Coral Costa Caribe: "ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!! - AUGHHH"

Have you ever seen the TV show "Hotel Impossible?" Well this hotel should be showcased on that. It really does need a lot of improvement. I was very disappointed with the room conditions. When I walked in the room, my jaw dropped. My first reaction was "Are you kidding me? This is what we paid for?? AUGHHH!" It looked and felt like a cheap motel. The sink area was dark and dingy, the lights, when turned off took forever to turn back on (the ballast needs to be replaced). The bathroom was dark... [... read more]like there was no light on (seriously needs a light bulb change). The bathroom door wouldn't close. The bottom of the doors look like there was water damage. The door frame had a gap between the wall and the frame so you can actually look through the wall (where is the privacy?) The toilet bowl had stains on the inside as if it hadn't been cleaned or even worse it looked moldy. The air conditioner was leaking...water all over the balcony. The bed was lumpy and the pillows were flat. The bed covers looked old and improperly washed. The hallways are dark and scary. The elevator didn't work. I almost forgot...we were on the 3rd floor and when I went to take a shower I found that there was no water pressure in the shower... and then eventually, no water in the shower at all!!! Not even a drop. I complained to front desk and requested a room replacement and was told that it happens at certain times during the day...not much that can be done about it. I was told to go back to my room and they will try to fix it. The service was varied...some of the staff were really good (understanding and empathetic), some need to take a course on hospitality and customer service (downright rude). The food was ok...there were 3 restaurants that you need to make a reservation for. The Italian Restaurant - yuck! I think they use tortilla wraps as their pasta for the canneloni and the lasagna...either that or it was extremely undercooked pasta because it was very tough to even cut through. The beach was spectacular and the view is amazing but the lounge chairs need to be replaced as a lot of them were broken. These are the things you don't get to see in the pictures that they have on the website. BEWARE...It might seem like you're paying a good price for the trip but truly... no price is worth staying here...not even if it was free.

Occidental Caribe: Barcelo is not what it used to be!!!!

Food was great both buffet and restaurants, service was also really good. Our room and resort was very tired looking. Our air conditioner and shower did not work, and the plaster from the ceiling was falling down onto bed when sleeping...

Occidental Punta Cana: Special Resort

Traveled with the love of my life Feb 2015, this resort is special to us been there Jan 2012 was our first trip as a couple.... Love this resort, most beautiful beach, staff is awesome many remembered us from 2012 making it even more special for us. Rooms are huge, we always stay on 3rd floor. Food very good... Amazing vacation, would go back in a heartbeat, very welcoming!!

Royalton CHIC Punta Cana: Nice facilities, Bad location

The resort itself is beautiful, but the beach & ocean not so much. The beach is ok. It's not white sand and it isn't big. The water is not your typical blue or turquoise colour and it's rough. Red flag days are the norm at this resort. Food is great, staff is great. The big negative is the timeshare pitch from the staff. They are relentless and it gets to be annoying after awhile. Loud music around the pool in the aft makes for a less than restful and peaceful environment.

