Grand Paradise Bavaro Complex

“ Good hotel, food was of a good standard, not a clubbing destination, could have provided better entertainment, apart from that the hotel was good the beach was fantastic, deffinetly recommended.

“ Top Tip: Excursions - you must go on the Super Truck Safari & the Zip Line Adventure.

“ I have been to the Grand Paradise 3 times in the last 4 years , it is one of the most friendly i have stayed at , i have been to the Dominican Republic over 10 times so have seen many of the hotels, the staff are polite and helpful, the hotel rooms are very clean and well kept, the food is fab ( never been ill once in all my stays) i would recommend it every time.

“ Top Tip: It is perfectly safe to venture into the town, go into Bavaro and look around Everyone is very welcoming.

“ My comments are as follows;

1) The hotel was frankly well below the standard of a three or even two star hotel in terms of the quality of accommodation, quality of service or in terms of the staff being organised and making your holiday a pleasant experience.

2) The staff were not very well trained and hardly spoke any English which made it impossible to to communicate with them effectively and expected to be tipped even when they were providing a substandard service.

3) There were very few entertainment activities organised either for the children or the adults.

4) because of how disorganised the staff were, you had to queue up for over thirty minutes to an hour everyday for meals in the buffet restaurants, suggesting that that having one buffet restaurant in each of the sections was not adequate.

5) If you were in the section closer to the beach you had a wider variety of food to choose from in the designated buffet restaurant and there were more activities, which if you were on the side of the resort you felt left out and second class.

6) Housekeeping was frankly abysmal and most times you had to carrying on calling the housekeeping department to have you room cleaned, sometimes even at 19:00 hrs the room was still not made up.

7) The staff were aggressive, rude, unhelpful and unresponsive unless you offered them money (in dollars to be precise, as they did not seem to appreciate tips in their own currency).

8) The management was certainly not visible and you almost got the impression that they purposely kept out if the way for fear of being queried.

9) Contrary to published information, there was no Internet access for days for at least the first week of our holiday and no on could provide a plausible explanation why not.

“ The hotel is kept clean and tidy and on the whole most of the staff are friendly.
I was very impressed by Wilkin on the Reception Desk.
The main resort is very near to the beach - which is fantastic.
My one criticism for this hotel is in the evening there are 2 sittings for the buffet 6.30-7 and 8.30-9.30 and what i found was that not too many people attended the first sitting ,but you then had to queue to get into the dining room for the 2nd sitting and at this time it often appeared chaos. Although the staff did their best, often it was difficult to get served water, drinks etc. Whereas (like in most AIs I have stayed at) the buffet is continually open and there is a steady stream of people throughout the night - hence no queuing, chaos etc.
Also there are two parts to this hotel - the main resort and the Club (which is slight distance away) and often in the evening instead of using the disco at the Resort - where most people were... they opened the disco at the Club and hence not too many people attended.

Overall, this hotel satisfied my needs, but i would probably rate it at 3* as opposed to 4* as specified in the brochure.

“ Top Tip: If you walk out of the main entrance of the hotel and walk only a few metres there is a small shopping "plaza" for all your gifts. All the folks want you to go into their shop and look at the gifts on sale. They are all very amicable.
Do not be afraid - this is a great experience.