Quite possibly you are reading this review because you have just finished reading my review of LeBlanc Spa & Resort, Los Cabos!   If you organically found this review, you may want to read my review of LeBlanc first as I talk about travel protocols en route to Mexico.

PLEASE NOTE: THIS REVIEW IS INTENDED TO PROMOTE SALES AS A TRAVEL ADVISOR, I WOULD APPRECIATE YOUR BUSINESS IF YOU DECIDE THIS VACATION IS FOR YOU.

Following our 4 night stay at LeBlanc, we moved to the Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos.  This is my 3rd visit to the resort in 5 years and I have reviewed this resort previously, so I urge you to read my reviews:

Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos 2015

Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos 2019

I will mostly only touch on the Covid Protocols and our overall experience in this review. This resort had just opened on September 24th, we were checking in on October 13th, so they had only been open a couple of weeks and were still working on the “new normal” for procedures and protocols.  This was not my best stay at this resort, but I am choosing to give them a bit of grace during this time because I still feel that it is a good resort choice for the right client.  It’s also very hard going from a 5+ star luxury resort to a solid 4 star resort.

We arrived via taxi to the Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos, we were greeted with a friendly “hello”, our bags were taken for sanitization and held at the bellman station while we were checked in to the resort.  We were ushered through the foot sanitization station, we were given hand sanitizer and then escorted to the front desk where there was a plexiglas partition between us and the front desk employee.  Again, our temperatures were not taken upon arrival.  During the check-in process we were advised that they request that masks be worn whenever transiting the resort.  

Our room was ready, so once we were checked-in, we went to our room and our luggage was delivered promptly.  The rooms are sealed so that you know that they have been sanitized and ready for new guests.  They have put things like the toiletries and the remote control into bags that are sealed for sanitization, which is good.  There are no water or wine glasses in the room but you could easily get them to bring to the room if needed.  

The room itself was consistent with my previous stays.  It was clean and didn’t show any new signs of wear and tear.  We had a standard room with a sliver of an ocean view.  I could have paid to upgrade to the full ocean view room, but I knew that we would not be in the room enough to justify the upcharge.  Plenty of time to enjoy the ocean view from the pool!  We did notice when we went to bed that first night that the sheets felt damp.  It might have been because it had rained that day and perhaps some of the humidity got into the room while being set up, who knows.  We did have them refresh the room the next day and it was better.  

Dining:  This resort used to never take reservations in advance but due to Covid they decided to start so that they could avoid having crowds of people congregating while waiting for their tables.  A great idea but a bit problematic.  We attempted to make reservations for our first night and all they had were the regular tables in Dozo (Sushi/Teppanyaki) restaurant, which we took.  We then asked about making reservations for the rest of our stay and were told that we could only make them the day of starting at 9am.    We attempted to do this, though not quite at 9am because we are not early risers and each day it was a problem trying to get reservations.  We would often get managers involved and we would get our reservation.   You’d think that we’d see full restaurants but we could count numerous empty tables that remained empty while we dined.  

On our last day, we set an alarm to wake up at 9am to call and they told us that the French restaurant was full.  We didn’t see how that could be if they just started taking reservations at 9am, we were then told that they had been taking reservations for a couple of days.  Sometime during our stay, they changed the policy and started allowing advance reservations of more than the day of reservation.  Again, chalk it up to them learning what is working and what is not working, we just were not informed of the change. 

QR codes are the only way to view the menus.  They do not give you the option to have a paper menu at all. 

Food:  overall the food was good.  

Dozo:  my husband ordered sushi and he thought it was his best meal of the resort stay.  The rest of us ordered the teppanyaki dish but all agreed that our meat was tough and a little too well done.  We were never asked how we wanted out meat.   Service was a little slow in this venue but overall good. 

Hacienda Beach Grill:  Food was all good, no complaints.  Our problem here was that they were supposedly out of several items on the menu and tried to pass off a Rib Eye steak as a NY Steak to our friend.  When advised it was wrong, they then said they were out of NY Steaks, but the chef had already been cleaning and breaking down the grill as we were the last table to be served for the night.  We think that they probably didn’t want to cook another steak at that point. 

Zaffiro Italian:  Excellent, I think one of my best meals at this resort this time. We tried a variety of dishes and we had great service. 

Bon Vivant French:  Also excellent, once we got seated.  We did have the initial 9am problem with getting the reservation and then once we arrived they did not have our reservation, we were still seated after a bit of a scuffle about it.   For being “full” we were the only ones seated in our section of 4 tables (a section that would normally have about 10 tables before covid) for the first hour.   Food was very good and once again the flowing chocolate heart cake dessert that is more like a souffle was EXCELLENT!!    

La Plaza:  breakfast buffet, you can’t go wrong with that.  These are now assisted buffets, the servers roam around the room to help guests & serve food to their plates.  You then have a waiter who will bring you beverages.  