Occidental Caribe: Good time had by all

We stayed at the Barceló Punta Cana from Feb 6 – 13. We were a group of 13 and we all overall enjoyed our stay. It was a nice convenient 25 min ride from the airport. First of all, I’m pretty basic when it comes to vacations and don’t normally stay at high end places so if you're use to 5 star luxury resorts you may want to reconsider. The resort is older, but they manage to keep it very clean and I would always see workers cleaning/updating things daily. I only had a few minor complaint [... read more]s over the week we stayed, most of them being around customer service from the front desk. We arrived late to the resort, around 12am, so we were all tired after a long day of travelling. Check in took over 45 minutes and they would allow other guests to butt the line of people waiting to check in. I had e-mailed the resort ahead of time requesting our group be placed together and to be in building three – I kept e-mailing them until I finally got a response confirming they received my e-mail. After waiting a long time to check in, we did manage to get rooms in building three. For the most part our rooms were fairly close together. ROOMS I stayed in room 3221. It was clean and had a very nice view. We always had hot water (sometimes a little bit too much hot water). The door of the room over looked the buffet so sometimes it would get quite noisy and hot from the heat of the buffet. A few of the nights they would be doing repairs during the middle of the night with power tools etc . I thought it was strange but I was still able to sleep and didn’t care too much. Majority of the nights after 10-11 p.m. our toilet would not flush. The other five rooms of our group had the same issue. Our Air Transat rep told us it was due to some water issues they were having and it was only going to be 1 or 2 nights, but it ended up being the whole week. Everyone’s A/C worked good and the rooms have ceiling fans as well which I found helped a lot. Beds were quite comfy and the cleaning lady changed the bedding every day. We got fresh towels everyday and the mini fridge was stocked daily. We did leave small gifts and a small tip for the cleaning lady every day and she was always very happy and appreciative. We had a nice flat screen tv but found it to be quite blurry. I found majority of the channels were in Spanish but did manage to find a few decent stations. Never saw one bug or anything in our room. About half way through the week we did receive a call from the front desk or something asking if we were happy with our room…so I did appreciate the follow up, but overall I was quite happy with our room, especially since it was so close to everything. Elevators were quick and worked every single day except the last day we were there because it was raining and somehow flooded them. POOLS I found both pools to be gorgeous. Service at the time up bar was pretty good – didn’t have to wait long to get drinks. The only complaint I have about the pools is the lack of lounge chairs. People would constantly throw their towels over lounge chairs to “claim” them…at times I would never even see people that entire day come back to their chair. I just felt like we wasted so much time trying to find somewhere to lounge. Aside from that, the pools were kept very clean and maintained nicely. BEACH The beach was beautiful. They would clean the seaweed away every morning. The waves were quite intense and usually had a yellow or red flag out, so you couldn’t expect to really go swimming without being slapped by waves. FOOD I found the food to be quite good at the buffet. They would change it up every night so it wasn’t too repetitive. Breakfast was pretty much the same everyday but quite tasty. I give kudos to the guy making the omelets – from the beginning of his shift to the end he was always smiling. We did four a la cartes – the Dominican, Japenese, Italian and French. The Japanese was by far the best one we had. Food was made fresh in front of us and was an awesome show. The other a la cartes were just mediocre and the service was quite slow. Some of us would get upset stomachs afterwards. We never had any problems booking the a la cartes. The hotel actually prebooked our reservations, but we had to get them all changed and had no problem doing so. You were only allowed to book three in advance, but they would post availability daily and you could make additional reservations if you booked the day of. The pizzeria at the pool bar was good – but again service was slow. One day it took us over an hour to get our food. I do realize they were only limited to the one oven and the waiters would constantly keep bringing us drinks without even asking so it made the wait a little better. The pizzas and calzones were stone baked, fresh and delicious. At night the pool bar would serve food up until about 4-5 a.m. They had food such as hot dogs, quesadillas, chicken wings, French fries etc. NIGHT LIFE To be honest…I only made it out to one nightly show. It was one of those ones where they pick people from the audience. It was funny but felt really disorganized. Our a la carte dinners were usually late so by the time we were done dinner the entertainment would be over or else I would of checked out more shows. They would sometimes have live music playing in the lobby but that didn’t seem to go on late. The disco at night was open until 2am. It’s in the downstairs from the lobby and the sound seemed pretty well contained. I found some nights at the disco better then others…they would tend to play a lot of latin salsa type music…which fine for a few songs but they didn’t seem to mix it up very well. We would request songs and then would have to wait half an hour to hear them even if there was hardly anyone else there. It was nothing special but at least something to do at night. CHECK OUT Unfortunately we had a 10:30 p.m. flight and the bus to the airport wasn’t coming to pick us up until 7:30 p.m. Check out is at noon and they leave a note under your door the night before explaining you can request late check out for $10 an hour. We figured we would try and keep one or two rooms to shower and keep our luggage. I inquired about this service the day before we were to check out. I was told to come back the next day and they would be able to help me. About 2 hours before check out I requested the late check out and told I wasn’t able to do late check out because it was “too busy”. The maximum they could provide was until 2:00 p.m. I was however informed that they have “courtesy” rooms so people can shower etc. We decided to go this route as we wanted to enjoy the full day by the pool. Unfortunately after checking out it decided to pour rain all day long. It was just unfortunate to not have a room or have anywhere to go for an entire day due to the rain. I did decide to use the courtesy room to shower and was told we could have half an hour each. After waiting 45 minutes we had our turn and not even being in the room for 10 minutes front desk was already calling asking when we would be done. There was a pretty big line up to use it, so I recommend if you have a later flight to really push for the late check out and keep your room. The courtesy room we used was in building 5 on the bottom level…I would definitely have to say our room in building 3 was A LOT better and made me appreciate it even more. I should note that check out was really fast and easy. I hope in the future they develop a better system for check in as it was ridiculously long and disorganized. OVERALL Overall I really did have a good time. I believe most of this was due to travelling in a large group, because it’s really impossible to not have a good time. There were some minor stomach issues here and there with everyone in group due to the food…but it was nothing really consistent. I believe we all had the same opinions about the resort as we all had a good time. I can’t complain about the room we received at all. We had a birthday in the group mid-week and they put a banner on her door and had a fruit basket and bottle of champagne delivered which I thought was really nice. I also asked if they could do a cake for her birthday which they did for us at the Italian a la carte at no extra charge. We got this resort at a fairly reasonable price so overall I am happy with my choice. Wifi is available but is at an extra charge. Some people were able to get a connection in their room but I found you had to walk around to get connection. The wifi is kind of overpriced in my opinion ... $12 for 24 hours or $50 for a week. That gets you one code so you can't use it on multiple devices at one time. Not sure if I would return to this resort as I like to try new places, but I would recommend this resort if you got it for a good price. If they could work out the consistency of service between staff then this place would be awesome. For the most part I found you didn't need to tip a lot to get good service.

