Hotel Villa Taina

All I can say is we stayed for a week and ended up staying for 3. I brought my mom and my 6 year old down for a family trip for kitesurfing and windsurfing. I have been to Cabarete numerous times but had stayed at kite beach but the beach eroded so we came to Villa Taina. We had the most amazing time, everything was so clean, the staff was so friendly and the lay out is perfect. Wendy at the front desk was so friendly and helpful for all kinds of issues regarding extending our visit, side excursions, airport shuttle, straightening out an issue I had with a local merchant, etc. All the staff is super and helpful also from the cleaning lady to security to the restaurant staff. The logistics are also worth mentioning because they are perfect. The pool is right between the hotel and beach and the hotel on one side with the bar on the other. The place is not too big so really feels boutiquey and you really get to know the staff and other guests.

I can’t say enough good things about this property. The people are great at the front desk especially Wendy. He arranged a tour that was great and at a discount. The service staff are wonderful as I had three meals three. The rooms are great but beds are terrible! The pool is nice and it’s steps from the beach. They have a lot of inclusive amenities while you are there which was an added bonus!

Only 30 steps to the beach, a salty breeze, beautiful rooms, perfect distance from the shops and surrounding restaurants. A personal favourite of mine is the Mongolian buffet on Wednesday nights. Although, the pool is usually cold and the beach crowd can get a little bit loud. Breakfast buffet is included but all other meals are not. Overall this is a beautiful spot with nice large rooms but maintenance could be improved.

The location was perfect! The hotel is located in the city center on a main street. There are shops and restaurants surrounding it. You have the choice of eating in the restaurant which is on the beach with marvelous views or eating from the restaurants on the street. It's EXTREMELY economical to eat on the main street. We mostly did the buffet breakfast which is mostly continental but it was good. The food was good and I would recommend eating there for your stay if you didn't want to eat outside of the hotel. The hotel was nice and I really liked that it wasn't a large establishment (only 61 rooms). Due to the size the walk to the beach is merely feet away. I would suggest when making your reservation to request beach front so that you do not have the noise of the street. It's not super modern but it's modern enough. The exterior is a Mediterranean/Spanish design. The staff was always friendly and our rooms were always cleaned. A HUGE plus was that they provided face/washcloths. My previous stay in DR and from others that I know have stayed in DR wash cloths were not provided and most of the staff had no clue of what we were requesting. The pool was never crowded and there was always a chair available on the beach. We were told that the tents/umbrellas were included in our rate; however were told by the beach staff there was an additional charge. No big deal there were enough large palm trees for shade. The hotel has free-WiFi and we had a signal all the way on the beach. Not so much of a dislike but an FYI - the hotel does not have elevators. There are 4 levels with the upper level being the penthouse suites. It's not listed on the description but I think is good information to know for a person that my have difficulty going up and down stairs. The mattresses aren't that comfortable and slept like boards. They should really invest in upgrading. The main con we had is that by the third day there was what we thought was condensation on the floor from the mini fridge. Maintenance came in our room within minutes of our call and advised the AC was not working and they were working to fix. However; it was not fixed by our check out date 2 days later.

