Mexico ~ Bahia Principe Residences & Golf Community – 1

Posted in: Blog, Countries, Mexico, Random, Retirement, Travel|July 11, 2012No Comments

My visit to the Bahia Principe Residences and Golf Community on the Riviera Maya in Mexico.

At Life Rich Real Estate Inc. we always try to visit developments in our Portfolio whenever possible. This enables us to speak first hand about the development, the destination and what it has to offer to our clients. As with all our developers, Bahia Principe has an exclusive money saving offer for clients of Life Rich Real Estate Inc. – don’t miss out – be sure to contact us for more information on these offers. My next couple of blogs will be on my recent visit to the Bahia Principe Residences and Golf Community which is located about an hour south of Cancun in the Riviera Maya.

Day 1

I opted to take the early morning flight from Toronto with a connection in Miami that had me landing in Cancun just shortly before 1pm. (There are direct flights available from Toronto to Cancun however as this is off season they tend to be a little pricey. The flight with one stop that took a little longer to get there saved me close to $500 on the price of my ticket.)

I had forgotten how large the airport was at Cancun so it was a little bit of a hike to Immigration, once there clearing immigration was fast, efficient and the officers were very friendly & welcoming.

I entered the luggage hall and headed for the carousel; to my surprise my luggage was already waiting for me. I picked up my luggage and found the end of the very long queue of passengers with their luggage lined up to go through customs.

Everyone was moving forward in an orderly fashion a step at a time – I had to chuckle as it reminded me of one of those movies where everyone is hypnotized & moving into a doorway to the unknown.

At customs all your luggage is x-rayed. Once through the x-ray you hand your form to the customs officer who reviews it briefly and then you have to push the button – green light you are on your way, red light you proceed to the secondary inspection which involves a physical inspection of your bag. I got the green light and headed out through the myriad of taxi touts into the bright sunshine. It only took about 30 minutes to get from the plane through customs and on my way which from my past travel experience I thought that was pretty good.

The drive down to the Bahia Principe from Cancun took just under an hour thanks in part to the new bridge through Playa del Carmen and an excellent highway. It was a pretty uninterrupted drive, only slowing down to go through a couple of towns & a single lane police check-point heading into Playa del Carmen – Christopher says that they are primarily checking for unlicensed or unsafe cars, drunk drivers – certainly nothing ‘sinister’ and it serves to slow the traffic down going through Playa del Carmen as it is a very busy town both with locals and the tourists.

What struck me from the moment we left the airport was how good the highway was, how courteous the drivers are and how clean everywhere was – no litter at the side of the roads, no graffiti.

Sian Ka’an Lobby

Arriving at the Grand Bahia Principe Sian Ka’an (Don Pablos collection) all inclusive resort we were greeted by very attentive bell hops, I was checked in and shown to my room. I changed and freshened up and headed back to the Yul Ku buffet restaurant to meet Christopher for some lunch (there was way too many choices!).

After lunch Christopher and I went over to the Bahia Principe sales office, in the Golf Club house, to meet the rest of his team and plan a schedule for the next couple of days that would give me the best overview and experience of the Bahia Principe Residences and Golf Community development and the surrounding areas.

As there were very few golfers out on the course it was safe enough for us to take a golf cart for a quick tour of the fabulous Robert Trent Jones Jr. designed golf course.

It really is an amazing course – they have done a great job of using the natural landscape to provide the challenge – Cenotes provide magnificent water hazards & the jungle gives ‘the rough’ a whole new meaning. You can play dodge the iguanas and other wildlife as you challenge the course. It really is an outstanding course that they hope will become PGA standard in the next couple of years once the course has matured.

After the tour around the golf course I headed back to the hotel – it was hot, it had been a long day & I needed a rest before dinner.

I had a late dinner at the Maiko Restaurant – Japanese/Oriental a la carte restaurant in the Sian Ka’an resort (it’s an ‘all inclusive’ resort) . It was an excellent meal with great service and surprisingly good Sake.

I wandered back to my room along pathways that wind through the lush landscaping past the Alux restaurant, the night-lit pools and the Cenote Snack bar that is open 24/7.