Iberostar Grand Hotel Bavaro

Fabulous in every way with all tastes catered for . I went with my partner for 1 week of relaxation after having read about the constant temperatures all year round , and a far cry from the doom and gloom or a rain and wind laden UK ! The hotel did not disappoint and exceeded our expectations on every level ..rooms , service , food , views , location near the beach , friendly staff . The hotel owner is a self made guy and worked his way from humble beginnings and now owns a few more on the island but if you prefer a quiet , kids free space and special quality time then this is it . 6 alacarte restaurants and room service all included in our holiday with 2 personal butlers 24/7 made us feel pampered and special . The food was delicious and so much choice . Fresh biscuits , bread cooked in-house daily , lots of fresh fruit , drinks bought to you at the pool . There was a poolside bar where we sat on stools in the water and the bar was at the pool , crazy ! We had fish cooked in front of us then filleted and served with vegetables , lovely . The sea was only 1 minute walk from the hotel and lovely blue and warm , it was like paradise and no wonder people return again even if it is expensive but it is worth it . There are around 270 rooms and all booked for adults only , no children allowed under 18 years of age . we even had sushi bought to our room at night and champagne ! The beds were made up and sprinkled with flowers as was the shower room .. you have to experience it to believe it ... We were warned not to travel to the shops as it was not safe to do so , and there were buggys that took us the other hotels in the chain free where you could indulge in a casino or watch a show . We wore wristbands to identify the hotl we were from but other hotel guests could not visit us . We will definitely go again so start saving now !!!

Returned back to the UK yesterday from our perfect Honeymoon at Iberostar Grand Bavaro. This review is specifically written from the perspective of 2 Londoners staying for 14 nights as our experience may differ in some respects to majority American guests who we noticed tend to stay for 3 to 5 nights and may have different expectations. We are fairly well travelled and have around 15 all inclusive holidays under our belts ranging from Thailand and Maldives to various Caribbean destinations, mainly Cuba and DR. I have left out a lot of positive experiences we had, and the reason for this is because they should be left as surprises for you when you visit, as opposed to becoming expectations. Arrival at Punta Cana Airport and Hotel First impressions: We were off the plane, had collected our luggage and through customs in 20 minutes. This is the fastest we have experienced. Transfer to hotel was around 30 minutes. First impressions walking through the hotel entrance instantly gave confidence that this is a high end and well-maintained resort. We joked about taking our shoes off before walking on the red carpet towards the immaculate reception desk area. Booking in etc was fast and seamless with a bell boy carrying luggage to our room. The room: The resort was practically empty when we arrived having just re-opened from a refurb. This may have contributed to us being given an upgraded room (Lake view) free of charge. Garden View suites and Lake View Suites are actually the same, only the view is different. We arrived to find a bottle of Champagne on ice and a bowl of fresh fruit. The room and furnishings are of a high standard, quite large, with a nice en-suite complete with Jacuzzi overlooking the grounds. Room facilities are as advertised, only that following previous Caribbean holidays, I copied music onto CD's to take with us, but there was no CD player, only an MP3 player! Mentioned this to the Butler and within 15 minutes a CD/DVD player was installed and wired through the TV speakers. Butler Service: A novelty for us and it worked really well. 2 Butlers who regularly checked on our well being and nothing was too much trouble for them. You don't even have to outright ask for anything, for example, just in conversation my wife mentioned she liked Rose Wine and when later returning to the room a bottle had been left for us. You don't have to use any aspect of the butler service if you prefer, but the little touches they provide definitely add a special touch to a honeymoon, including returning to the room one evening at 12:30am to find the Jacuzzi filled and decorated with flowers and a bottle of bubbly on ice awaiting us. Really nice touch. On one occasion the air conditioning started making a banging noise during the night which prevented my wife from sleeping. (I was too drunk to care!) My wife called the butler who immediately provided an alternative room to sleep in, and by morning the air con had been fixed and we returned to our room. The experience of this was actually positive as opposed to negative that you would expect at most resorts. Beach and Pool Both perfect with a cabanas and loungers spread far enough apart to give you whatever level of privacy and space you prefer. Beach is large, clean and uncrowded (just look across to neighbouring resorts to really appreciate what you have here in comparison). As said, the resort was almost empty in the first week so Cabanas around the pool or loungers under parasols were always available in the best spots. In the second week it was busier and good spots were still always available on the beach, and whilst parasols were usually available around the pool, most best spots had been reserved by 7am which I'll come onto in more detail later. Food: The best food we