I’m sure we’re not the only ones who had to cancel a few trips in 2020 because of COVID. Nedless to say, we were starting to get a little bit of cabin fever. We decided to go ahead and book a vacation in Mexico. Since we are all vaccinated, it seemed like a great time to go. After looking through many resorts in Cancun, we ended up deciding on the Dreams Natura. We spent 7 relaxing days at the pool and beach. Our trip was just what we needed! I wanted to share our experience at Dreams Natura for those of you looking to book a vacation in Cancun!

Room

We stayed in the Junior Suite Ocean View. It was very nice and spacious with a large king bed that was so comfy! (Really! We actually wanted to ask what mattress it was so we could buy one for ourselves!) It had a small seating area with a coffee table and couch which pulled out to another bed. We spent a few mornings on the peaceful and private balcony where we ordered room service breakfast. The balcony had 2 chairs and a small table.

All of the AM resorts we have been to, have a large countertop in the living area in the room. It is nice to have so much counter space even though it inevitably gets cluttered with clothes, sunscreen, snacks, etc. There was a small mini fridge that was (supposed to be) refilled daily with soft drinks, water and beer. We had a small wardrobe closet with a safe and a lot of drawers to unpack our clothes into. (Side note, does anyone else put their clothes in the drawers or do you live out of a suitcase?)

The bathroom was spacious with a double sink, toilet area and shower. The one thing I had read about the bathrooms at this resort was that there was no bathtubs which makes it difficult to bathe small children. I found a little inflatable that I packed with us so we could give Charlee a bath, Here is the one we used and it worked great! We were a little disappointed there was no tub, but we came prepared and made it work.

We don’t usually spend a lot of time in the room, so it’s rare that we upgrade. However, this trip was definitely different with a baby in tow and we were regretting not getting a different room. As a new mommy, I didn’t even think about nap time and that I would have to be going back and forth to the room for the baby to sleep. We kind of wished we would have gotten a swim out room so I could have still been able to relax by the pool with the baby asleep just steps away. They did provide a crib upon request. I forgot to get a good photo but here is what it looked like.

Food

I feel like when I talk about food, it’s always one of the longer things I write. The short story is… we love food!

One of the reasons we decided to go to Dreams Natura was because we have been to 3 other AM Resorts (find my post about Breathless Resort Cancun here) and have great food at all of them. Something we love about AM Resorts is that you do not have to make reservations for dinner. We find that when we’re on vacation, we don’t like to stick with a timeline. This is even more true now with a baby! We enjoy the flexibility to be able to spend as much time as we want at the pool or beach, leisurely make our way back to the room to shower and change, and get to dinner whenever all three of us are ready. Vacations are about what you want to do, not what you have to do, right?

Restaurants

Dreams Natura resort is all-inclusive (which is the only way to go in my opinion) and has 7 different restaurant options for dinner and 3 options for lunch. There is a buffet that is open for all meals. This is where we went most mornings for breakfast. You can also order room service for any meal but the hours are slightly limited right now because of COVID. It really only affects late night service though. We ordered room service for breakfast one morning. One of my husband’s pet peeves is when his food is cold but we were pleasently surprised when our food showed up nice and warm! It was perfect and delicious!

For lunches, we usually went to the Bluewater Grill which was located right next to the baby pool where we spent most of our vacation. It is the perfect spot to get out of the sun for a bit and have a good burger, or my favorite, ceviche! Another option for lunch was the beach bar. To be honest, we were pretty disappointed in the options there though. They had a menu but were always “out” of everything on it. There was a pizza oven and pizza was on their menu, but we never did see anyone with pizza the entire time we were there. I’m sure a lot of it has to do with COVID and the resorts running on less staff, but still a little bit of a bummer when we felt like just hanging out by the pool for lunch.

Dinner is one of my favorite parts of staying at an AM Resort. They have themed restaurants that have really good a la carte menus to choose from. My favorite restaurant was the French Restaurant Bordeaux. We loved the escargot, foil Gras, puff pastry salmon and of course, the creme brûlée! All the restaurants at Dreams Natura allow kids, except for this one. We were very fortunate to have my parents with us who offered to watch Charlee while we went to dinner, but there is childcare available. We realized it was the first time we had dinner as just the two of us since before Charlee was born!

