooms right away,
pv was really nice beach wasnt white sand and blue water but still very nice.
good bars and clubs , 'cheap booze and an overall good time.
also forecast was for rain all 6 days there not once did it rain, sunny and hot every single day. VERY HOT!!!!
drinks were a lil expensive in hotel swim up bars, but were made really well.
all in all very nice vacation in puerta vallarta

My husband and I just returned from a 5 day vacation in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico and stayed at the Westin. Overall the trip was very fun. The weather in PV was great even though the forecast predicted thunderstorms everyday. The pools at the hotel were nice and we do not have kids, so we spent all of our time at the pool that had the least children. The rooms were spacious and the ac worked great. The beds were more comfortable than most in Mexico (even at nicer resorts), but I do not think they were true Heavenly Beds. Service at the Westin was sub par especially compared to other Westin Hotels that we have stayed at. The front desk was slow and it took us three times of standing in line and being told to come back before we got our room. We also had a huge problem with being kept up at night by screaming children running up and down the hallways outside of our room (until 3:30am!). After two nights of this, we had to switch to a room on another floor which was a huge inconvenience and we were not offered any sort of compensation. We also had to wait for the bellhop to come get our bags and bring us our keys for our new room for about 45 minutes. The spa was nice. I got a massage which was average but enjoyable.

One thing to beware of is charges that are put to your room without your knowing. We got rafts by the pool a couple of days which they have as part of the towl hut. They do not charge for the towels so we assumed the rafts were also free. WRONG! They charged us $17 per raft at checkout. As much as we protested, they would not remove these charges.

The best part of our whole trip was the dinners that we went to. Some great places are La Palapa (on the beach right by the water), El Palomar de las Gonzalez (up in the mountains, beautiful view), PiPis (casual, in town Mexican) and Las Palomas (sit upstairs and look out over the water). I would highly recommend all of these, but El Palomar is a do not miss.