My friend and I just came back from the Palladium Bavaro and I have a LOT to share:

PROS:
1. The grounds are GORGEOUS as everyone has said. Tons of palm trees, grass, beautiful flowers, fruit trees and a gorgeous stretch of white sand and crystal blue waters. Everything was well taken care of and didn't see any type of deconstruction around the entire property. Nothing looked shabby in the slightest and you truly felt like you spent your money well. There is a tram that goes through the properties but we never used it since we have no problems walking. Yes, the grounds are pretty expansive and you do have to walk some to get to places but not as bad as others have made it sound. To get anywhere would be 10-15 minutes MAX and it's worth walking around the beautifully laid out paths around the different areas of the resort.

2. The rooms are quite nice! We were "upgraded" to a Junior Suite but I have a feeling most of the rooms are Junior Suites and they say this to make you feel special. Nonetheless, the room was very large, lots of closet space and a HUGE jacuzzi tub in the bathroom that could easily fit two people. Beds were a bit firm but I'm the one who like a TON of featherbeds and pillows around me so I'm biased. TV works with lots of english speaking channels and the maid service comes in every day and does and excellent cleaning job (better if you tip more, of course).

3. The food at the buffets are really very good and a HUGE selection. If you're vegetarian, you'll have no problem eating a ton of food like everyone else there. Tons of fresh fruit, juices, meat selection, salads, seafood, pasta, pizza, etc. And this is for both breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Definitely don't miss breakfast either since it's absolutely incredible the choices they have! Please know that my friend and I are bartenders and "foodies" so we have relatively high standards for food but liked a lot of what was on our plate. Also I nice note is there is a smoking and non-smoking section so no one feels as if they are being bombarded with other people's cigarettes.

4. The beach and pool areas are truly clean, comfortable and gorgeous all around. Yes, it's true, you do have to wake up early to find two seats next to each other but hey, whatcha gonna do, right? Didn't have much problems finding seats at the pool, however, so if you're not too picky, just do that. I do recommend doing it early, like around 9 but that should be enough. Also the pool areas are very close to the beach which is nice too.

5. Service is fantastic. I don't know WHAT people are complaining about when they say people there are rude. Again, my friend and I are in the service industry so we are a lot or relaxed about how we are treated (we know what it means to work hard for our cash) but all in all, everyone there was beyond helpfull, respectful and fun! Yes, we tipped a lot but not until AFTER we received good service. Also keep in mind that if you are nice to them, they will be nice in return so if you have an attitude from the getgo, well, you deserve it back. Also, the english speaking there isn't as bad as I thought. Yes, it does help to know how to order drinks but they are typically willing to be patient with you.

CONS (which really aren't CONS since they're kinda petty but thought these should be noted for certain type of people)
:
1. They do not fill the mini-fridge that often in the rooms. This is somewhat picky and really quite irrelevant since you can get anything you need from the bars around the whole resort but for some of you who like the lazy feeling of getting up and doing nothing, this may be a concern. Didn't bother me all that much except I've heard other resorts go CRAZY with the room ammenities (i.e. bottles of rum waiting for you, flowers on the bed, etc).

2. Although it's "all you can drink" don't expect much out of the drinks you'll get. They use cheap liquor in the drinks and not much of it either. You will have to order more drinks than normal if you are lookin to get your groove on so be expecting of that. I found that if you tip them before the first round and explain you want extra booze, they'll usually deliver.

3. Late-night activities at the resort are a bit lacking. The "club" on the grounds, Sunset Boulevard, is quite sad and the Sports Bar reminds me of something you'd see at an airport at best. If you're with a large group of people, you may be fine but when it's just two of ya, it's kind of boring. Also, the shows they put on aren't that great either. It sucks too because you know the dancers have put SO much work into them to make the guests entertained but they just miss the mark. Granted I only saw one but I cannot imagine any of the others would be better. But at they try!

4. The casino isn't all it is cracked up to be. Really small, not that many machines or tables. All in all a bit depressing.

5. Do NOT go to any resort of this nature with just one friend. Everything there is either as a couple or as a couple in a HUGE group. I could be just guessing all this but I don't believe I remember seeing anyone there who wasn't holding the hand of anyone else. This isn't a CON per se but more of a warning if you think you'd be uncomfortable about this.

I think that about covers it. If you're looking for a gorgeous place to relax and unwind, you should definitely go here!

As a Belgian (Brussels) citizen, aged 46 and with a lot of travel experience (for business and for holidays), spend, from April 26 through May 5th in the Palladium (Fiesta) resort.

