My Favorite Free Vacation: Hyatt Zilara Properties in Cancún and Punta Cana

Last updated Oct. 2021

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My friends, allow me to introduce you to – without hyperbole – the greatest discovery of my twenties: The Hyatt Zilara properties.

I’ve been to the Cancún location four times (confessions of a #Texan) and the Punta Cana location once, for my honeymoon.

Allow me to grace you with the high points:

• They’re five-star, all-inclusive resorts, and not the kind of all-inclusive where you can tell the kitchen threw 47 DiGiorno pizzas in the oven for poolside lunch: The kind of all-inclusive resort where they’ll custom-make eggs Benedict with so much care and concern that you’d think their life depended on the perfection of the poached egg. These are nice all-inclusive resorts with great drinks, beautiful facilities, and friendly staff.

• They have three locations: Cancún, Punta Cana, and Rose Hall (in Jamaica) – but I can only speak to Mexico and Punta Cana, as those are the two I’ve been to.

• There’s a sister property that you’ll have access to, the Hyatt Ziva. Hyatt Zilara is adults only, while Ziva allows children. They have distinctly different vibes, but having access to both (especially in Punta Cana) is great. You can book at either, but know that if you have kids, you won’t be able to bring them to Zilara – but if you can pawn them off on a well-meaning patron of the resort, you and bae can head next door. This is why I’m not a parent.

• I consider this the best discovery of my twenties because of how cheap it is – but not cheap dollars-wise, cheap points-wise: I just ran a search for November (a great time to check out Cancún) and the cost is $663 per night:

• But if you were to book with Hyatt points, you’d only pay 25,000 points per night! How does one get 25,000 Hyatt points, you ask? Easy. You sign up for the Chase Sapphire Preferred card (at 60,000 points) and transfer them to Hyatt. Bada-bing, bada-boom – you’ve got 2.25 free nights.

(For an article fully dedicated to how to transfer your points to Hyatt, check this out.)

The only thing I’ll note: You need to be flexible with your dates. For some time periods, the cost is 40,000 points per night, so you’ll need to click around the calendar and find a date range where every night is 25,000 points.

But if you assume the average cost is $600 per night, 2 x $600 = $1,200 value for your 60,000 points!

Other considerations

• Transportation: I recommend booking your transportation through the resort as well. They have two options (a van and an SUV) and while they’re expensive (I believe it’s $150 roundtrip), having safe, reliable transportation is priceless in other countries. The Cancún airport is a bit of a feeding frenzy and we’ve had drivers pretend to be ours before, so try not to engage with the drivers who flag you down as you’re exiting – look for the Zilara employee with your name on a sign, and only go with him. (Trust me – the schemes and scams are extreme.)

• Tips: Bring cash for tips. I know, I know – I said it was a free trip – but the staff are amazing, and you’ll want to tip them generously. We usually tip $5-$10 per meal (depending on how much we ate and drank) and $1 per drink, so you can extrapolate from there. $30 per day is probably fine, but bring cash ahead of time and don’t plan on relying on the ATM in the lobby or cash advances unless you love paying extra fees (I assume you don’t).

• Vibe: This is definitely a place to go and relax. The Punta Cana resort has a literal waterpark with crazy slides (which is super fun), but it’s (generally speaking) a laidback vacation. If you’re interested in eating and drinking delicious food and beverages and lounging by an infinity pool, this is the trip for you. If you’re trying to go on crazy hikes and see the sites, maybe not.

• Spas: The Hyatt Zilara in Cancún has a spa day pass for $25 (an amazing value) where you can use the sauna, steam room, cold plunge, and other amenities. I did this once on a day where it rained, and it was lovely. The Punta Cana resort’s spa day pass is far more expensive (like, $200) so I didn’t bother. Just something to note if you’re planning to use the spa.

Which Hyatt Zilara resort do I like most?

Objectively speaking, the Punta Cana location is nicer and has more restaurants (it was opened in late 2019, so it’s practically brand new as there weren’t many guests in 2020), but I actually think I’m going to pledge my allegiance to Mexico for a few reasons:

• Poolside: The cabanas are free/first come, first serve. In Punta Cana, you have to reserve them for $100 per day, which annoyed me.

• Size: Cancún’s resort is a lot smaller, so it’s easier/faster to get around. I felt like we were walking a lot in Punta Cana (which is fine!), but it seemed to take longer to do everything as a result.

• Familiarity and ease of access: Since I’ve been to the Mexico location four times, I feel like it’s a second home. I know exactly how to order my free room service cake after dinner. I know the room layouts. I know where I’m eating breakfast every day. I like the familiarity of the experience, because it helps me relax more – that said, if you’ve never been to either, you could theoretically achieve the same in Punta Cana with ease. The only shortcoming to Punta Cana (in the Dominican Republic) is that (for me, in Colorado) it’s harder to access. I have to take a connecting flight and have a longer, more expensive day of travel than when I fly nonstop to Cancún. When I lived in Dallas, we could do weekend trips to Cancún because it was so close.

Speaking of travel, what about flights to the Hyatt Zilara?

This is a trickier answer, as it fully depends on where you live.

For example, if you live in Atlanta, your best bet is Delta. Dallas? American or Southwest. Denver? Probably United or Southwest.

The point is, your location will impact which airline deserves your loyalty, but in general, the best “points redemption” programs are Southwest’s Rapid Rewards program and United’s MileagePlus program.

I’d recommend picking an airline card and snagging it a few months after you grab the Sapphire card (90 days is generally a safe bet for a second application).

This blog highlights my favorite, and why.

Interested in leveling up your travel rewards game?

Check out my full breakdowns:

• My overall strategy and 5-step process for achieving travel rewards world domination

• My strategy for couples specifically, to generate nearly $10,000 in free travel

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