Grand Sirenis Punta Cana Resort and Aqua Games

Do not believe reviews. This place is wonderful. . Location beautiful. Clean and so well looked after. 😍 we had a family suite was one of the best rooms ever stayed in. The staff are fantastic helpful friendly and will do anything for you. Shout out to the pool bar staff who kept us in drinks all day. Restaurant staff and the ladies at the coffee shop and the food truck staff.. They work so hard. .The problem is not the staff as in other reviews it's some of the guests who have left their manners at home. How hard can it be to just say please and thank you. The food is good something for everyone. Japanese is great. . Don't miss the Michael Jackson show great. And animation team work hard everyday. .What a wonderful holiday ❤️ thank you all at the grand sirenis.

I just returned from a five-day family trip. The beach is beautiful, but the rest of the experience was terrible. The hotel food was awful; I'm not a very picky person, but it was difficult to find anything decent to eat. The staff seemed exhausted from the workload and, in general, in a bad mood. Honestly, I would have preferred to pay more and go to a hotel where the staff were treated better, so they could provide higher-quality service. Furthermore, the restaurants never had reservations available, and the few we managed to get were handled poorly.

I definitely wouldn’t recommend this hotel. We read the other reviews before we came and just assumed that people were being slightly negative and we imagined that everything was being over exaggerated, oh we were so wrong! The hotel itself is a good size and the beach is gorgeous and pool is also a great size but these are the only positives i can say We got upgraded for free which was a nice touch to a family suite (which we didn’t need) However the room is very dated and our air conditioning unit is leaking, the shower and bath leak water out onto the floor which is dangerous. Again we haven’t made a fuss as we aren’t on holiday to enjoy the room but it still matters! The food is absolutely atrocious, little choice, i had pork which was completely raw in the middle! (photo attached) and genuinely just poor standards of food hygiene and options. We have stayed at many hotels and i have to say this is the absolute worst on the food front The staff are rude and seem extremely unhappy to be there, i understand they are paid very little but if you do not tip then don’t expect any service at all! They only acknowledge you once a tip has been provided and even then are still miserable and make you feel awkward Entertainment is also bad, we haven’t stayed and watched any of it for the last few nights we have been here as it has all been samey and not fun at all Overall if you want budget then i guess this hotel is okay but for what we have paid to be here i am EXTREMELY disappointed and will not be returning