Had a GREAT time overthere ! Nice room, nice people, good food, nice grounds, nice beach, etc..
The resort is huge - basically 4 hotels on one site - To get around I suggest to use the funny train (particularly handsome in the evenings if you want to go to one or another restaurant). It feels a bit like a Disney train.... but it is for sure also convenient to get an overall impression of the estate and of the specific locations of the swimming pools and different restaurants.

The grounds are very well kept - a huge effort for such a big estate - there are gardeners working all the time to keep the grounds green, clean and tidy.
The hotel has a very long beach (due to its size) and the beaches and the sea are very nice. Perfect for long beach walks.
Due to the trees and vegetation it is possible to have some shade on the beach. The beach is clean and well safeguarded. Not too crowded.
Fitness - just adequate - material is not top notch - but you can always have some swims or beach runs...
Rooms - had a luxury room with jacuzzi - great - size is more than adequate - everything worked perfectly (fridge, tv set, jacuzzi, etc..) - sponsored the cleaning lady 1 usd per day and that worked out perfectly well - linnen and towels changed every day.
Pools - plenty of them - had a close look at all of them in the resort and am of the opinion that the one close to restaurant Bejique was the cleanest and most quiet one.
The other ones were also ok but I preferred this one. The one in the area of the Royal Suites was not the cleanest one.....
Restaurants : tried a lot of them on the estate - in general, buffets showed in my opinion a lot of variety : always fresh vegetables and fresh fruits, choise of pre-prepared food or of instantly coocked stuff. Absolutely adequate. Service was overall -with some exceptions in two specialty restaurants- good or very good.
As far as a "ranking" is concerned :
- the buffet restaurants : restaurant Bejique is top notch for lunch and dinner - not necessarily so for breakfast- food, service, atmosphere ànd location are very very good ; Torres is good - food for dinner is good and it's there that you get the best breakfast on the estate (more choice of fruits, etc..) (service is also fine, location and atmosphere a bit less).
- the specialty restaurants : during my stay was able to do : Arrecife (International Cuisine) , La Gran Cantina Mariachi (Mexican) , Mare Nostrum (Italian) and El Quijote (Spanish).
From a food point of view : El Quijote and Mare Nostrum very good, Arrefice good and Mariachi average.
From a service point of view Mare Nostrum and Arrefice very good, El Quijote and Mariachi average.
Bars - all pretty good - service also pretty good

Tipping - it indeed helps to tip regularly (be it at the bar, in the restaurants or the people serving you the drinks at the poolside or the cleaning lady). So, yes bring a lot of 1 usd bills along.

Overall, when I'll return to the Dominican republic, I'll go to this place again.
It has nice rooms, nice and friendly people around, good food, nice swimming pools and nice beach. And overall, in my opinion, the price quality ratio is good.

What more would one need to have a nice vacation .... ?

If further comments or questions required, please let me know.
thibojo@yahoo.com

My husband (fiancé at the time) and 7 others stayed at the Grand Palladium Palace resort from March 25-April 8, 2006 and had a great time. Before booking our vacation, we used this site to determine the best resort to hold our wedding and found the overall comments to be good-keeping in mind that neither my husband or were every down south before.

Arrival and check in:
Defiantly wear either shorts or capris pants before leaving no matter how cold it is where you are departing from. When you get off the plane, the heat and humidity just hits you.

The bus ride is about 45 mins-1 hour to the resort. It’s an air-conditioned bus and you get to see some of the Dominican life along the way; interesting ride.

Upon arrival, there are bus boys there to handle your luggage and you are offered a cold beverage while you wait in line. The line up was large but it did not take long at all. We arrived at about 1pm but our room was not ready until 3pm. Not a big deal if you packed light clothing in your carry on. While we waited, we just walked and reviewed the resort while sipping on some Pina Coladas!

Rooms:
The rooms are very nice and super clean. However, we did have a major problem with our room the first few nights. The air conditioner did not work at all and because of this, we had water dripping in the middle of our room. Due to this, we also had a very bad musky smell in the room. I had to move my wedding dress to another’s room just to ensure that it did not get damp and start to smell. It was not very pleasant. We had advised the first desk on 3 occasions before anything was done about this. Finally, our wedding co-ordinater escalated our complaint to the manager and we were quickly upgraded to the Royal Suites without charge. This was a nice surprise but we would have been happy with our original room providing the problem was fixed.

When we booked our vacation, we had also specified that we wanted all 9 of us in the same building, which overlooked the ocean and had requested the top floor. Some of us did get the building but only one couple retrieved the top floor. Even though we booked over 6 months in advance, the resort does not give preference to any special requests until about a week before you arrive and at that point, most requests cannot be accommodated.

