We just returned a couple of days ago from 3 nights at the Emporio Acapulco.

First thing, when arriving at Acapulco airport, don't sucker for the cab / return cab / entertainment / breakfast what-not that is offered by people there at the airport. It is a time-share ploy by the Mayan Plaza something or other, and they want to waste your vacation time. We weren't aware of this, and only through luck did we get our promised free dinner for two at La Perla without sitting through their presentation. We simply got mad and demanded a cab back, and they gave us all the goodies by mistake. La Perla and the cliff-diving was great though, and we ate free for our hour of wasted cab rides.

The hotel Emporio itself is nice enough, although understand that this is a third world country, and 5-stars means like 2 or 3 stars in the USA. The lobby is kept a little warm, like 80-84 degrees I think, and the lounge and adjoining buffet restaurant share the temperature.

The good -

The staff is mostly terrific. At the front desk during the daytime, a very lovely lass named Lucero helped us promptly, perfect english, bright smile. In the Condimento restaurant, we were always served breakfast beverages by Carlos, and he is a very pleasant young man, not such great english but he knows what people are asking for and he is very prompt, with a cheerful attitude. The buffet was actually quite good, and being from Texas ourselves, we are accustomed to Mexican food, and I ate papas con huevo and frijoles refrito with salsa every morning... Mmmmm, good stuff. In the evening we only ate there once, but they had carne asada that was very tender, and I enjoyed very much. The tres leches cake was incredibly good. In the lounge, the Coronas were brought promptly and wait staff very prompt, and we were careful to keep tossing out 10 pesos every trip. The poolside bar service was very good, prompt, and we were careful to tip them too, which kept them coming back regularly.

The rooms were comfortable enough. They don't rate 5 stars in the US, but they are clean and spacious. They have a slightly damp feel that is really normal for a coastal city. The reports that the mattresses are firm are true, but my wife and I are used to a firm mattress, and we had no trouble sleeping. The room cleaning service was very good, unintrusive, and we left 50 pesos (about $4.50) on the bed every day. For that minor tip, all of our shoes were lined up in the closet, the linens changed, our personal bathroom supplies such and toothbrushes, hairbrushes and medicines all neatly arranged. The housekeeping services were really superb.

The bad -

The family pool was closed, under construction. This was disappointing, as it is the one with the bar actually in the pool, and we were wanting to enjoy that.

The sushi bar was also closed. No reason was given, but the lady at the bar who spoke broken english said maybe it would re-open in a week.

The adult pool had been opened to everyone, and while it was rather crowded with kids, it was still roomy enough to not be a nuisance.

All of the above didn't bother me much. After all, they do have to refinish the pools at some point in time.

Finally, one thing that really got me irritable - The front desk would not accept American Express travelers checks. On a Sunday evening, when no banks were open, we could not get them to exchange travelers checks for pesos, they would only accept US cash for pesos. What kind of resort hotel doesn't accept American Express travelers checks??? They had an American Express credit card machine, but wouldn't accept the travelers checks, and I am considering calling American Express and reporting that their entire range of AmEx services aren't being accepted. We had reservations for La Perla and cliff diving, and I was about to panic because we had no pesos for a cab ride. I asked for a manager and was told she was eating dinner, then asked a bit later and was told there was no manager on duty. We managed to squeak around this by going down the street two blocks to Crown Plaza, acting like hotel patrons and getting their front desk to cash the travelers checks. By the way, this scored some points with me for Crown Plaza. I like my resorts to be very accomodating.

All in all, it was a pleasant enough trip. Given the choice, I'm not sure I'd stay in the Emporio again as opposed to other hotels in the area, but I'm not disappointed in my stay. It was alright. Some good, some not so good, but certainly interesting.

I visited the Emporio last spring with a group of my friends. I would have to say the service was the best that I have every seen, because the waiter “David” making sure that we had everything that we could possibly need. All inclusive was great too. We never left our beach hut all week because the food/drinks were awesome. Vendors can be a little ridiculous…but I did end up buying 15 straw hats!!

My biggest problem and most likely the man reason why I won’t go back especially because I’m single is that my friends and I meet some really nice girls that week from a different hotel. When we invited them over to hangout they were stop in the main lobby. Hotel manger won’t let them up to our rooms saying that outsides guest weren’t allowed. So alright there are rules but when I spend $2000 on a vacation I would think that I could have a guest in my hotel room. Isn’t that what vacations are about finding love??? But rules are rules and I understand this. The problem I have is that rules can suddenly change when money is involved… right in front of girls the manager asks to me to pay money to let them hangout with us. It was something stupid like I had to pay $40 a girl a night. This is suppose to be a 4+ star hotel that I pay good money for, this isn’t suppose to be a hotel that I pay by the hour. My girlfriends never felt so cheap and like hookers in their entire life. It’s not like I picked up some random prostitute on the street and try to bring them into the hotel or had an afterhour’s party and brought in 30+ people. I just think the hotel workers are trying to make few extra bucks by making my guest feel like trashy women. If your single guy ask them the first day if you can pay the hooker fee for your week stay so the security guards don’t make your girlfriends feel like tramps.

I checked into the Hotel Emporio on very early in the morning on Wednesday, June 13th and checked out after 20 minutes. We were given a room on the 4th floor, which upon entering the room looked great, but which had a nasty musty smell. I was willing to wait it out and see if turning the A/C on eliminated the odor, but that's when we spotted small, gnat-like insects crawling all over the floor and table in the room. We called the front desk and they said they would come up to check it out, but after 10 minutes, we just decided to go downstairs. They gave us another room on the 9th floor. That room had the same musty odor, but didn't have insects crawling - instead, the insects were on the floor dead which means that housekeeping is pretty lousy. Also, the beds had hairs (short, kinky ones) on the sheets -- the sheets look like they hadn't been changed at all! It was pretty gross. We checked out and headed to the Fairmont Acupulco Princess....what a difference!

I stayed at this hotel while attending a conference in Acapulco for my work. Several of us booked Friday and Saturday nights following the conference for a small vacation before heading home. The hotel did not honor these reservations despite the fact that they were made 4 months ahead of time. Instead they kicked all of us out on Friday. I imagine there were at least 50 of us in this situation since this was one of three hotels for a conference of 350+ people.

In addition, I was traveling with my one year old daughter and needed a refrigerator for milk and food for her. They originally said that this would be provided, but when I got there they would not give us the key to the refrigerator in the room and accused me of needing it for drugs. When my husband and I finally convinced them it was for milk, they insisted on filling it with drinks or they would charge an additional fee for using the refrigerator. In any event it took from 5pm when we arrived on Monday until 11pm that night until they finally opened the refrigerator in the room for us.

Upon leaving the hotel, they had me sign, but did not give me an itemized receipt of our stay. I am still having trouble getting this receipt which I need for our travel office at work.

This hotel has great pools for kids and adults, so-so restaurants, and nice decor, but do not expect to get what they tell you they will provide in services. If you are traveling with kids I recommend the Hotel Sands across the street. They happily provided us with a nice minifridge for free no questions asked. They were polite and had nice, clean rooms and did not suprise us with any extra charges at the end of our stay. (This is the hotel we went to when the Emporio kicked us out!).