We went to the domincan with my auntie. This was her 4th time and she wanted to share it with us. Pure Paradise is what we found .Why people moan about this hotel we can not understand . We ate well , and we drank lots ( as much as we wanted) We had geat fun with the entertainment crew especially coca cola , teddy , moto and sexi john and toni . They go out of their way to make you feel wanted. The beach is to die for , Yes you do get beach sellers but they are so friendly you can't get cross with them at the end of the day they are just tryin to earn a livin. The maids gave great detail to cleaniness they call every day with linen and clean towels and always with a smile. There was plenty of variety in the buffet restaurant and you would be hard pushed to go hungry. The pool buffet restaurant opens at 10:00am-18:00pm and always had hot food available and also cakes, fruit , biscuits, nachos also tea, coffee, hot choclate and cold drinks. PLEASE ignore the BAD reveiws go for your self you will not be disapointed we have just booked to go again . If it was no good my auntie would not be goin back for the fifth time ... If You Should come across any concerns go straight to fredrick in customer services and he will sort you out and it wont be long till you are happy and smiling again this hotel has the WOW FACTOR ! see you there!!! : ) ...
Also totally safe for teengers and younger children so much to do .Hope this helps with your decision .. ~WE LOVED IT ~ My auntie would not of let us waste our money if it werent FANSTASTIC....Take Care Have fun from Mandy ,Andy,Sadez,Ryan,chris,Giorgi,Barbara,Tracy

just back from a 2 week stay in this hotel and must say had a wonderful holiday.We got married their in our second week.This ceremony was a wonderful experience and thanks to Ambiores our wedding co ordinator and the hotel guest services manager it was a day to remember and one which went totally problem free from start to finish.I am lost for words to find to praise this man.The wedding package he put together was fantastic not to mention an upgraded room with a fantastic ocean view. This room was as good as any 4 star apartment with separate living area, fridge, microwave and tea making facilities. The list goes on. The hotel staff were remarkable, friendly and very obliging, the rooms were cleaned daily. The food was of a high standard, the breakfasts in particular were better than i ever experienced abroad before. All tastes are catered for here.The a la carte restaurants are a must so book on arrival. Mexican, italian and the grill. The entertainment is typical of what you get elsewhere. It involves audience participation so beware if seated near the front. Dont book your day trips through hotel or holiday reps much too expensive. Do it in nearbye mall or on the beach. We booked through a guy called Felix on the beech who looked after us well and gave good discounts. The tours which are a must are paradise island, ocean world and one of the safari trips that take you to the waterfalls. If you can take with you plenty of small treats for the local kids as they surround the bus at various locations. Small packs of sweets or colouring pencils are well received. Seeing their little faces smile is rewarding in itself.
If you want a really relaxing experience get Ambiores to arrange a visit to the Jasmine well being centre and experience the hot stone massage followed by a dip in a natural cold pool. A 5 course lunch is also included. A totally fantastic experience and one not to be missed. This holiday was overall a fantastic experience and you should not be put off by any negative reviews you read about this hotel. Feel free to contact me if i can help i will be happy to oblige . email [-]

I have been to other four star hotels. This is a two star if that! The service stinks. We boarded at 10:00A.M. and they told us our room was not available until four O'Clock.. This was because 60% of their income comes from the Local Dominican population which don't mind a 2 star rating. So they serve the Dominican locals first and then they deal with people overseas. So expect to be TREATED LIKE A 3RD CLASS CITIZEN IN THIS HOTEL. Not only that they have sections of the hotel that are actually four star that people pay alot extra because they purchases the next step up. Get ready to be pestered by sales associates from every corner. to move from your leaking ant and cockeroach infested hotel room to the prime suites. The food was horrible. If you could live off hambergers and hot dogs then your O.K. And guess what! If you booked a 14 day or 7 day visit expect please minus the weekends because it is populated by local dominican and their children. So they invade the beach the restaurants. You might as well fly back home during the weekends because that is exactley how you will feel busy busy busy. No plates, glasses and extra long line ups. At one time the security told us that the tables were full and that we should go eat burgers at the snack bar instead.

Not only that when you are at the beach there are panhandlers selling stuff and bothering you every minute of the day.

P.S. The front desk was always busy because people were always complaining about their rooms! I happen to speak spanish and noticed that the locals who resereved their hotels were complaining too. That is not good!

So is this a four star? NOOOOOO. Unless you are willing to pay $100 extra U.S. per night for the upgraded suites which should have been the actuall four star suites we should have been staying in. Then don't waste you money go to Occidental playa turquesa in Cuba. The Cubans treat you the best!!!!!!!! The only reason they are a four star was because they have the premium suites. Otherwise every other room is only a two star!!!