The resort/beach:
This resort is huge! The grounds are absolutely beautiful and very well maintained. Beautiful flowers, palms trees and coconuts all around. Many buffets, lounging areas, a nice size casino, theatre, disco and a nice spa.

The beach…..OUT OF THIS WORLD! Nice fluffy white sand and tropical blue ocean for miles. The beach is outstanding both day and night. There is always a nice little breeze from the beach, which is just enough to keep you from overheating. Sometimes the ocean was actually warmer than the pools!

I agree with other comments made regarding the lounge chairs. We had already known that we would have to get up super earlier in effort to have a chair to relax on at the beach and pool. We did this a few mornings and to our surprise, most of them were gone by 6:30am. We always managed to find one but if you weren’t there early, you would never get one. We would just place our towels on the chairs, head for breakfast and then go directly back. If we weren’t going to use the chairs for the most part of the day, we were courteous and let someone else use them, as they are very few.

The Pool:
The pool was nice on the palace side. It was never overly crowded but the lounge chairs were again very few. The swim up bar was an added touch and the bartenders there made every effort to ensure we were satisfied. The pool music is awesome and kept us in a good mood all day. There are severs that come around to take your drink order while you are catching some rays near the pool. It was nice to have someone wait on you!

We visited some of the pools on the resort, which were also very nice but spent most of our time at the Palace. We did not sure the Royal Suites pool at all. Although it was beautiful, it was a little too quite and open for us. I, being 24 and my husband 27, found the Royal Suites a little too excluded and found that not too many couples our age stayed there. We did however, have breakfast near the pool a few mornings and enjoyed the champagne at breakfast.

The food:
We found the food to be overall good. We were very surprised to see such a large selection at the buffets. I am a very picky eater but managed to find something every night…there is something there for everyone. The best buffet is located across from the Sports Bar; you can take the train there.

However, after a week of eating at the buffet, we became a little tired of the food. My husband and I both suffered from diarrhea and one of our guests also experienced vomiting for 3 days after eating the rabbit. Make sure you take Imodium and diarrhea relief as you may need it. We also tried the Seafood, Mexican and Italian restaurants. All were good but we preferred the buffet overall.

Excursions:
We took the trip to Saona Island and really enjoyed it. I would recommend this to anyone visiting this resort. Saona Island is beautiful and the beach/natural swimming pool was amazing. We had a buffet lunch on the beach, which was very nice.

We decided to do the ATV run based on the information provided by the local person selling the package. We were advised that we would be provided a lunch, would visit a Dominican school and walk through a nearby cave. None of this happened! We went 5 hours without anything to eat or even water. If you wanted water, you had to buy if off some of the kids on the beach where we had stopped for a break. We did stop and see the different types of trees and got to taste coffee, sugar cane and coconut….

We had to take a bus to the ATV place, which was very uncomfortable. There was no air conditioning and we continuously stopped for no apparent reason.

All of the bikes were in really bad conidtion and several of the broke down. There were no 2-seater bikes as we were told there was. My husband and I shared one bike and it was extremely uncomfortable. My mother and sister also shared a bike and had hot oil sprayed over there legs. My mother had a small burn but it was not serious. The beach we stopped at was just a local beach; it was nice but nothing extra. We had thought we were going to ride through the water but this did not happen. A few people went swimming there but the waves were a little too strong for me to venture. My husband and a few of his friends went wave hopping and seemed to enjoy that.

This excursion in our opinion and almost everyone who went with us, was a waste of time and money. We confronted the people who booked this for us and he denied advising that we would do anything besides ride the bike. I would not recommend this to anyone.

We tried the Banana boat and Parasailing, which were both a blast and well worth the money. My husband also rented a speed boat with his friend and went snorkeling and swimming with sharks. This was also well worth the money.

And now for the wedding…
We had beautiful day for the wedding. Everything went just as planned. Our wedding co-ordinater, Adriana, was great. She arranged everything for us without a hitch. The cake, flowers, Gazebo, and dinner were perfect.

-If you want tropical flowers for your bouquet, which I did, you have to pay extra for this. I decided not to use the tropical flowers, as they were really expensive. I used the included roses, which were beautiful. My sister stood at the wedding and I had to pay for her bouquet. 10 roses for $57US.