Staff was friendly, especially Mayra good service :) gracias

Arriving at the resort feels like paradise. Palm tree lined boulevard, large leafy lobby, attentive staff. However things underneath are neither as well maintained or as organised as they seem. Once you've filled in a million check in forms you get a wristband which is also your room key and a token for a beach towel (under 3s don't get a beach towel). Unbeknown to us you then have to double back on yourself, out of the lobby to the drop off area to tell the bell boys your room number. I've never experienced this before. We weren't taken to our room, or even told what direction/floor it was on - you just have to figure that out yourself. Despite having emailed ahead to ask for a nice room we were given possibly the worst - the terrace looked onto the main path leading to the restaurants, which meant it was extremely noisy all day and late into the night. The terrace was also directly behind the industrial scale extractor fan servicing 4 restaurants, so it was impossible to sit on the terrace and relax of an evening as it sounded constantly like a jet plane was taking off. We did ask to move rooms but were told there was nothing else available for at least a few days. The room: We had a family suite for 2 adults, a three year old and a one year old. The living area was tight as the sofa had been made into a double bed (which we couldn't fold up) and we also had a cot in there but it worked fine for us. The sliding doors were great and I loved that the terrace wasn't accessible from the kids room. However it did mean that once the kids went to sleep we lost access to the mini fridge, and had to sneak back in to go to the bathroom. There were a few issues with the room, none of the lights worked in the suite area, I raised this with reception, concierge, guest services, through the app and emailed. Everyone is very dismissive if you have an issue. On day 3 of no lights a maintenance guy turned up at 9.45pm - not exactly helpful with two sleeping children. They replaced a lightbulb but the switch still didn't work so my husband had to stand on a table and unscrew the lightbulb every night before bed. On day 7 we were told there was a separate switch hidden behind a curtain 🫩 this would have been avoided if we'd been shown to our room or at any point told the main light switch didn't work. You don't get a kettle in the room so can't make powdered formula or steriles bottles or make tea. We also didn't have a plug for the sink or bath which made washing bottles and bathing the children challenging. After 6 days of asking for one I gave up and made a makeshift plug. The room was tidied every day, the bed made and fresh towels put out but it wasn't "cleaned" and the sheets weren't changed during the duration of our two week stay. Every day people asked us if our room was ok, every day we told them of the problems and every day nothing was done about it. On day 8 the bathroom in the room above us started leaking into ours. When we reported it it did get fixed but then the hot water stopped working in our bathroom. The food: One of our big hesitations was the amount of reviews saying the food was repetitive. We thought 'that must be impossible, there's so many restaurants" WRONG assumption. Although there are many restaurants, firstly GOOD LUCK getting a reservation. You can't book before you arrive, and the availablity is released on a Monday. So if you arrive on a Tuesday like we did you're screwed. Secondly all the restaurants basically serve exactly the same food, from one central kitchen. For example the Brazilian brings meat round on a kebab but the sides, starters and puddings are the same as all the other restaurants. The only restaurant which was slightly different was the Asian restaurant which was supposed to be "show cooking" but actually it's just a guy banging metal spatulas onto a tapnyaki hot plate for 45 minutes, at the end of which you get a plate of egg fried rice. Once you're seated there's no explanation of how each restaurant works (some are buffet starters, some you order starters and others just bring you starters regardless of what you want) there's just a lot of presuming you know the system. In the Italian we asked for a kids pizza, a kids pasta, and two main meals (didn't order starters, soups etc) and were told by the manager we could only have one child's meal, they would have to share. Absolutely bizarre behaviour. We got a TUI Beach Dinner booked for us (didn't want it, but it seemed compulsory) which turned out to be in the Mexican restaurant not on the beach. The Mexican restaurant is as hot as the surface of the sun, no AC, no fans, about 42 degrees when the sun goes down. The menu was a suprise but the waiters didn't explain what each course was, just put the food down and walked away. On course number 2 (a cheesy fried wanton in a bowl of seafood soup) I asked for some pasta for the kids as unsurprisingly they were not enjoying the element of suprise. The manager told me that no, they couldn't do that (even though the kid on the table next to us had a bowl of pasta) One of the buffet restaurants was closed during the duration of our stay. We were not told why, but word on the resort was a leaking ceiling. This meant the entire population of the resort has to have breakfast in the buffet which was of course carnage. It seemed like they had a lot of plumbing issues as restaurants would regularly close at a moments notice and for the next few days you'd see teams of people in there mopping up gallons of water. If you got to the buffet pre 8am it was ok, but after that it seemed like they were serving rations. Not once during our stay did I see a temperature probe or thermometer. There seemed to be no method of chilling food or keeping it warm on the buffet. Lots of sweaty ham. Anyone who was eating mussels or shrimp from the buffet was surely dancing with death. Buffet food at night was just random - you might not go hungry but you will go without a normal looking meal. Boiled cassava, Parma ham and devilled eggs anyone?! Also it was almost always filthy, even when we were the first people in there the floor obviously hadn't been cleaned since lunch service with spilled food, hair and general grime everywhere. If you want chips don't come here! They only cook a handful at a time in 45 minute intervals for no apparent reason. They only seemed to have five highchairs throughout the entire resort, and for absolutely no apparent reason all the tables were really high and the chairs were really low. My babies forehead would be level with the table, which made every meal unnecessarily