If you like a two star motel type of look with floor ants and busy busy weekends than this trip is for you!

The only thing good about this location was the beach. It was not rocky or grainy. They have a newly renovated kids club that was good too.

We just returned on 23rd July 2008 from staying at this hotel. Although the internet states it as a 4* and the Thomas Cook rated it a 3*plus it was certainly only a 2 star.

While we were there, the security guards were asking us if we wanted to buy drugs.

On the weekends, the hotel was offering stays from Friday lunchtime until Sunday lunchtime for local Dominicans and for Dominicans from the USA for $80 per room for an all inclusive stay. The place was inundated with many rooms being occupied by 6 or more people.

During this time, you could not get in the pool, could not get a table at the buffet and if you did you couldn't get near the food, you certainly couldn't get a drink at the bar as it was four or five deep and only 2 or at the most 3 serving.

There were three bars. One a swim up bar with a limited range of drinks that was only open as long as the pool. The main bar was open from 10am until late and the other pool side bar only opened at 12noon until 6pm.

The rooms were very old, tired and worn and I would certainly advise anyone going to ensure that they are in blocks 5 or 6. Block 4 was completely unsuitable for habitation. The french windows on the ground floor were so old they were coming away from the wall/frames and they didn't lock. The main door to the hotel couldn't be locked either. Block 5 where we were moved to was only marginally better in that the doors all had locks. The problems here, especially in room 5116 was the bathroom. The false ceiling was bowed and was leaking. We were afraid at one stage it would fall down on us.

We reported a leaking toilet in room 5118 which was meant to have been repaired but still leaked afterwards.

The place was infested with bugs and we believe it was bed bugs not only mosquitos as someone in our party went to bed one evening with PJ's on and even bed socks because they were sick to death of being bitten and then woke up full of bites on their legs.

The food was absolutely disgusting. Its ok if you like mashed banana with onions, peas, carrots, sweet beans, fried banana, fried red and yellow peppers for breakfast. For lunch you could either try and brave the snack bar where all that was served was burnt burgers (with a strange taste), hot dog sausages that were deep fried, chips and a small salad selection and a small dessert selection (although I wouldn't recommend having anything from the desserts as they were left open to the flies and birds), you could brave the buffet room but every day was basically the same - some form of rice, soggy pasta, fried chicken bones (as they don't seem to have any meat on them) with a sort of gravy, and every day with the exception of maybe 4, we had goulash. For the evening meal, it was pretty much more of the same and the chefs on the grille would keep the best bits of meat or fish etc., for the locals. I saw one american lady literally throw the food he had given her back onto the grill and ask for better pieces actually pointing out the ones she wanted and it only took her four attempts of doing this to actually get it. As an idea of the meals in the evenining, you could be served stewed lentils or stewed beans. The only really descent thing they did was on the BBQ night and that was baked potatoes, although they couldn't really mess these up.

The food was so bad that one of our party ended up going to the local hospital with food poisoning and she barely ate a thing there anyway.

The restaurants were only marginally better. The starters in the Italian restaurant were terrible, what was supposed to be ceasar salad had certainly never seen it in my lifetime.

As for the entertainment, whilst during the week, the entertainment staff did their best - especially catering for english speaking and spanish speaking alike, even german and french, at the weekend it was a completely different story with spanish being generally the only language spoken.

As for daytime activities, whilst basic were not too bad but again at the weekend activities that my two teenage boys had been allowed to do during the week were told they had to be adults to do at the weekend.

As for the supposed free sports, you could windsurf for free although they did expect you to take out accidental damage insurance of either $5 daily per item used or $20 per week. Basically if you lost or damaged any of the windsurfing gear, you paid for it and they even had a price list to show you how much each thing cost to "encourage" you to cough up for insurance.

The snorkling was only free to do in the pool! - not much point in that.

The final straw was sitting down on our second weekend in the entertainment area to see locals openly conducting drug deals and they even had pistols in their pockets that were clearly visible.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE CONSIDER THIS VERY CAREFULLY IF YOU ARE GOING - can you imagine filling our your insurance claim form with "whilst I was sitting watching the evening entertainment, I inadvertently got in the way of a cocaine deal going down and was shot".

The only poisitive comments generally received about the hotel by talking to other guests were from the regular weekend dominicans that went there. The amount of people we struck up conversations with generally had all said they were absolutely disgusted with the place.