The judge was 45 mins late but we didn’t mind that too much as it was a beautiful day. A white horse and buggy picked myself, my mother and my sister up at the reception as soon as the judge had arrived. The ceremony lasted for about 15 mins tops. There were no vows to repeat…the only words we spoke were “I DO.” If you want to exchange vows, you will need to arrange this. The interpreter was great; there was no language barrier at all. We had a champagne toast while our musical trio played. We had our first dance in the Gazebo while everyone watched.

We took pictures in the garden, in the horse and buggy and of course on the beach. The Photographer did not speak English but we managed to tell him what we wanted,….there were no problems at all. Our pictures turned out beautiful minus a few. Our dinner was booked at the Seafood restaurant. The only problem with the dinner was that we could not join 2 tables together. Even though the tables were right next to each other, the staff would not allow us to join them together at all, which I thought was a little strange.

A few other comments:
The massages on the beach are out of this world! We had two while we were there and would definitely recommend this. I also had my toenails painted at the Spa. The girls there do a great job with drawing flowers and palm trees on your toes…very cute! It was only $8US and well worth it….I have been back in Nova Scotia for over 2 weeks and it is still on!

Bring lots of $1 bills for tipping…the staff greatly appreciates this and really do a great job in ensuring you are satisfied.

Leave gifts for the maids…whether it be money, hair accessories, colouring books, etc….they appreciate it and do an excellent job with cleaning your room. The fresh flowers and heart shaped towels are very sweet.

Bring comfortable footwear as you will do a lot of walking…the resort is massive!

Visit the marketplace on the beach…it is quite fun. If you go early in the morning, you will usually get a free gift just for coming into their shop. They prices they give you are ridiculous but they are only trying to make money. Always offer half of what they tell you…you will eventually get a good price. Most of the necklaces (which are very nice) you can get for 3/$10US if you barter with them long enough.

Overall, we had a great time and would definitely return to Punta Cana. Other people who traveled with us indicated that this is the best resort they have ever been too. We have nothing to compare it to but thought it was amazing…5 starts all the way!! For anyone looking to spend one or two weeks of total relaxation, this is the place to go. I could write a book of good comments about the place!

If anyone has any questions about anything including our wedding, please feel free to contact us. We would be more than happy to make your vacation as wonderful as ours was!

My Husband and I and another couple have just returned from Punta Cana On March 26th. Before we left I started to read some of the reviews and thought to myself maybe this was not the place to go.. Well we had a wonderful time and we WILL be going back!!

We had no problems at the airport. Customs was pretty easy to go thru. (Just make sure when you are on the plane that you fill out the blue paper before you get to the airport to save some time in line. You will get thru faster) Coming and Going

When we got to the resort it was so BEAUTIFUL and the workers all greeted you when you arrived and helped you to your rooms. The rooms were very clean. Yes bring little gifts for your house maids. It does make a difference and as far as the house maids being nice they are!! We always left her a dollar and something little. Make sure you leave a note for them for the gifts or they will not take it due to geting in trouble. We always had clean towels and the drinks were always filled in the mini bar in our room. We had a room safe and we did use it, but I did not feel that it was not safe if you forgot something out.

The pools were very nice and clean. The swim up bar was great!! We did tip the bartenders because usually the drinks were alittle stronger when you did. A dollar means alot to them.

We went on the Safari Tour which everyone should do. Very interesting. On this tour you will visit the village, have lunch in the mountains and go boogy boarding. Beautiful Water!!

We also went on the Tiki Boat Adventure. Here we went snorkling for the day and partying on the boat. LOTS OF FUN!! Specially if you like dancing!!

Went on a 4-wheeler adventure to a village and rode the back road. Lots of fun. Bring gifts for the kids. Candy is great or colors. They love MM's and gum. I would not give them money at least they tell you not too. I did not

As far as the food... We really never ate breakfast but the morings we did they have everything. Lunch is pretty normal too. You can find anything. Now for supper situation. Make your dinner reservations when YOU ARRIVE!! They book up early. We had two reservations for supper and we canceled our third one. We thought they were ok. Pretty fancy. I would just go to the alley carts. They have everything but get there at supper time.

You can bring US money. They like it when you purchase with it. Brings lots of $1.00's and smaller bills. Sometimes they can't break big bills. $20.00 are great.

They do speak alot of English and my husband and I did not speak but two words of Spanish. Don't worry if you can't we had no problems. They will work with you to make you understand them or by just shaking your head no they will understand. They try to speak English and some do.

The Apple Vacations Reps that are in the lobby are very helpful. If you have questions or problems they will help. Make your reservations with them for your activities and tours.

So as far as reading the reviews from people don't worry, go and HAVE A GREAT TIME!! We did and we will go back!!