Grand Bahia Principe Bavaro - All Inclusive

Check in was a hot mess. Disorganized and haphazard. Over crowded with pushy Europeans who acted like they owned the whole place. I was pushed multiple times or they would just blatently butt in front of lines and then look at you as if you were the crazy one. If you don't speak Spanish this is not the place for you. Never ever been to an All-Inclusive where the drinks were so obviously watered down. If you want a decent drink it will cost you more money. Food was always cold and even the "Good Restaurants" were no better than the average American chain. Don't expect tasty seasoned Island food. Expect European food that you have never seen before, over cooked seafood and under cooked chicken and beef. Cost $76 for a cabs to and from the airport. Drove so fast I feared for my life. Wouldn't recommend it to anyone. Wouldn't go back. Too many other nice places to go. [...]

I've traveled to Punta Cana every year for the past eight years and this was the worst (and only) terrible experience. The staff was completely unfriendly and inhospitable. Check in time was 3pm but were not able to get into my room until 6pm and it was still dirty. Tried to make dinner res for my bday but was not able to. I begged the manager for a res but he refused and told me to eat at the buffet. Staff is miserable and it shows. Hotel is too big and poorly managed.

My husband and I got sick at this hotel. We had [*] for several days. My brother-in-law was knocked over by the hotel owned bus and was bruised. Hotel did not even say sorry.

The front desk staff sent us all over the resort to get what we needed. When we had a concern, it was someone else's problem. I heard a guest tell the front desk "horrible management" as he left, all the front desk guy said was "I agree, have a nice trip home." Guest Services sort of chuckled when we said that we had no luggage because the airline had sent it to another island. We had to spend $400 on one change of clothes because the stores are so expensive. Our seats at the buffet were given away when we got up to get a plate so we had to wander around with our plates to get a new table. The servers kept forgetting to bring our drinks. The shuttle service guy told us we had to be ready to go at 4am for an 8am flight, so we got there and waited an hour and a half at the airport before it opened. The toilet ran constantly in the room, the shower flooded the bathroom, and the minibar was stocked once when I cornered the maid and she gave me drinks from other rooms. If you stop the servers and tell them what you want, they are great, but don't expect it to be brought to you.

Everything was a mess, First the didn't find our reservation, Second they gave us a dirty room with two beds, when we select a King size bed because we are a couple and we were in our anniversary, Third the personnel was not friendly and they were acting like your are not the client and that you didn't pay your money for your vacation, also they never had space for reservation at the restaurants a la cart, always the restaurant was full and when you go by the restaurant the place was empty, honestly i don't want to keep talking about it, me and my wife regret the day that we choose that hotel for our anniversary.

The Hotel should have been great if they have a designated place for the smokers..You will feel like you are in las vegas hotel when you are in their lobby because there are a lot of people who smokes there. The staff in the buffet have some attitude also not friendly specially the greeters who hands you the cleansing gel..When your leaving early be aware , when you dial the front desk no body is answering the phone, we have to walk from our villa to the front desk. And you will not be greeted with good morning but with frowning faces... The Place was good , there are just things that have to be refined, specially the staff who are unfriendly... if you dont like smoking please beware..Bring some insect repellant ,definitely...

