It was that time of year again to take the family on vacation. This year, we decided to trade out our timeshare at Cibola Vista Resort and Spa in Phoenix, Arizona, for one at the Palm Canyon Resort and Spa in Palm Springs, California.
The trip started out great. It was only a three-hour drive with plenty of good sites to see on the way. We were pleased with appearance of the resort when we arrived.
As we stood in line at the 4 p.m. check in time, there was an assortment of people ahead of us. We chatted with people around us and listened to the noise of the front desk. The attendant clearly wasn’t having as good a day as we were. One couple was upset that their room was not a pool side room. They demanded a pool side room and would wait on the sofa until the attendant fixed the situation. Another lady also had issues and she made a few unprintable comments to the rest of us waiting in line. Hum, I hoped that I still had a room.
It was our turn next and everything went smooth. They had a two bedroom, one bath suite waiting for us; however, it was not poolside. Should we have complained also? No. We were excited to be on vacation and it was more quiet on the backside with beautiful views of the mountain.
The room was pretty nice, but they liked to mix cheap particle board furniture in with nicer furniture. We had a large balcony, a fully equipped kitchen, and a Jacuzzi style hot tub in the bathroom. I took the computer with us so that I could do a little work while I was there, but that turned out to be the one thing that drove me crazy. We were near the end of the building and the wireless signal was not very strong. In order for me to use the internet, I had to walk down the hall about two doors and sit on the floor.
After we settled into our room, it was time to explore the resort. They have a gorgeous pool with two sections: A shallow end for kids and a deeper end. The shallow end featured two slides separated by a rope. My son enjoyed the little slide and I enjoyed the big slide. The shallow end ranged from one and a half feet to four feet. The deeper end ranged from three feet to five feet and sported a volleyball net for recreation. We spent a lot of time in the pool as the water was excellent.
Between the two pools was a large rock formation with tables at the top and the start of the big slide. Several waterfalls provided a smoothing and relaxing aura. A tunnel inside the Rock formation led to a set a bathrooms and a hot tub that peered through one of the falls overlooking the pool. They had a towel section and the attendant would fill up any of your floatable devices for free. They had another hot tub on the outside of the rocks near the end of the pool set at a hot 103 degrees.
They had a bar at the side of the pool and a restaurant where you could order food. We never tried the bar, but we did eat from the restaurant. I tried to order a pizza from the room and I requested to pick it up. I was told that if I wanted to pick it up I would have to go there and order it, which I did. I went down and ordered a large pepperoni pizza, which they made in record time. Although the pizza was good, we soon realized why it was done in record time, it could have been cooked a little more. Oh, back to the room.
The room came with ants free of charge. I called the front desk and, maintenance came up and sprayed the bathroom. The next day, my wife found ants in the kitchen. Again we called, again they quickly sent someone up to spray, again we found ants, but why call, they were just going to send up another band aid to fix the situation that required more. My one-year old daughter ended up having over twenty bites. When I told the attended at the front desk, she seemed unfazed and she offered nothing for our situation. Okay, back to exploring the resort.
They had a nice activity room with a pool table, a large TV with some outdated movies to watch, a Macintosh computer that you could use if you knew how to and bought the internet service, which was cheap at $20 dollars for a seven day period. They also had a game room around the corner with three or four games.
It was time to check out the exercise room. I have yet to find a good exercise room in either a resort or a hotel. This resort had a larger weight room than normal with two treadmills, several dumbbells, and a few weight machines. The equipment was tired and needed replaced, but it was a better exercise room than normal. They also had an indoor basketball court, which could be viewed through the exercise room’s large windows.
The resort also had a spa for facials and massages, a guest services office and a sales office just in case you were interested in buying time at the resort. It was now time to see what Palm Springs had for entertainment.
We went to the concierge desk and he was very helpful. They had lot of brochures and he knew the area well. We visited several entertainment spots such as Boomer’s, the Living Desert, San Jacinto State Park, Downtown’s Thursday night street party, and several restaurants through out the Palm Springs, Cathedral City, and Desert Palms area.
Overall, this resort had a nice look to it, the pool was excellent, the customer service could be improved, the room was nice and spacious, the parking was limited, and the internet was horrible in the our end unit.
Palm Canyon Resort and Spa was and is a good place for a family vacation. No place is perfect and as for the people that were unhappy when we checked in, you can’t please everyone and someone will always find something to complain about.
Would we return to this resort? If we were to go to Palm Springs again, probably. Would I recommend this resort to someone else? I would if the Marriott Resort was full or unavailable. To cap it off, we had an excellent time on our vacation.