Melia Caribe Beach Resort: Mid February vacation

My girlfriend and I are in our fifties and this was our first vacation together. To say the least I had high expectations that our time and money will be well spent. Let me preface my comments by firstly saying I had read many reviews of this property and while I found some negative I found even more positive. We opted not to spend the money on the Level upgrade and hope for the best. The checkin was smooth and quick. We were taken to our room and our luggage was taken there for us. First impres [... read more]sions of the room were very good. Well appointed and clean. Sure there are some cracked tiles in the corners of the floor and some less than perfect grout work in the bathroom but nothing to take away the smile on your face. The balcony faced the gardens which are so perfectly groomed it will take your breath away. The beach has powder white sand meeting the aqua blue ocean. The weeds do wash up but are quickly taken away by a special attachment drawn by a tractor. Let me also say as you walk the beaches you will see some resorts using men with rakes and wheel barrows. Many lawn chairs and never an issue to find one. The food.... amazing! Our favorite was the Tia Restaurant. Make reservations if you want to eat at either the Japanese or American grill. Other than that you may have to wait 30mins to get in to the other a la cart restaurants but hey your on vacation.Just walk around any corner and you will find a bar with people who are willing to make the time pass quickly. Many thanks to Heroberto Diaz at The Avenue bar. The entertainment provided by the resort is fun and starts at 930pm lasting about an hour. When it finished you will find a live band in the lobby where you will dance till 11pm or so. When it packs up then the crowd moves to the Fun Bar also within the resort. Yes people smoke at the resort but never was it an issue for me (non smoker). The constant breeze from the ocean takes care of any second hand smoke. We brought 500US each and came home with money. Everyone takes the US currency. Tip the bartenders 1 dollar per round and leave your maid 5 dollars on the pillow. You will get excellent service and they do work very hard. The property is large and we stayed next to the beach as opposed to closer to the restaurants. Our thinking was if we wanted to make a trip to our room during the day from the beach for any reason .... this would be best. Worked perfectly!! Trains run on regular schedules to take you from one end of the resort without a problem. So we discussed beach, food, room, entertainment, money, and transport while there.