have ever had at any all inclusive. A hugely diverse array of fresh foods. Breakfast could be anything from fresh fruit, various choices of bread, fish, gluten free products, branded (Kellogs) cereals, to Fry ups (Except no baked beans!). Also were doughnuts to run under a chocolate fountain or pancakes with a large choice of syrups which tended to be favoured by Americans. Lunch and Dinner: Again, a huge selection of food and we did not get bored of it at any point during the stay. Again, Anything from Lobster to Kobe Steak available at all meal times (this can't be real Kobe as it would be way too expensive to serve in such large volumes, so its possibly Wagyu or an imitation Kobe from the U.S), nonetheless the Steak was of high quality and better than you find in many restaurants at home. Even the Kebab wraps which were served using the best cuts of lamb and fresh salad were delicious and on par with those served in Turkish restaurants in London. Food wise, nobody will go hungry here and you will find new foods (particularly fish) that are not commonly available at home that make interesting and tasty alternatives to what we're used to. A-La-Carte Restaurants All of 5 of them are outstanding and come with a level of service you rarely get in London. We thoroughly enjoyed every single meal in these. Different courses are served as close or as far apart as you wish (we tend to immediately eat one course after the other and get frustrated at home when waiting 30 mins for the next course). Within seconds of finishing a course your plate is immediately removed. Have a small early lunch before visiting one of these in the evening, otherwise you'll eat too much and end up spending the rest of the evening trying to stay awake at the bar and this is coming from someone who usually stuffs their face all day at home! Too many foods available to list, so diverse, from Scallops and (some type of) Caviar for starters, to Pheasant for mains, to Apple Pie and Cinnamon ice cream for dessert. Everyone makes an effort dressing up for these restaurants and it does make the ambience that bit more special. Level of Service: Outstanding. This is what made our honeymoon perfect. Staff are there when you need them, there to help when you think you don't need them and out of site when you don't. A lot of training has gone into pulling this off so professionally. You will regularly be asked if there is anything anyone can do for you, or if there is anything you'd like to have done for you, whether it be related to your room, the service, the food, anything at all, yet this is done in such a way we never found it intrusive. Brilliant hard-working staff throughout and no member of staff ever looked bored or uninterested, every single one of them appeared to genuinely want your stay to be perfect, and they absolutely achieved this goal for us. Examples of service that surprised us: There is a (bar/waiter/waitress/buffet staff) Manager who seemed to be visible from 10am through to 1am almost every day. He watches everything the staff do and he spots the smallest imperfection in every detail and has it rectified immediately. We sat down one evening and around 3 minutes passed and we hadn't been served, he clocked this and took our order himself. On another occasion we sat in the buffet and our table was wobbly. Again, he immediately spotted this and literally ran towards us with a piece of plastic to support the wobbly table leg. Other examples included walking through breakfast buffet trying to carry a plate whilst pouring a glass of orange juice, immediately someone spotted this and came over to assist and proceeded to carry our drinks to the table whilst we continued browsing the buffet. The small touches carried out by staff are too numerous to list, but for us this was the wow factor having been used to All inclusive holidays that often have a cross section of lazy staff and helpful staff. At Iberostar Grand Bavaro, every member of staff was attentive, helpful and friendly, to the extent that we made friends with 2 of them. We have never stayed in contact with staff on any holiday previously. Tipping Staff: The service we received was outstanding throughout, to the extent that you will want to tip. Unlike our American Cousins who tend to tip small amounts after each meal or on receiving rounds of drinks etc, most Brits (I think) prefer to tip based on the overall service received towards the end of the holiday. Going to the bar waving $5 notes to get staff attention just isn’t necessary (in our opinion) and doesn’t affect the level of service you’ll receive. Other than single-visit a la carte restaurants, we didn’t tip at all until the last 2 days of our stay after which we gave good tips to those staff we felt worked hardest to deserve it. At no time during our stay did any member of staff appear to expect a tip and in no way did not tipping affect the service we received. Overall, we gave around £120 in tips, whether you think this is too much or too little is your personal preference, but is based purely on what was affordable to us and what we felt was fair. Naming Staff Members in Tripadvisor Reviews: You'll notice that many tripadvisor reviews for Iberostar Grand Bavaro specifically mention lists of staff names. On reading reviews this can be annoying because its a personal experience from the reviewer and not necessarily something that will help your decision to visit. However, once you have visited you begin to understand why people do this, there will almost certainly be members of staff that you’ll remember and want to name in your review, and for this reason I've added an extra