This place was way too big. We stayed in the Bavaro Premier section and they put us in the last hut, which was furthest from everything. They say a trolly comes every 5 mins to pick you up, but that is incorrect. We never saw a trolly pick us up or drop us off from our hut. But if we walked 5-10 mins. to the main lobby then they had trollys taking people to the beach and back, which was another 5-10 mins. trip. The buffet food was eatable but not good. If you ordered a drink at any of the restaurants, it would take at least 10 mins to get it. What really made me mad was the lack of organization of the place. We had a reservation to eat at the japanese restaurant on my GFs bday at 7:00. Our tour was supposed to come in at 5, instead we didn't get in till 645. We asked the front desk if they can change our reservation to any time later than 830 so my GF can get ready for her special night. They said no, everything is full. We begged and said please because she needs time to get ready, spend big money on a dress, etc... After about 30 mins of begging they changed it to 8:30 and said they can't make it any later because the restaurant is full and there's no room. Well, we rushed and got there by 8:30, and the place was basically empty. Maybe about 20% FULL. There were about 8 tables around us that never even seen people the whole time we were there. Very disappointed. We had 3 a la cart dinners. Japanese was ok, no where near as good as Benihana. Mexican was very disappointed for me, buy my GF liked it. The Italian was GREAT. So many interesting appetizers, and the pasta was very good. We were a little disappointed in the weather. It was a high of 80 during the day, and the sun peaked out in the morning, but was non-existent at night. So we were hoping to swim in the pools then, but the pools all closed at 6 pm (ridiculous) and none of them were heated, so it was too cold to swim. But they had lots of jacuzzis!!! Oh, but wait, these jacuzzis werent "hot tubs" they were just pools with jets. So they were the same temperature as the pools. They had no hot tubs on site. The entertainment was not good. The Michael Jackson tribute was decent. So every day you either have a card or a beach towel from the resort. You can go up to many huts and exchange your card for a towel, or dirty towel for clean towel, or whatever. Well, I at one point went 2 1/2 days without a towel because every hut was all out. They keep collecting all the dirty towels but probably clean them maybe once a day, so people are stuck without towels freezing. I heard many people complain. These are all easy fixes that can make this resort a nice place to stay. Open the pools till at least 8 pm. Get heaters for them. Was the towels more often. Get more trollys. The rooms were pretty clean. No bugs. The maid didn't really do a good job with our room. One day they gave us new sheets that were still damp when she put them on, so they smelled like dirty water. And the pillows she gave us looked like 8 handfulls of cotton stuffed into a pillowcase. We called to request new pillows and received them 4 hours later. Luckily the tours saved us. We went on the Dominican Republic tour will you visit their culture, make cigars, coffee, horseback riding, etc... It was great! Then we went on the ziplining tour as well, which was good but overpriced.The one day the sun was out the whole day, the waves were crashing hard and the tide was high, so they wouldnt let us swim in the beach. I went to an ATM once to get some money and they said they would charge $3 fee, well my statement showed up and they charged me a $10 fee for a $40 withdraw. We would not recommend this hotel. Stay somewhere else and you can enjoy the DR.

The hotel was awful. I went with my brother on vacation for a couple days. I called ahead and asked for a room with two beds, and they gave us a king. We arrived at 3:30pm, and the maid was still cleaning the room they assigned us. Not only that, but another maid and her were basically lounging around in our room for almost an hour chatting! The "two" buffets that they have are practically never open at the same time, forcing you to walk all the way to the beach or the lobby to eat. Our shower head was not secured and flew all over the place. We called to ask them to clean our room between 11-12 (because the maid routinely came at 4:30) and we got two phone calls and two unwanted entries at 9 in the morning on the day of departure. (Checkout is at noon) AVOID AT ALL COSTS

The main hotel what you see on the pictures is very good but the area of the hotel where they place you [...] is not even on the hotel pictures it would be a few inches above the actual photos you see in the descriptions. Security at entrance to hotel took 15 minutes to get thru, Front desk very rude and in attentive. Rest of staff was friendly and helpful enough but not enough to overcome the bait and switch with the rooms and the security and front desk issues.

The food was terrible at each restaurant. It was not fresh and had terrible flavor. The food was old and often hard. Each restaurant had terrible service. We often waited 20 minutes on drinks at times. The people were not friendly and many were not either English or fluent Spanish speakers. This is due to many Haitians working at the resort. No one understood their role as a server and it was clear they weren't trained. They had no concept of the money spent and that it was a time for me to relax and enjoy my vacation. The entire trip cost around $4,200.00 with flight. It was my Christmas present to my girlfriend and myself. A lot of money to be spent. I was very dissatisfied with the entire trip and happy when I left because the stress it caused to be at the Gran Bahia. I had high expectations and I was let down.