The coffee shop had good hot and cold drinks as well as shakes and pastries. Around lunchtime, they would put out small sandwiches and snacks. An afternoon ice cream was also a must have and the flavors varied each day.

The other restaurants there that we ate at over the week are the Mexican restaurant, El Patio, a seafood restaurant, Oceana, Italian restaurant, Portofino, Asian restaurant, Himitsu, and a steakhouse, the Bluewater Grill (opened for lunch and dinner). Like I mentioned before, the buffet is always an option too, be we enjoyed getting dressed up a little and having a nice sit down dinner.

One thing to mention was that the food here didn’t seem to be to the same quality that we have had at other AM resorts. I have a feeling it was because of COVID and they were running lower staff. It’s hard to say because we have never been to a Dreams Resort where kids are allowed (vs adults only where they may have heigher standards on food???) and we have also never been to this specific resort.

The buffet was a little difficult to use because they were (understandably) not allowing guests to serve themselves and required a staff member to serve you. Here again, they seemed very understaffed and there was only 1-2 people serving so there were long lines around most things. I would say overall, the food was still good, just not as great as we have had at their other resorts. This being said, it didn’t necessarily detract from our vacation.

Beach

Are you a sunbathe-by-the- beach person or a lounge-by-the-pool person? One of the first questions people ask about our resort is “how was the beach?” If you have been to Cancun at all in the last few years, you probably know about the seaweed problem they are having. They do a good job of cleaning up as much as they can, however the the job is endless.

I will say they have a pretty large beach from the resort to the ocean that is clean and free of seaweed. There isn’t a shortage of beach chairs and umbrellas either. We spent most of our time by the baby pool, but we did spend a little time in the sand under the umbrellas. We thought they did an amazing job of clearing the seaweed to make the beach very enjoyable. Make sure you take a short walk to the edge of the resort property to watch the crocodiles!

Activities

For this vacation, we decided to stay at the resort and didn’t do any excursions outside the resort. With a baby and COVID, we figured it would be safest to stay in and enjoy what the resort had to offer.

Most days we simply found our spot near the baby pool, and let the baby splash around in the water. If you have kids, this place is awesome! (And even if you’re a kid at heart!). There are 3 separate pools to enjoy, one being adults only with a swim up bar. There is an infinity edge pool and a baby pool that gradually goes in to about 2 ft.

One thing we enjoyed at least once a day was the lazy river. Although we had to ask to have it turned on several mornings, it was peaceful and relaxing to grab a tube and float around the river. The lazy river is right next to the 3 water slides, one enclosed, one open and one that you use a tube to ride down. Marc and I took the double tube down many times! There is a kids water park located behind the slide area but we didn’t use it because it is more for kids who are a little older than Charlee.

Spa

You can’t really call it a vacation if you don’t go to the spa, right? One of our favorite things to do on vacation is to book a couples massage. We have had some of the best massages when on vacation and Dreams Natura was no different!

The spa a Dreams Natura is super unique! It looks like a cave! I would highly recommend the hydrotherapy circuit if you do nothing else. If you’ve never done one before, let me explain. You basically go through a series of pools with different jets and temperatures. We started out by pulling a chain to dumping a bucket of cool water over us. It was surprisingly after being in the heat outside. Next we went to the steam room and sauna. The hydrotherapy pools were after that. We moved through “stations” with jets and sprays that massaged you shoulders, upper and lower back, submerged loungers with relaxing bubble jets, and an ice pool followed by a hot tub where they brought us refreshing hibiscus water. It was so relaxing and got is ready for our massage!

Transportation

Cancun is so easy to get to from Denver and definitely played into our decision to go there. We had a direct flight from Denver to Cancun in just under 4 hours. We usually book thorough Apple Vacations and they include the airport transfers. Charlee was a great little traveler on her first flight. Let’s hope she stays this way! Everything was so easy and we were on the beach by 1pm!

I would love to hear about your trip if you have stayed at Dreams Natura. Please leave any questions you have about the resort below!