Bahia Principe Explore La Romana: Gran Baha'i Prinicipe La Romana - bewarE

My husband and I returned from one week at the Gran Baha’i Principe, La Romana on Feb 18th. Having travelled to several destinations in the Caribbean staying at different resorts, we were well prepared. We had read Trip Advisor and done lots of research and knew that some people were getting ill at this resort but felt that they were not being sensible, maybe drinking too much, drinking the tap water or eating off site. We therefore were going to abide by all the rules for Caribbean travel. W [... read more]e arrived mid afternoon on Wednesday to a beautiful resort – sun was shining, check in was easy and smooth and we got one of the buildings we had requested – Villa 26. The balcony had a lovely ocean view and it was only a few steps to the pool. Lovely!! The grounds are gorgeous, beautiful well kept shrubs and flowers, palm trees etc. The pool had clear blue water and was a great temperature. The room was spacious, well appointed with a hard but comfortable king sized bed, a table and chairs, and a couch. The bathroom was very clean and spacious with double sinks but the shower/tub was small. Eventually we learned that the water from the shower was luke warm only. As other people have reported, the ocean is cloudy and the beach is hard packed brown sand. We are not beach people though and the surroundings are pretty with staff cleaning all the time so it didn’t bother us. The entire resort is a bit tired but very clean and well kept. The staff overall at the resort were polite but not overly friendly or helpful. Free Wifi in the lobby is a nuisance – hard to login and you get 60 consecutive minutes a day… Now to the issues… the food and drinks!! On arrival, we were told to get our lunch before the main buffet closed and to wait for our room to be ready. We were greeted at the restaurant by the Hostess and given hand sanitizer – that perhaps should have been our first clue. The buffet was more than disappointing – all the hot food was cold to warm and the food in general tasted bland. People in the restaurant were talking about the fact that others were ill so be careful what you eat. Honestly, at a resort of this calibre, you should be able to eat everything. The food did not improve at all during the week. On the second day at our Transat Vacations briefing, we were warned not to drink the slushy drinks as they sometimes ‘make people ill’. My husband stuck to beer and pop all week with no ice. I tried my best to stay away from slushy drinks but found that hard as there really aren’t many other options and I don’t drink beer. These resorts interest me for the pina coladas and margaritas etc. In any case, I drank far less that I usually would often drinking bottled water at the pool. However, I always had ice. The A La Carte Restaurants were not much better than the buffet – however the Seafood one was good and my food was actually hot! On Sunday, I came down with something – was extremely ill with diarrhea and severe cramping. I honestly never ate or drank again at the resort except bottled water and was confined to my room and the toilet until mid Tuesday. On Tuesday night, my husband was taken down with diarrhea first and then vomiting. I have not seen him that sick before. We travelled back to Canada popped full of drugs on Wednesday. Neither of us was able to consume food until Thursday/Friday. This should not happen!! When we told the Transat Vacations rep and the staff at the Gran Baha’i, they really didn’t seem to care. At least half the people we spoke to at both sides of this resort had been ill during the week. On the bus to the Punta Cana Airport several people from our resort were ill and one was vomiting on the ride. If you choose to travel to this resort in the DR, bring lots of gravol and immodium and be prepared! I would not recommend coming here until they completely disinfect and do something about the food pre and clean water. There is no water purification plant on site.

Hyatt Vivid Punta Cana: Nice resort

Clean, everyone used hand sanitizer. Public bathrooms need some updating. Some of the toilets didn't flush. There was a lot of seating in the lobby but it was uncomfortable. The preferred clients came over to our pools and reserved a lot of the chairs. They didn't use their pool as much. We liked that we didn't have to wear an armband, no towel card, no reservations needed for the a la carte restaurants, free safe, free internet in one of the little shops. The beach was nice, not too crowded bec [... read more]ause there was only three resorts then a nature park.

VH Gran Ventana Beach Resort: Good holiday, good food, service just OK

Check in was smooth but to still have to pay for a safety deposit box with a key to carry around is a pain. The room was clean, slightly dated, and lacking in drawer space(for clothes) or and extra chair. We had the quiet side and 3rd floor as requested which was nice But a lot of stairs (no elevator if you need it). 2 pools (one quiet) across the driveway at part two of hotel, which was nice. Food was good, salads, fruit, a meat, deserts. Service was non existent, do well to get water at the ta [... read more]ble. No bar service around the pool(you go get it). Beach was nice, lots of space, trees for shade, most days enough chairs, vendors tiresome after awhile. We would return if price was right.

Blau Natura Park Resort: Natural Beauty

I was a bit skeptical of this resort prior to arriving. We usually book at leaf a solid 4 star or higher BUT once we settled in and toured the grounds we were extremely pleased with the choice The grounds crew are always busy trimming tidying and cleaning. Some rooms were dated but clean and the cleaning staff were thorough and friendly The waiter service at the bars were Always happy and friendly The food was always good and lots of choices. I would recommend this resort to everyone

Bahia Principe Explore Punta Cana: Beautiful Resort

We returned from this resort on Wednesday night. We had a great time. The resort is huge but the train service was easy and frequent. The a la cart restaurants were 5/5!! Book early to get your choices. The service was great and they treated you like you were important wven with the sheer number of people. There was something foe everyone at this resort!

Paradise Playa Dorada: No complaints !