stressful as she wasn't able to see her food/feed herself. Even for an average size adult the chairs were uncomfortabley low. In our 14 night stay we only managed to get reservations at 4 of the themed restaurants. Our baby also contracted hand, foot & mouth on day 10. Cleanliness was rather lacking, I didn't see a spray of disinfectant used once when turning tables. Despite having antiseptic wipes and hand spray with us at all times it was a loosing battle. In every restaurant they ask if you have food allergies but I have absolutely no idea how they would manage an allergy! The food label rarely describes what the dish is. The Aqua park: We mainly stayed near the little children's bit which was great for a 3 and one year old. It was like a great splash pad with a few little slides. There's also a pirate themed slightly larger area, adults aren't allowed on it though and instead of just putting a sign up the life guard loudly blows her whistle 78 times an hour which is less than relaxing. There's a bar serving hot drinks, soft drinks and beer and a food area with pizza, nachos, wings and salad. There's a few big slides for adults which we didn't try as they seemed held together with silicone and gaffatape. It was reassuring to know there was a doctor on site. The service: Very different from any other Carribbean island I've been to. We majorly underestimated the language barrier. 95% of the staff don't speak any English, and struggle with European dialect Spanish. It's a very Latino resort, lots of bosanova and no steel pans, jerk chicken, curry goat, festivals, rice and peas, rum cocktails etc that you'd probably expect from the Carribbean. Service was lacking in all restaurants, they wouldn't offer to carry a highchair for you, just let you drag it while bouncing a baby. No expedited service on children's meals. All the staff were very sweet but almost overwhelmingly in the kids faces. Lots of cheeky squeezing but not a lot of practical help. The overall vibe from most of the staff is that they hate you/their job. Smiles are rare, there's no chat or getting to know them. They seem extremely p*ssed off regardless of how friendly or low maintenance you try to be. The old guy at the beach BBQ, the guy at the pizza place and the older man behind the main swim up bar palpabley hate your guts. For some reason some staff were weird with our baby (she's 20 months) and wouldn't give us cutlery for her, when laying the table saying '3 people, not 4, she doesn't count" The up selling: You "concierge" won't give a rats ass if the lights in your room don't work but will aggressively try to book you in for a "VIP Breakfast" - it's very important you do not go. This is a 3 hour sales pitch on the timeshares of the roof top suites. Do not go. Within the resort there is an "ultimate leisure club" area, they have different menus, a private pool, get golf buggied about and I presume much preferential service. However how you join the ULC or if you can pay to upgrade is a complete mystery. The beach: The beach is beautiful, in 14 days we only experienced sargassum on one day after a storm. Unfortunately the clientele are quite rough and use the golden sand like one massive ashtray/bin. In any area of beach for each foot of sand you'll find a buckets worth of fag ends & bottle tops. A real shame. There are only two toilet blocks by the main pools/beach and each is a good stretch of the legs. You'd regularly see adults get into the kids pool to relieve themselves rather than making the pilgrimage to the bathroom The app: As good as useless. Activities aren't where they say they are, menus are different, just generally a waste of time. Cleanliness: Don't ignore the reviews. The lobby, main bar and gardens down to the beach are immaculate. Everywhere else is grubby with litter strewn everywhere, and quite often a strong stench of sewerage. Our room got tidied everyday but wasn't actually cleaned for the duration of our stay. On day 10 we realised the bedding wasn't going to get changed unless we requested it. Could have really done with a bottle of bathroom cleaner in our room to do it myself. The pools by the end of the day are full of debris, bugs and leaves. On two occasions we saw entire pools closed down because someone had done a p00 or been sick in it. However the ladies at the beach toilets and splash pad toilets do a phenomenal job of keeping them clean. For the size of the resort they could do with a hundred more cleaners and groundskeepers, but it's also largely to do with the disrespect shown from the guests. Kids: Ours weren't old enough to use the kids club, but given the disorganised/uncaring nature of the staff I wouldn't have used it. There's only two mini discos a week and they are so late (8.45pm) and badly organised. Not enough highchairs, no bottle warming facilities, weird in general - would either give our one year old a goblet of water and a 3 course meal or refuse her cutlery and food. Clientele: A strange mix of grumpy northerners, followed by redneck Canadians (imagine Trailer Park Boys at the beach) and in overwhelming majority Latin Americans - Cuba, Columbia, Mexico etc It seems the law if you are Latino to carry a boom box with you at all times blasting Latin Trap music at max volume, so you'll often be getting deafened with multiple rhythms from every direction if you're on the beach or by the pool. All day. Expect a lot of "gold" medallions, thug life slogans and tattoos of guns. There are a literally a handful of staff who are really genuinely lovely and they are: Fanny at the buffet, an absolute princess. She works so hard, remembers your order every time and is just refreshingly happy! Alejandro and Alfredo at the water park bar. Both lovely guys going above and beyond. If you catch Isaac or Edward at the little beach bar you might also get a glimmer of a smile. Tips & Tricks: Take the reviews into consideration. It's very Hispanic and not at all what we were expecting from a Carribbean resort. If you want a slither of decent customer service be prepared to tip heavily. The bottled water in the room is purified (not spring/mineral water) and is quite hard going on the stomach. The tap water isn't safe to drink. Take all the imodium and rehydration treatment you can pack. If you order cocktails they use 'house spirits' which I'm convinced are mostly sugar and water. If you like gin then most bars have Gordon's and the main bars have tanqueray and Bombay so if you specifically ask for that you know what you're getting. The tonic water is bottled not post mix so less chance of any bacteria. There is always a wonderful array of fresh tropical fruits.