Iberostar Grand Paraiso

Mirna is an excellent butler (but we do miss her by the pools) Mirna is professional and competent and took care of us expertly this trip as always. Mirna is always wonderful. Elizabeth - pool concierge and Adrianna - the quiet pool waiter are both awesome! And Jonathan the bartender is so polite and his drinks are great! He is awesome.

A great resort with little to fault. The staff is amazing. In particular front desk manager Paulina solved a bad transportation issue for us. Others such as Eustebio in the Italian restaurant (our favorite), Saulo and Estrella in the lobby bar, Gama for room service, and Oscar our concierge, Eunice and Lenin around the pool, were just some of the people who went above and beyond. Concerning the facility, it is beautiful and well cared for. Definitely will be returning for our 4th trip this year! Highly recommend for a wonderful vacation. If possible DO NOT use W2M transport to the resort.

This was our first visit to JOIA Paraiso, but not to a JOIA Property. Upon arrival we were met at the entrance and were escorted into the Lobby area to wait to complete our registration. The property is huge, we were taken on a tram to our room. The buildings and grounds are well maintained. We had reserved the Penthouse Suite. The suite is large, however the space is not well used. One of our many complaints for the suite is in the spa like bathroom. The shower only has an overhead shower head, no hand held wand or side jets, something you would expect in a penthouse suite. To make matters worse the water pressure was low making taking a shower not a pleasant experience. On our second day we were approached and agreed to listen to a Sales Presentation for Membership in the hotel. We were told that we would have a “special and romantic” breakfast. After the initial meeting with the Sales Team we were escorted back to the JOIA Buffet breakfast, nothing special or romantic. After listening to the Sales Presentation when presented with the cost of the program we politely said no, we were not interested. Ultimately we had to say No three more times before they realized they were not going to win us over. This left a bad taste with us. When we said no, they should have stopped. During this presentation we told them of our concerns over this property. We travel a lot and like consistency. Our experience at the JOIA Rose Hall in Jamaica was totally different than at JOIA Paraiso. The room says it comes with a Butler, reality they are a concierge staying in the lobby of the building. We had butler service at the JOIA Rose hall, they met us each morning, checked on us when we were at the pool and took care of us. We did not get the same service here. Four of the specialty restaurants are small. If you are not there before they open to be in line, you will not get in to eat until much later in the evening. There are no reservations, except for Members [but not told/shared up front]. We sat in the French Restaurant, there was an open table the entire time we were eating, while there were couples waiting outside for a table. We had decided to leave our vacation which we planned 6 months to a year in advance early. I will say that we were surprised when approached by the Executive Assistant Manager at dinner on the night before we were leaving. She listened to our concerns and was very professional. In the end she made a bad experience somewhat less bad for us and appreciate what she did. I will finish by saying that this property is just not what we expected based on our experience at same type properties in other countries. For us, we like consistency and this was not like the type of experience we have had at other resorts in the Caribbean. Stay tuned into this I wanna go home series because we will be at updating the series every 90days because we will be traveling to their other properties. I do want to extend a thank you to IIse Kobus executive Assistant Manager. You have done your best with the time allowed. Yes we decided to leave our trip early than planned but in the short time you went above and beyond to help us navigate our thought process into understanding things will be better with someone like you heading the charge, and your guest service manager at your side, I hope to be welcomed back for a follow up visit. Thank you.

Lovely place with a good golf course but a horrible system for having people eat dinner. No reservations. You have to show up and once the restaurant is full you get on a list. They can text but not email. So come early or go to the buffet. Tried 3 restaurants tonight at 7-ish. 30 +/- min wait at each. 3-4 couples waiting it out at each place. Who knows how many waiting for texts. Just awful.

We return here for many reasons. The staff are so fabulous at this resort, you truly feel at home, but better lol. The food is great, we love their buffet restaurant, so much food! The beach is powder sand the water is warm. The beach loungers are well spaced and you can always get a spot at the beach or pool, no need to get up at dawn to get a spot. Just a great place all round.