This Resort was great and I have no complaints. The food was great and there was a large variety at all restaurants, buffets and snack bars. The rooms were nice and spacious, as well as the cleaning staff were efficient and thorough. All the staff whether it be bar tenders, waiters or front desk personal were friendly and very accommodating to all needs. The beaches were clean and not crowded. Tourists are able to walk along the entire beach and there are many areas to play sports such as volley [... read more]ball or football on the beach. Some nights you could even find the owners mingling about the resort with their guests to ensure the quality of the resort is adequate. During the day there are many activities for guests to interact in and the entertainment staff did a great job in getting people to participate in their games. Nightly entertainment was very interactive and fun for all ages.This is a great resort for people of all ages. I would recommend going here to anyone!

Majestic Elegance Punta Cana: Beautiful well maintained resort.

The grounds of the resort were just beautiful. They had these bushes with little orange flowers that were on each side of the walking path. They had lanterns as well lit to mark path. The room itself was large, spotless and the maid service was terrific. Food was very tasty and great selection.

Catalonia Bavaro Resort: Enjoyed our stay

There are a few things worth mentioning if you are thinking of staying at this resort. First, be prepared for representatives of the resort to CONSTANTLY bombard you with wanting you to listen to a presentation. They tell you it will take 1 hour....3 hours later we left. Secondly, smoking is very prevalent at this resort and we are non smokers. Our room smelled like smoke which I think was also being pumped in by the air conditioning fan from other rooms. Thirdly, there are these very tiny tiny  [... read more]bugs that crawled on everything. Otherwise, our stay was nice and we enjoyed it. The service was good and the food was excellent!

Bahia Principe Explore El Portillo: Good but not amazing

The resort is OK, the food was good, service nice, room good. However the resort was overcrowded and to get a chair had to get up at 6 AM. The pool was packed with kids that are jumping and splashing around. The lobby is missing some natural flowers and vegetation; I was amazed to see that all flower are made of plastic and the central piece consist of palms made of metal. The beach is nice, long and just right for long walks. The trip to and from the airport was fast and very well organized. Th [... read more]e fact that we had to pay extra for a safe in the room isn't exactly what we expected since this is a all inclusive resort and you need to put your valuables somewhere. Overall, I cannot say that this was a bad experience but next time I will try something else for sure.

Royalton Splash Punta Cana: Great Family Resort

I was so impressed with the service and food. The rooms were great and very clean. The entertainment was great. Family water park was awesome. Would definitely go back. Layout was great and train was very convenient

Bahia Principe Escape Ambar: First timer

Where do I start? Well for one the resort at the Ambar is beautiful the grounds are gorgeous,the beach couldn't ask for better the only complaint would be that as an adult only resort the entertainment is very minimal everything shut down at 11pm if you want to see entertainment you have to go the other resort where's there kids which to me it doesn't make any sense the reason we paid more to stay at an all adult resort is to be with no kids. Also the pool closes early (6pm) :( . We went to 4 a  [... read more]la carte restaurant which they were all excellent all in all we did enjoy our stay great friendly staff

Riu Merengue: 2nd trip did not disapoint

This was our second stay at the Riu Merengue. We came back because we had a great first visit, and our second trip waa just as good. We read a lot of mixed reviews so we were a little concerned, but Riu dies it right. The rooms were clean and the staff was always friendly. At our first trip Diaz the bartender made a great impression on us and we were happy to find him there again. It was a pleasure every morning to be greeted by Oscar the omelet guy at the garden restaurants. We highly recomm [... read more]end this resort...especially for first timers

Iberostar Waves Costa Dorada: Excellent choice

This vacation was a very positive experience. The hotel was great; nicely designed, with covered walkways from building to building if you chose. Facilities were terrific; we tried Japanese, Mexican and Brazilian a la cartes. Buffet was awesome as well... food overall was the best we've had in some time. We had lobster (Paella and Fideua dishes prepared on the beach), shrimp and lots of other seafood. Beef was surprisingly tender. Many pork, chicken dishes as well. Breakfast offerings were outst [... read more]anding. Best assortment of cheese I've ever seen at a holiday resort. Soft ice cream and popcorn were a nice touch at the poolside restaurant. Bar service was also great, beach bar, pool bar, swim up bar, lobby bar... they made it look easy and selection was plenty. There were orchid, mint and aloe gardens. Spa had complimentary Turkish baths available. Star Band was very good and the nightly shows were not at all disappointing (as they sometimes can be). Staff at all levels tried their best to make it a pleasure to stay here.

Catalonia Royal Bavaro: Loved it

Thoroughly enjoyed this resort. Loved that there was no limitations or reservations on ala cartes. Enjoyed all the restaurants. Staff worked very hard and were so friendly. No need to get up early and save pool or beach chairs.