Samba Vallarta - All Inclusive

The Italian restaurant is better than the Mexican. Unfortunately, they never had mussels during our stay. It’s kind of weird they charge for room keys - 60 pesos The staff is so so. The buffet is so so. The bar service is crazy slow. There was like one bartender at the bar by the pool. I also think it’s interesting that there isn’t a swim up bar

I like the activities and the pool area. I disliked the foul smell of mold in the rooms. I had to switch rooms after I was gaslighted about the mold smell. The. Mold smell was bad that it caused a headache thought my stay.

Variety of food Staff very friendly Beach was great A little loud with the entertainment at the pool Room didn’t have a balcony or view Black birds getting to be to many and lots of bird shit

Beach access, pool and service

Other than the rooms needing updating, everything was super clean and very comfortable. Beds & pillows comfortable. The staff were awesome. Food and drinks were lovely. Daily mini-bar refreshments. Our cleaning lady Alma was a lovely person. We liked everything- no complaints.

The staff worked very hard and the resort was clean. The beach and pool was nice The room we were given was not the room we booked . We complained and were moved a couple of days later to a nicer room. From talking to other guests,,found that was a common occurrence. The hotel is old and nothing has been done to update it. The lighting in the room is not very good and was difficult to get hot water. The buffet was okay. But on specialty nights the food selection did not make sense. For example on Italian night, only one pasta dish. The bar staff worked hard but kept running out of coke light. Lobby bar was always overcrowded before dinner and furniture needs updating.

The only good thing was the location and the fact that it was beachfront. The beach is nice, but that has nothing to do with the resort. The resort is quite rundown, several areas are closed down or red-taped off. The food was mediocre at best. Overall the service is terrible. Roughly half of the staff were very rude and unhelpful, I lost count of how many times I was ignored or turned away. They are understaffed so there’s a line up for everything, and as a result the resort is a mess throughout the day. Housecleaning only came about half the days, and refused to change dirty sheets until after we checked out. There is also next to nothing to do during except sit at the pool or beach, good luck keeping your kids entertained. There’s also an infestation of hornets at the beach that they do nothing about. No one cleans up the dirty cups that people leave behind and it draws in all the bugs, by later in the day the chair area is almost uninhabitable.

The location was great, right on the beach with showers and washrooms nearby. The cleaning crew for the rooms and corridors did a good job. Honestly, when I read previous reviews about the aviary situation, I thought they meant there were a few birds occasionally flying around. The reality is the Samba management has thoroughly failed to deal with the unsanitary environment caused by large flocks of birds landing the roofs, snack bar, and restaurants of the resort, eating off plates that were left unattended and pooping everywhere. In Canada, the resort will fail food safety inspection. The buffet was mediocre at best. The snack bar food was really not good, especially when it’s left out for hours in a bird infested area.

A lot of noise construction next door. Really bad odors from the source or alcantarilla. Bad customer service. Nothing

The staff was friendly, and being beachfront is nice. The beds by the pool facing the beach were nice for relaxing duing the day or evening. The facility is very dated. The pool was so cloudy we both were too concerned for our saftey and health to swim in it. They advertise multipel pools but its really just 1 pool with walkways across it that I guess they use that to call them seperate pools. The food was underwhelming, and if you stay for only 1 night, you only get two meals (dinner and breakfast) since you check in after lunch ends. The hours of the bars are staggered so despite having multipel bars, often only 1 or 2 are open, causing long lines. For $250 USD for 1 night, and in off season, we expected a lot more. We would not return. Waste of money.

Very comfy and staff is very friendly Pool is little bit dirty

The food was excellent. And the staff were very kind There was a lot of birds living on the tile roof and they would poop in the pool everyday

The customer service was great. The food was very good. This is an old hotel. My room specifically had a bad humid smell. The worst part was it was on the bedding specifically the pillow. I had brought Fabreeze, but even that did not help. Quite honestly, the good food and customer service made up for it.

The pool is big and nice no complaints.. On my second day the housekeeper lady took $200 dollars out my wallet. We filed a report and nothing happened they clearly didn’t care all they said was it was our fault for forgetting to put away our wallet. If you plan on staying here just make sure not to forget any valuables while you are out.. Another reason why I wouldn’t recommend this resort is the food, It’s all bad especially the Italian restaurant. It’s a very old and outdated hotel, it definitely needs a good renovation, My bathroom had a huge flood due to my shower head dripping and splashing out the tub while we were out in the pool.

The building is old

We had a wonderful stay. The beds were comfortable; the resort and rooms were clean. We were always able to find something to eat; however that would be the only negative. Sometimes the bread wasn’t fresh, there weren’t always vegetarian options, and the fresh pizza or other popular dishes ran out quickly and weren’t restocked. We also found the activities coordinator Pancho to be disrespectful and rude, he often made jokes that were making fun of guests and had activities where he changed the rules midway as to who would win. The other activity staff were great.

Pros: Waiters, bartenders, housekeeping staff were all amazing. Nice small resort with a laid back vibe A la carte restaurants were good and easy to book We were usually able to get a chair by the beach or pool Good location for walking Beautiful beach We arrived to a not so great room, facing the parking lot and a fence. The noise from the Riu was loud. The balcony had a couple of old cafeteria chairs and you had to crawl over the bed to access it (not that you'd want to anyway) The room smelled like mold and mildew. And of course sewer. Finally after day four, we were moved to a pool view, beautiful room. It was great. The front desk staff were hard to deal with. They did not want to move us out of the bad room, and they treated us poorly when we insisted. We weren't the only ones complaining about rooms. It seemed like every time I went to the desk, someone else was also getting the run around. Management should advertise those rooms as third rate, and avoid all the hassle. Or bring them up to an acceptable level.

The food was great and the staff was very friendly The bed is a little uncomfortable

None None

The very friendly staff and extremely comfortable beds Quite in need of some updates around the property. Food in buffet was mediocre. Specialty restaurants ok. Value for your money adequate