I am trying to figure out how much cash to bring. Regarding bartenders, maids, etc - Tip daily? According to some posts it seems acceptable to do a lump sum at the end. I am just wondering what "the norm" is. Thanks.

Moonpie, we tipped on the morning of our last day there. I believe that some people tip on a daily basis but it's just a matter of preference. We made sure to tip Gerly and Heather (front desk) as well as the maids, bartenders and restaurant staff. We tipped Kevin and Eduardo (drivers for us) when we left also.

We also tipped on our last day. We put the lump sum in the envelope with a listing of who gets which amount.

When figuring out how much to tip, we broke it down by how much we thought we would have tipped each day and multiplied it by the number of days we were there. With the front desk staff and drivers, we just based it on the whole time we were there.

I am wondering the same. It seemed like there recently was a post on the same topic that gave very good advice including how much to tip. I have a done a search for it and can not seem to find it. If some one could post a link to the earlier discussion I would really appreciate it. Any suggestions of what amount to tip?

You might be referring to my trip report (Trip Report Feb10-17)...

Here is a copy of the tipping paragraph from my trip report. We were there a total of 5 nights (3 in Casa Teka and 2 in LaPalma)

GRATUITIES

BdC will allow you to add your tips to your bill and pay them in traveler’s checks and they will distribute it how you request. We wrote down people names or titles with dollar amounts. When pressed, they recommend using US standards. So we took that as around $2/night for maids and 10-20% for specific services. We called out Philip (guide) for $10, Frank (driver to BdC who waited patiently and transferred our luggage between casa and cabina) $5, Kevin (driver to PJ) $2, and Gerly (front-desk) $5. Also, we were so impressed with the trail maintenance and felt this heightened our experience immensely that we called out Raphael specifically for $10. We then tipped $2/night for each of our maids respectively. 15% of our bar bill was split between the bartenders. And finally we put $60 in a pool for kitchen and ground maintenance staff to split.



Hope this helps - not sure if the is "the norm" - maybe others can speak up for what they did.

My memory is getting a little hazy, but my last stay (6 nights) ended up being about $150 and I paid at the end of my stay, just telling Kim whom to give what except for the maids which I left in my cabina. I think I did about $20 for maids, $20 for Heilyn and $20 for Jenny (servers), $20 for Gerly (front desk), $20 for Jose (bar), $30 for kitchen, $10 for Eduardo (hike & a drop off at horses), $10 for Kevin (transfers). May be off a little bit but I think that's pretty close. I gave the 3 girls a little more than the norm I guess, but I hung out with them frequently and all had taken care of some special things/requests. I will say that I never ever felt any of the treatment I received was ever dependant on a tip. Whom you tip is best judged at the end, for your stay you may never use one of the guides for example.

Thank you Locolowe and Tully. It really does help.

We did ours a little differently. We gave our lump sum to Kim in a separate envelope on the last morning we were there. On the front of the envelope, I designated the names of specific individuals (such as Kevin, Phillip, Eduardo, Miguel, Jose, etc), but left the balance for Kim to determine.

Heather, a young American intern who was working there when we were there, told me that she believed Kim was really fair in divvying up the remaining $$ among the wait staff and behind the scenes employees.

We tipped the guides for each one of us who participated ($5 each). For example, if 3 of us went out with Phillip on 2 tours, he received $30 in tips. When we estimated the remaining $$ to be paid to everyone else (kitchen, housekeeping, etc) we did it by cabina, rather than per person. We were there 4 nights and I left about $200 in tips. That was for 2 cabinas, ours and our son's (trip was a gift to him). So 3 people, 2 cabinas, 4 nights.

Tipping wasn't common at all a few years ago. It has become more prevalent. As a rule in other areas of the country, we tip guides $5 each ($10 each for full day), leave a couple of dollars per day for housekeeping, and add an extra dollar or two for excellent service in restaurants. 10% is already automatically added to your restaurant tab, along with the 13% tax. We rarely tip cab drivers and they don't expect it.

I was glad Tully shared her tipping information regarding Bosque del Cabo, because it wouldn't have occured to me to leave tips for anyone except the tour guides. The entire staff there is very friendly and helpful.

Thanks to everyone that replied!

No problem, hope it helped some. Just remember there are no hard & fast rules. I know my first visit there I wanted them to give some money to Luis the ranger (he got sick & is no lobger there). They were like 'the ranger?' But I explained I had run into him on a walk and he spent over an hour with me (neither of us spoke each other's language) but he found me lots of birds, a snake, monkeys, some pacas and several frogs. So he never did it expecting anything but I wanted to thank him for something that really was nice for me.