It was hit and miss. We will not return. We've been to various locations within the Caribbean and this was our least favorite. Don't drink the water, don't eat the ice. We did not choose this vacation, as previously stated, we were attending a destination wedding. Working with the hotel to reserve the rooms. Eh. I really wanted a king size bed. Not sure where the confusion was, didn't happen. Hotel was supposed to have arranged a ride for us, pick-up at the airport, bring us to hotel. NEVER happened. Never received a reason why it didn't happen either. Never heard mention of transportation back to the airport either.... We arranged for it ourselves. Anyway, thank the good lord above we had my husbands aunt (brides grandmother - this was told to the hotel, too) with us and she speaks fluent Spanish. Otherwise, I am afraid we would still be at the airport, waiting for the transfer. Speaking of fluent Spanish. At check-in the front desk person was rude and had the nerve to question where our aunt learned to speak Spanish (she was born and raised in Ecuador, by the way) I am pretty sure, again, that if our aunt wasn't with us, had we actually made it to the hotel, not sure we would have made it through check-in. After the front desk person realized that our aunt spoke Spanish (even if she didn't care for how she spoke it) not another word was said in English. All check-in information was then stated to our aunt to translate to us. These were separate reservations mind you. Our aunt was travelling with us for a few reasons: 1. She was recently widowed. 2. She is the brides grandmother, but lives closest to us out of all the people attending. 3. She is in her 70's. All of these thing combined, she didn't want to travel alone. All of this taken into consideration I feel it was inappropriate for the front desk person to use our aunt as a translator. As it was not our aunts responsibility to tell us everything pertaining to our check-in. Additionally, I provided ALL details including our flight information, per the hotels request and because of them supposedly setting up the transfer from the airport. Yet when we did arrive the front desk person couldn't figure out who we were. The room, aside from the smaller than requested bed, was fine. We ate all meals at the restaurant on site. Others in party ventured off site and many complained of not feeling well after. We ate and drank freely AT THIS LOCATION because we knew that they ship in the ice and all of the water was Dasani bottled water, which you purchase. I am pretty sure that the kitchen is also using bottled water when they are preparing the food. This is important! The panhandlers are relentless. I have never experienced it to that degree previously elsewhere in our Caribbean travels. Our room included the breakfast buffet. I enjoyed it. Limited choices but that didn't affect any of the people in the group we were travelling with. Lunch and dinner were on us (again did not leave our hotel) and everything we ate was fine. The wait staff at the restaurant (later in the day) were awesome! Really great people with wonderful personalities. I can't say the same for the bar staff (or the front desk person). I believe had everyone here had the wait staff's attitude this would have helped make the trip more enjoyable. The housekeeping was fine, no problems there. The safe in the room was too small to really put any of our larger valuables in e.g. laptop, camera. So it was basically like not having a safe. Everything was accounted for, so I am happy about that. We stayed for about a week. The ocean. Ok, so this is not the destination for you if you are a beach bum and want to enjoy the Caribbean. The beach/ocean area was filled with all sort of people doing activities related to the wind. This place is windy! The beaches in Jamaica and Barbados were much more suitable for someone looking to enjoy the ocean without needing additional equipment e.g. surfboard, windboard, etc. I also was eaten alive by bugs. It is now the end of June when I am writing this review and I still have scars on my legs from the ridiculous bug bites. Be sure to pack bug spray. We did briefly venture off the hotel grounds in search of sunglasses as my dear husband accidentally broke his. I would not recommend a lone female, especially if you are not fluent in Spanish, to do this. My husband came with me and our aunt and together all three of us were fine. Caribbean in the winter (when currently living in the northeast) what's not to love. I came home with a tan in March. But, there are much better destinations, in my opinion, for enjoying the Caribbean.

most of my issue is with hotel.com showing a rate of 75 which jumped to 110 no breakfast included, I left before easter, not sure why such a high rate, one reason I stayed here was for the yoga but it was not daily due to it not being season, yet the front desk told me to check the board for time and it said daily and I stupidly was only one to show up for the non existant class, it would be nice if they served drinks on the beach while your in a chair but you got to get it your self, hotel was clean but not worth the price as I was off season leaving before easter and rates in the area, for over 100 id expect more, the bed and pillow very hard and uncomfortable food was just ok , preferred eating elsewhere , also the sup trip was less than 2 hours and not worth it at all

Villa Taina is a very nice beachfront hotel in Cabarete. We stayed for 9 days on the top floor Premium Queen room. Room was small but nice, the king Premium rooms are larger. Housekeeping was great. Included breakfast was good, but not much variety. Great location!

We had a great stay at Hotel Villa Taina. It was reasonably priced and the room was more spacious than we expected, comfortable, and clean. The restaurant was good, with a lovely breakfast (albeit pricey at $10 pp). Hotel’s location is fantastic - right in the town center next to all the shops and restaurants. Parking is very tight so you wouldn’t be able to park right there, but we didn’t rent a car so no problem for us. If you are a kite surfer, you can rent right in front of the hotel and take off from there. For everyone else, the hotel’s location on the beach is good, just at the border where the kites are not permitted so you can swim, and I enjoyed sitting there on a beach chair and watching the kites. If you have a child this is a nice spot because Front Loop next door is a place where kids congregate - my 9 year old son found lots of children to play soccer with on the beach in front of the hotel. The gym has no air conditioning and is small, but there are daily fitness and yoga classes at the hotel.

We stayed here 7nights and enjoyed a lot. Happy hour every day 5-7pm, mojito, piña colada, cuba libre etc. The breakfast we tooked 2times, it was good. At the beach there was a lot of small bugs and they were quite annoying. The pool was quite small, so we spent the week at the beach. The room was nice with the balcony. And the most adorable thing was that next to our balcony there was a palm tree full of little green lizards and we liked them a lot. When we checked in our credit card was charged 2000pesos (some deposit for the beachtowels) and when we checked out the receptionist could not get the moneytransfer-machine working so she promised to try it later. Let’s hope that we can still get our money back. Otherwise everything worked well!