We started our stay at an all inclusive hotel down the beach because our son's baseball team was staying there. We decided to make a vacation out of the tournament travel, so booked the rest of our stay at Villa La Estancia. OMG I'm so glad we decided to leave the other hotel and come to Villa La Estancia. The properties were night and day! I could not think of a single complaint about Villa La Estancia. We stayed in room 1307 with our 3 boys ages 11, 13 and 15. We were all comfortable, had plenty of room and the rooms were comfortable, very clean and well stocked. Our patio was spacious and had a great view. The service was TOP NOTCH, I've never had such amazing service at any other hotel. We tried our Spanish but it was helpful that most employees were able to fill in with English when needed.
The hotel restaurants were very good, so we ended up staying on property for most of our meals. The pools were fun. The beach isn't really the draw here as there are lots of vendors who approach you and the water is not swimmable most times of the year due to strong currents. We found we enjoyed our selves so much on the property we really didn't venture to the beach as often as I had thought we would. The only thing that could have improved our experience would be to have access to the pools at the sister properties. There are 3 hotels all connected, but outside of those 3 hotels you are a little isolated unless you take a 20 minute walk into town or down the beach. 20 minute walk either direction took you to places where the vibe was more like ""girls gone wild meets Vegas meets Disneyland"".
As that wasn't what we were going for, we stayed on the hotel property for most of the time. Having access to the pools at the other resorts within our property would have been nice as there is only one large pool on this property. Though it is a lovely pool, we just got a bit bored of it by day 4. I was solo with my 3 boys as my husband got sick while on vacation so I wasn't comfortable travelling into town by myself. Having Urgent Care on property also came in very handy! Doctor was great!