section below to cover it. Comments for Hotel Management, Specific Staff, and areas needing improvement: Specific Staff: Every member of staff we found to be hard working, professional and friendly, showing a real desire to ensure we were 100% happy at all times. Entertainment Staff Jeffrey: Jeffrey was a stand out member of the Entertainment staff for us. A friendly and very hard working guy who always had time to talk to us and encouraged us to get involved with activities we wouldn't have done otherwise, and we thoroughly enjoyed them, especially the Archery. Our Butlers Leo and Cesar: Brilliant at what they did, and they both picked up on every word we said to them throughout our honeymoon and used this to tailor their service to fit our precise wants and desires, such as the DVD player being delivered to our room, the surprise bottles of Rose and even though we hadn't requested it, the Jacuzzi being filled and decorated at the end of an evening where they had clearly calculated it to be the perfect night to do it for us. We spent more time with Leo than with Cesar, and Leo is clearly a professional who will go far in his career. Brilliant. Willy the Concierge: Willy could not do enough for us. Always had a friendly smile, a huge personality that continually shone through. He seemed to genuinely like us from the second we arrived and we thought very highly of him. He is clearly intelligent educated and this became obvious in the way he tailored his conversation to us. Willy always made us feel like we were the only people he was interested in at any given moment. Even if we didn't ask for something, he seemed to know what we wanted and he'd get it arranged immediately. He made us laugh every day. An absolute professional and I would be honoured to have someone like him working for me. Sujeidy: What can we say.... Sujeidy really made our honeymoon extra special. She moves fast, appears to serve more drinks than anyone else, and was at our service within seconds every single time we sat down for a drink. Within a couple of days she knew our drinking style and therefore how often to offer us refills. Her timing was always perfect, even when we were out of site of the bar and playing pool, she'd always arrive with fresh drinks and a big smile within seconds of finishing a previous drink. Sujeidy was always smiling, had a brilliant personality, always made us laugh and even had us in tears of laughter (It takes a lot to make me laugh like that). She is an absolute superstar and she is definitely the main reason as to why we want to book to come back. Sujeidy made our holiday more memorable than anybody else and she worked so hard to make sure of that. An absolute superstar and we will genuinely miss having her around. We have never included a member of staff in a holiday photo before, but for our entire holiday, Sujeidy felt like part of our family. And just to point out the comment earlier in the review about waiting 3 minutes before being served in the bar area, that was on the night when Sujeidy was not working. Areas requiring improvement: There isn't much that needs improvement, but here's a couple of small things: The TV channels: We don't go on holiday to watch TV and rarely switch it on, but on this occasion there was one particular sporting event I wanted to watch. I fully understand and appreciate this is a first world problem. There are 100's if not 1000's of channels yet no channel listing available, so the only way to find a specific channel is to flick through every channel till you find it, and if adverts are on you have to wait for them to finish to see which channel it is. It took over an hour to find the channel I wanted, which then turned out to be the Spanish version. Of course I could have rung the Butler to sort it out, but it felt too trivial to do so. In the end I watched the event on an Ipad through the hotel Wi-Fi. Reserving Loungers/parasols/cabanas around the pool and beach: There are clear signs telling guests not to do this but they do. On a couple of occasions, we went to the pool or beach very early to enjoy them while they were completely empty. At 7am one morning at the beach there were already towels reserving all of the best (front rows) parasols with the best views. What really annoyed us was that by midday NOBODY had actually sat on any of them, and the older American couple who had reserved the very best spot didn't turn up until 2pm, then sat down for around 30 minutes before leaving them empty for another 3 hours before eventually coming back at 5pm to collect their towels and belongings. That is just totally wrong. Our experience at the pool during the busier second week was also similar. All but a handful of Cabanas had been reserved when we sat down at 8am, yet we were the only people actually using them. When we left the pool at 11am over half had still not been used by anybody but remained reserved. To an extent I can understand people dropping belongings and towels off at a Cabana on the way to breakfast and then using them after breakfast, but to have Pool Cabanas and beach Parasols reserved from early morning and throughout most of the day without using them is just wrong, especially when people reserve them early morning, go off on a half day trip and then come back to use them when they get back in the afternoon. (and before you think it, it wasn’t the Germans, lol). Despite the above there was always Parasols available on the beach, and only 2 occasions where there was no Cabana availability around the pool. The Disco / DJ The evening disco on the boat was generally empty. People would visit on their first couple