Playa del Carmen, Mexico (January 20, 2013) – For the fourth consecutive year since opening in 2008, Grand Velas Riviera Maya was awarded American Automobile Association’s (AAA) Five Diamond Award for lodging, an award for excellence in quality and service. According to the AAA website, each year AAA reviews more than 30,000 lodgings, while less than one-third of one percent make the AAA Five Diamond list.
Marking its fifth anniversary in the presence of special invited guests and the media, Grand Velas Riviera Maya also celebrated receiving the prestigious AAA Five Diamond Award for restaurants for Cocina de Autor, the only restaurant of an all-inclusive to receive the award in 100 years of AAA. Cocina De Autor Chefs Bruno Oteiza and Mike Alonso are disciples of the famed Chef Arzak of Northern Spain.
“It’s with great pleasure we receive these awards, as there are few hotels and restaurants in the world who enjoy this honor. We have made a commitment to ensure we will deliver the quality and service which made these awards possible for many, many years to come,” said Fernando Garcia Rossette, Managing Director of the exclusive resort located five minutes from Playa del Carmen on Mexico’s Caribbean Coast.
At a ceremony attended by Mexico’s State Secretary of Tourism, Laura Fernandez and Director of the Riviera Maya Tourist Board, Dario Flota, Regional Manager of AAA, Tony Perrone congratulated Grand Velas Riviera Maya for this important honor and added that Quintana Roo, together with New York and Las Vegas, have become the three cities in the world with the most number of hotels with Five Diamonds, no fewer than eight each.
The representative of AAA highlighted that approximately 25 percent of the adult population in the United States and Canada, namely 65 million people, are members of AAA “which demonstrates the trust and credibility that our affiliates have in the news, recommendations and recognitions of quality that we bestow worldwide”.
To celebrate this important event, Garcia Rossette invited a group of distinguished friends, destination management companies, hotel executives and media to a dinner with Bruno Oteiza and Mikel Alonso. Together with Xavier Perez Stone, they created a menú celebrating the delicacies of the Basque country incorporating flavors of traditional Mexican cuisine.
In just five years of operation, Grand Velas Riviera Maya has obtained major recognition including being part of the exclusive Leading Hotels of the World and The Leading Spas of the World, inclusión in Virtuoso’s prestigious list, and numerous awards by top travel and luxury lifestyle magazines such as Condé Nast Traveler and Travel + Leisure.
With these Five Diamonds of AAA, Grand Velas Riviera Maya, a proudly Mexican resort with 491 suites, begins 2014 reaffirming its tourism excellence and position as one of the best in the world for its luxury, comfort, hospitality, sophisticated gastronomy and spectacular spa. Grand Velas Riviera Maya’s sister resort, Grand Velas Riviera Nayarit, is also the recipient of the AAA Five Diamond Award for lodging.
For more reservations or more information on Grand Velas Riviera Maya, please email reservations@velasresorts.com, call 1-888-407-4869, or visit http://rivieramaya.grandvelas.com/.
