Quick Getaway to Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa

Last week, my husband and I took a last-minute kid-free getaway to Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa just north of Albuquerque, New Mexico. I booked flights from DFW to ABQ on American Airlines using Alaska Airlines miles. We splurged on First Class seats since they were only 9000 miles each way (economy was 4500 Alaska miles). Hard to beat that price!

Pros and Cons of Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa

Pros:

• Category 4 property, which means you can use your free night certificates from the Chase World of Hyatt credit card
• Resort is a quick 30-minutes from the airport, yet it feels very secluded
• Gorgeous mountain and desert views
• Large adults-only pool
• Plenty of free and paid on-site activities so you can be occupied even if you don’t leave the resort

Cons:

• No kids club and no lazy river, which are available at comparable Hyatt resorts inTexas
• Some rooms are quite far from the lobby area, which may be an issue for people with mobility issues

Booking and Arrival

I was actually quite surprised that rooms were available on points over the July 4th holiday, considering I cooked up this trip just a few weeks in advance. I used Hyatt points (transferred from Bilt) to book 3 nights at 15,000 points per night.

The great thing about Albuquerque is that traffic is nothing compared to the DFW area. Our drive from the airport was around 30 minutes. The road to the resort is a few miles long, and it feels like the middle of nowhere.

Front entrance of resort:

The lobby and restaurants are decorated in a Southwest motif.

Our Room

We stayed in a room with a King bed and sofa bed. The room was fairly large:

The bed was comfortable, and we had our choice of hard and soft pillows.

Our room had a balcony that overlooked the adults-only pool:

Resort Dining

Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa has 3 restaurants plus a grab-and-go quick service store. Our first morning, we ate breakfast at Santa Ana Cafe and tried their famous blue corn pancakes. Yummy!

The next two mornings, we grabbed a small bite from the Trading Post grab-and-go and ate outside with these gorgeous views:

On our last night, we splurge on a fancier dinner at Corn Maiden restaurant, which was very good. I highly recommend the whipped ricotta appetizer.

Resort Activities

Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa has an onsite golf course and spa, but we didn’t experience either of these. It has 3 pools: adults-only pool (pictured above), a family pool with water slide and jacuzzi and an oxbow unheated pool with a nearby splash pad.

The pools had drinking water stations and plenty of lounge chairs and pool towels available. The resort offered some special activities by the pools for July 4th:

Free resort activities included:

• Tennis/pickleball/corn hole/basketball/horseshoes
• Guided nature walk
• Self-guided walking trails
• Pueblo oven bread buffet
• Cultural Learning Center
• Fire pit s’mores
• Bike rentals

Since it cooled down significantly in the evenings, we did enjoy walking the nature trails on property:

We also made s’mores on our last evening:

Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa has a nearby stables where you can go horseback riding and see a rodeo (for a fee):

In addition, the resort offered craft activities for kids (for a fee) and additional cultural activities.

Offsite Activities

New Mexico has a lot to offer, but we decided to keep our driving distance to a minimum since we were only there a few days. We limited our activities to things we could reach in an hour or less.

We took the Sandia Peak Tramway to the top:

View were great, and we hiked around a bit before coming back down:

After the tramway, we spent some time in Old Town Albuquerque. We had a fabulous lunch at Church Street Cafe (great Mexican food!). After exploring some shops, we visited The Breaking Bad Store and museum. It had some fun photos ops:

And yes, we did drive around Albuquerque and see some of the scenes from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul.

On our last full day, we drove to Santa Fe. We walked around the Plaza and visited some shops and churches. We had a fabulous lunch on the square:

Ok, this is my unpopular opinion: Santa Fe is a little overrated. Maybe it’s because we’re not in the position to buy expensive art and furniture. The shops were interesting, but I just wasn’t as enthralled with Santa Fe as I expected to be.

Lastly, we visited Coronado Historic Site, which is close to Hyatt Regency Tamaya. This is the type of place I would have found incredibly boring as a kid, but I was fascinated by it now. The site contains ruins from an old Native American pueblo.

We toured it on our own, but as we were getting ready to leave, a free guided tour started. I’m glad we stuck around for this because with the tour we got to climb inside this kiva (worship place):

 

Final Thoughts

It was so nice to get a change of scenery last week in New Mexico. I enjoyed the desert climate and mountain views during our stay at Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa. I’m not sure we will go back any time soon since I have so many other places on my wish list. But, I’m not going to rule out a return trip when I’m in need of a relaxing getaway.