of nights and then not go back. We are 40 and used to enjoy clubbing prior to starting a family, but the boat disco just doesn't work. The ambience doesn't seem right, the DJ seems to prefer the place empty. The music didn't appear to be to anyone's taste other than maybe the DJ's. We appreciate the local music and culture which is evident throughout the music being played around various parts of the resort and in the entertainment shows and other events. But the disco should appeal more to an international audience, even if it was just 80's and 90's cheesy pop music it would have attracted a lot more people. The DJ should be learning to understand what people want, or even asking people what they would like to hear. On one occasion we were the only people there yet again, so I gave the DJ a playlist of dance music which he played for a couple of hours, that was a brilliant night and even the other boat staff appeared to be enjoying it. If improvements were made here, maybe then people wouldn't be awake at 06:30am reserving sun loungers! To summarise: Iberostar Grand Bavaro is rated the best Hotel in Dominican Republic for very good reason. Our honeymoon was perfect and of the 5 Caribbean hotels we had shortlisted we KNOW we chose the right one. This is not a cheap holiday from the UK, but compared to other more expensive Caribbean Islands we feel the value for money was good considering the exceptional level of service and all-round quality we received. At London prices I probably ate and drunk more than the cost of the entire holiday, at least £100 worth of food each day, and the same again each night in high end beverages! If you visit the neighbouring hotels for a la carte meals, buffet or drinks you too will then appreciate Iberostar Grand Bavaro as being well worth the extra money. We would definitely come back at least once every 2 years, but whilst our children are still at home will not be able to, although I understand they will be building an Iberostar Grand hotel for families next door and we'll certainly look to book that up when it’s completed. Thank you to all staff who worked so hard to make everything perfect.

This was our third visit to the Iberostar Grand Bavaro. This resort continues to exceed our expectations. We celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary and we are extremely happy we chose the Grand Bavaro this year. We cannot say enough good things of the entire Hotel staff. From the time we checked in to the day we checked out we were greeted with top notch service and a staff that goes out of their way to make our stay truly special. We were greeted by friendly smiles, many of them remembered us from two years ago when we stayed at the Grand Bavaro. The grounds are beautiful, even though they had minor damage from the hurricane by the time we arrived the resort was immaculate. Our room 7358 was very clean and comfortable. Gladys the housekeeper did an excellent job keeping the room clean and tidy. The food is excellent, there is a broad variety for every diet! Make it a point to visit all the specialty restaurants, they all have something excellent to offer. Beach and pool area are excellent, what you would find in a 5 star resort. I would like to give special thanks to our butler Rafael, at the front desk, Melvin, Sandy Sazon at the pool buffet and all those that made our visit very special. The effort Mr. Aramando Pozo and his staff has put in to making this resort a 5 star resort is truly evident in the entire operation of this fine resort! We have also stayed at the Iberostar Grand Paraiso in Riviera Maya, which is also an excellent resort, however, the Grand Bavaro is by far our favorite!

To say that this resort is amazing is an understatement! Just celebrated our 10 year anniversary and the entire staff knew this and helped make it more memorable! From our Room Managers Rafael and Jose to the Entertainment Star Team - Ricardo, Starlyng, Lucero and wait staff Sandy and honestly all personal was great! It genuinely felt like everyone wanted to make sure that we were enjoying our stay! We absolutely loved the food from the ala carte restaurants to the Buffets. Thumbs up to the executive chef Alta Gracia! I will totally be looking to go back again next year and one day become an Iberostar Grand Member. Highly Highly recommend!

I absolutely love the Iberostar Grand Bavaro it was an amazing experience and I met so many incredible people on this journey! Our room was made up every day and they even did something new and special with the towels every time. Our Butlers Ayendi "Boom Boom" and Dawel were beyond amazing they helped us with everything so our stay was stress free and they would even sit down and have a present conversation with us, which really made it feel like home. Boom Boom even made us a romantic bath with rose pedals, wine, cheese, and fruits, it was incredible and way above and beyond! Dawel checked on us to always make sure we had everything we needed and he was super fun to talk to all the time! The shows at night were fanatic my favorite was the Micheal Jackson show! My favorite entertainer is Staryling, he is an amazing person and we loved seeing him around the resort because he was always had a smile on his face and greeted us with good conversation. The only thing I found disappointing was the spa :( It was way over priced and not a good experience at all they didn't take the time to do any massage for a mani pedi, they didn't know how to do designs on your nails, and all the paint chipped in less than 24 hours. I will definitely be returning to this fabulous resort, I just won't ever revisit the spa!