Poolside Dining:  we would order through our pool server a variety of food options that came from the Coco Cafe or the Taco Truck.  Quesadillas, tacos, hot dogs, burgers, fries, chips/guacamole, ceviche, etc.  Food was always consistent and good. 

Room Service:  we ordered breakfast on our check-out day so that we could pack while waiting for breakfast before our 9am ride to the airport.  This was a huge mistake and disappointment.  Delivered in a shopping bag, food in throw away containers, food was cold and just not very good.  My “crispy bacon” looked like it had died more than once.  They could not include a Cappuccino, so I had to go down to the Cafe to get my own.   It was just gross.   (this photo shows you the breakfast on the top from Le Blanc & the bottom photos are from this stay at the Hyatt Ziva) 

Fiesta Party:  They did have a Mexican Buffet one night out by the lagoon, the buffet was assisted and the food was good.  They also had Mexican singers and dancers who entertained us while dining.   

Summary & COVID PROTOCOLS:  Not my favorite stay at this resort, but it wasn’t terrible either.  We had great servers around the pool and in the restaurants.  The guy in the cafe for my morning cappuccino was super nice and friendly.  Friendly servers in both the sports and piano bars.   Still not a fan of the wines by the glass, you have two choices for red and two for white and both were mediocre.   Again, I choose to give them a little bit of grace.  We’ve all been through a tough year, I know when I received my first request to book a corporate trip after 3 months of not booking anything, I had to relearn the steps.  I’m sure these workers after having been off work for 6 months are also trying to get back into the groove once again. 

They really do enforce the mask wearing at this resort.  You have to wear one to/from your table in the restaurants.  You have to wear one in the lobby, in and out of the bars.  Some people would wear them while walking around the pool area, for the most part we did not because we could keep distance.  Of course, all employees are wearing masks all of the time.  They have the shoe sanitizing mats at the entrance of EVERY venue, this I found to be overkill and annoying.  I honestly don’t see the purpose because we’re not sitting on the floor, we’re not licking our shoes or the floor- but I guess it gives some people the perception of cleanliness.  We did get our temperatures taken before dinner in most of the restaurants but not all of them.  I think probably because the hostess was distracted between taking our name to check our reservation and seating us. 

I did reach out to my sales rep for the property when I returned and shared my experiences with her and I know that they are doing what they can to improve upon the experience so that guests do not have the same things to say going forward.  The fact that she wanted to discuss with me over the phone for 45 minutes says a lot.  She has also invited me back for 3 nights so that I can see for myself that the improvements have been made. 

To view current photos of this trip, please click here.

We had a prearranged ride to the airport with Mayaland.  They were at the resort at 850am for our 9am ride to the airport for our 12pm flight and we were ready early too.  We were at the airport in about 15 minutes, we had to show our reservation before we could enter the terminal & from there we printed our baggage tags on the self-serve consoles provided and walked right up to an agent to drop our bags and receive our boarding passes.  She asked us if we had completed the health questionnaire, which we had done so again and had the QR codes on our phone with our return flight information.  We headed up the escalator to security, they had one person collecting the health forms or looking at the QR codes (your temperature is taken without you knowing it while you’re at this stop), then you proceed to the next stop where they check your boarding pass and then proceed through the x-ray machines.  We had maybe 5-6 people ahead of us, the process was super easy.   

I posted on social media that we went from the curb to the Tequila store in 15 minutes.  Seriously.  We have a tradition when we leave any Mexican airport, we purchase a bottle of our favorite tequila:  Esperanto Tequila.  This time we bought two bottles because who knows when we’ll get back!   The Cabo airport was empty.  We really weren’t hungry so we decided to head towards our gate and had a few drinks at the bar.  I’d say we had maybe 20 people in the area until about 30 minutes prior to flight time and then it got busier but everyone kept distance and there was plenty of space to keep distance.  Hard to know how busy the rest of the airport was over the 2 hours that we had to wait, but we felt very comfortable and safe.   Our particular flight required a bus transfer from the terminal to the airplane.   I was impressed that they did not pack us into the bus like sardines, which I have had happen in the past, we had space, everyone was wearing their masks, it was all very civilized and the busses were sanitized between each use.  Our experience on Alaska airlines was similar to our outbound flight with middle seats empty and the same beverage and biscuit service on board.  We had another power bar for the ride home.   We flew into San Jose on the return and coming through Global Entry was a breeze.  All in all, a smooth return trip home! 

***Please note: airport experiences may vary based upon time of day, airline, etc.  Our friend went home a day earlier on the last flight of the day at 8pm.  She said the airport was like a ghost town.   I wish I could guarantee that you’ll always have this easy of an airport experience, but I simply cannot guarantee an airport experience with so many ever-changing variables****