Restaurants – Buffet was awesome, the hotel themed most of the dinners (i.e. italian, chinese). This is what it seemed anyways. The breakfasts and lunches were good too. I mean, we stayed away from some of the food, but I do that when I go to a buffet in Canada as well! Italian Restaurant – "Rigoletto" AMAZING! We went there 3 nights that week, and they remembered us each time. We received speedy service, and our food came out lightning quick, I’m not kidding. From what other guests had told us, we would be in for some decent food, but we would have to wait. Well, I guess we got lucky with the speed of service… 3… times… ? I honestly don’t know what people expect when they travel to these places. I also tipped very well at this restaurant, I went around to everyone who came to our table during our meal and tipped them personally. One night I think I tipped 5 people in there. 2$ to 4 of them, and 5$ to our main server. We went to the Sante Fe restaurant (The Mexican themed restaurant) and this may have been the only restaurant we were not impressed with, but it was our fault. You have to be careful what you order, and we made a mistake. Overall, we were quite impressed with the food and the restaurants. The hostesses and servers were very hospitable, food enjoyable.
Bars – Bars were great. Barely ever have to wait for a drink. Tip every now and again, but you really don’t have to. Beer "Presidente" was awesome. I would buy that back home if I could. Pina Coladas, Banana Mamas, Daquiris, rum and cokes, all went down quite nicely over the week. All I can say is learn how to order a drink! say "cerveza por favor" or pina colada with rum! or with white rum! They will understand. I found sometimes people would expect the bar tenders to understand what they were telling them in english, and as a matter of fact, most would. Remember you are in THEIR country, english is not their mother tongue. If you take a step back, you’ll soon realize that they can speak bits of english and french much much better than most guests there can speak any sort of spanish.
Beach and Pools – Beach was absolutely beautiful. It was well raked every day (I guess), I mean, it was always nice when we went down. There’s a lot of people at this resort, sometimes it can be difficult to find beach chairs, but keep looking. As long as there are no towels or other belongings on them, they’re fair game! There are many vendors that are on the beach trying to sell goods (cigarettes, hair braiding, hats, necklaces, etc.) They’re not all that bad. We bought a few items from them, sometimes its fun to barter with them, and to see what they have to offer. The best is the guy selling coconuts, oranges, and pineapples. He walks the beach saying "coco coco coco coco" For a few dollars he’ll crack you open a coconut, pop a straw in it, and cut out the coconut from the top so you can eat it. Well worth trying in my opinion.
Grounds – The ground were well-maintained. Maintenance employees were always out sweeping and picking up. I thought they did a good job.
Activities – The activities were pleantiful, as long as you were willing to participate. The "Chocolate Friends" – who amazingly have their own theme some, kept the guests well entertained. They did step aerobics on the beach and in the pool throughout the day, they did water polo, and volleyball. I like playing volleyball, but it’s very windy in the dominican, so this makes a game difficult, and everybody looks like a beginner. We went paddle boating for a short time one day, but you could also try going out in a small sailboat or windsurf. At extra cost, you could also try the banana boat ride. The staff also ran other activites throughout the day as well to keep guests entertained. They had darts on the beach, baci ball, they had a beer-drinking contest one day, etc. They would also put on a show each night, although seemingly unessessary choreographed dances and such, the shows were entertaining nonetheless. We went to every one. The chocolate friends were good to the guests, spoke french and english quite well, and always had smiles on their faces.
Tours – There were many tours offered, such as a tour into santo domingo for the day, snorkelling at a place called catalina island, you could try a 4-wheeler tour, or as we did, go horseback riding. It was just the 2 of us and our guide. I would highly recommend the horse back riding.
Conclusion – This resort was great. The bad – the hotel is outdate, and I really could care less. The water ran sometimes cold in the shower, again, not a big deal. I guess some people would think this is a big deal, and if you are one of these people, don’t go to a 4-star resort in a third-world country, pay the money and go to a 5-star or go to hawaii. Now the good – Food was great, people were friendly and hospitable, beach was beautiful, Activities and tours were pleantiful.