Grand Bavaro Princess

We have travelled to destinations in the south many times, but unfortunately this was our most disappointing experience. Throughout our stay in the Dominican Republic, we felt that the level of hospitality was noticeably different depending on whether guests spoke Spanish or appeared to be from the Dominican Republic or nearby countries. On numerous occasions, we were overlooked at both the à la carte restaurants and the buffet. We would wait patiently while other guests who arrived after us were served first. We are always polite, respectful, and appreciative of the staff, so this was particularly disappointing. We simply expected the same level of service and hospitality we have experienced on previous vacations. Based on our experience, I would not recommend this destination to travellers who do not speak Spanish, as we consistently felt ignored and did not receive the level of service we expected.

Beautiful place with lots of nature but terrible service. Some people were great but others had attitude when asked the simplest questions. I also almost got scammed out of $50 a head for what should have been complementary snorkeling. Rooms were humid and many things weren’t working like the A/C and some of the lights. The walls were nice and freshly painted, most likely to cover up all the mildew everywhere. The smell permeated everywhere in the room and you could see it on the beds and couch. WiFi sucked even with the $12 purchase of premium. Worked at most for 3 hours and would then cut out for hours at a time. The buffet repeated the same things everyday and many of the restaurants just repurposed left over food from the buffet. Overall it would have been an enjoyable experience if not for these things. I would not go back again.

The resort is pretty but there is a lot that needs to be improved. The rooms look nice but the beds feel moist and humid. There was mildew everywhere. In one of the rooms, the A/C wasn’t working for the duration of our trip. Some of the lights didn’t work either. The wifi in the resort SUCKED! We even paid premium for the wifi but it kept disconnecting and not working. Room cleaning wasn’t good either, they gave us two towels for 3 people and one of our rooms didn’t get cleaned at all. Our room phone was also broken and we couldn’t contact reception. The service was just okay, some people were very nice and kind to us but a lot of them were rude and had attitude. We had a bad encounter with one of the cooks at the Buffet near the beach where I asked for a small piece of chicken and they gave me all of the burnt pieces and told me, “Because I wanted a small piece.” then laughed in my face. I didn’t like the restaurants either. The food wasn’t very good and just tasted like the buffet food. We saw on the website that some water sports were included and when we went there, they tried to charge us $50 per person for snorkeling. We also did the kayaks and no one helped us bring out the kayaks and watched us struggle to get them in the water. Nevertheless, it was an enjoyable resort with lots of nature around. Not because of the quality of the resort, but with the company I had. We will NOT be coming back to this resort.

I travel a lot and this was the worst experience I have ever had. We were upgraded to the platinum princess section where you are supposed to have access to a private beach, restaurants, 24 hour room service and your own pool area. None of the restaurants were available except one, the cafe del mar, which when we booked the reservations it did not mention that there was an additional cost of $90 per person nor did we have any idea where this restaurant was located. None of the workers helped us find the restaurant. We had to ask people staying in the resort where it was. This night was my daughter's 18th birthday and because it was so late we were not able to have a birthday dinner meal. We tried calling room service as we were told we had 24 hour access. The room service was not available every time we tried calling. We had to leave the resort and go have street food. The street food was amazing! The food at the resort was AWFUL. I took one bite and had to put it back in my napkin. I could not eat it. The food lacked flavor and seemed to be stale. The presentation of the food was unappealing. My first night at the resort we had the do not disturb sign on the door and had the room service come knock on the door 5 times. They have stairs in the rooms and I fell down the stairs because I was dead asleep the first time. This happened several times while staying there. I have never had someone knock on the door when the do not disturb sign is up, especially on multiple occasions. I injured my foot on the ziplines that we did an excursion on and went to the front desk to ask for bandaids. They did not have any and told me to go to the medical center. I went to the medical center and spoke with the nurse and she also said they did not have bandaids. I went to the stores and I was told there was a small pharmacy on the resort which was never found. I went back to guest services multiple times and never received a bandaid. I went on another excursion and had to get bandaids from them. The resort never had a simple thing as bandaids while there and people were dropping glasses in the pub often. Hopefully they do not need bandaids. The sand at the beach was nice but the beach itself was rough and the water was gross. The water had seaweed and was brown. The beds in the room were small and very hard and the sheets had black bugs on them. When I asked others staying at the resort how they were enjoying their experience all of the people I spoke with said they did their research and this is not what they were expecting. They were all disappointed. The staff were extremely rude. I asked for additional waters to the room and had to ask 3 times and finally the next day someone gave us some water. The mised drinks were not good as they all had flavoring in them and bottom shelf liquor. There were not activities to do while there except for some dancing which ended early and was outdoors. I would highly recommend staying away from this resort. The pictures are cat fishing.

Our family reunion was amazing other then the fact that this hotel robbed my nephew of $500 and my sister $60. We had left for an all day excursion and when we returned my nephew noticed someone went into his luggage and took all his money. I know some will say why not leave it in the safe that is privated, we'll he wasn't expecting anyone to rummage through his bag. He felt safe so did my sister. On top of all that food was horrible at the buffet and the waitresses took over 30mins each time to serve us coffee and water. We made the best of it since we haven't seen each other for a while but never again will I go to this hotel.