This will be short but very accurate. We enjoyed every aspect of this vacation. The destination was beautiful. The hotel grounds and facilities were were above average. The room was lovely and well stocked with all that we needed. The staff was excellent, helpful and always generous with their smiles and their attemps to communicate were always sprinkled with humour.

In particular we encountered a really great waiter named Augusto at the buffet dinner on the terrace every evening who made our dinner time experience the best.

Another excellent asset to our trip was Jean Claude the Air Transat Rep. He included all the info you might need to have agreat holiday.

The beaches were absolutley gorgeous and we enjoyed the swimming in both the ocean and the pool.

Stayed March 3-10. The weather was great. Weather reports for Samana predicted scattered showers every day, yet it only rained a couple of times for 10 minutes or so.

The resort is clean and beautiful. It's beach wide, with a light golden sand and clear, warm water. The coral reafs near shore are full of colourful fish and sea life.
Hotel grounds are immaculate; flowers, tall palm trees and velvety grass.The staff is polite and helpful.

We got a Royal Golden suite close to the beach, asked for it in advance. The suites are beautiful, large, clean, elegant with a cozy feel to them. All the perks and free internet added a nice touch.

We tried all the à la carte restaurants. The gourmet "Orquidea" is beautiful, and serves great lamb. In the Italian, spaghetti with lobster, gnocci and chocolate dessert were delicious. The Seafood, with a lovely sea view, had a good fish and seafood platter. At the Oriental we liked fish broshettes and fried banana dessert. The service is excellent in all 4.
The buffet restaurant is very pretty, with a varied selection and attentive staff.

The town of Las Terrenas has a distinct local feel to it, and some nice shops. A cigar store on the main street sells good dominican cigars, including Aurora and Juan Clemente.
In the resort, Harrison's jewlry sells really beautiful gold jewlry.

Hi, I just returned (3rd of March) from a week vacation at this resort and stayed in the junior suite as a golden member. The 90 minute bus ride was most pleasant as it turned out to be a tour like ride. Beware though, no toilet on board! Same bad comments I've read about or noticed kept coming back: lack of face cloth, lack of chairs on the beach, entertainment starting too late (22:30hrs), confusion as to where night entertainment taking place, toaster placement clogging up circulation in buffet area. Very minor details for me. The people working on the resort were very polite and friendly. Staff employees were constantly working at improving or cleaning the site. One front desk attendant even took time to replace the missing screw of my pair of glasses. I felt very secure on the resort as armed officers were discreetly seen from time to time walking the beach. Employees were checked in and out at the front gate of the resort for theft prevention. Only items left on the bed pillow could be taken from the room by the cleaning staff ex money tips. A short note confirming your gift should accompany your item. Women’s make up is much appreciated considering that their monthly income is approximately 250 dollars. On more then one occasion, expensive items had been left in the open by mistake. Nothing ever went on missing. If you feel the 31 dollar fee for the safe is too expensive, you can always lock your items inside your luggage. I will surely go again.

Our experience at this hotel was very positive., and we found the comments in other complimentary reviews fairly accurate. Rather than repeat them I'll simply add a few observations either not covered, or not as we found things. Firstly walking shorts for men are acceptable at the buffet; long pants are required for the a la carte.

The beach is fabulous but off the beach not so good.

Sailing: you're allowed to take a catamaran alone if you pass the test. However, you have to find and wind your way between the coral heads. There are 2 marks, both white flags the same colour as the breaking waves. It is a Beam Reach out and back which helps, but it is very, very windy, and when you get beyond the reef its a wild ride. Straight out and back is best so that you can find the mark to get back. In 2 weeks we only sailed 3 times.

Snorkeling: not good!. There's lots of coral and it is all dead, located in mostly shallow water. We saw very few fish, no shoals. We did swim out to the edge of the reef about 500 m. and found some interesting canyons in deeper water, but no fish.

Swimming: not good. A long swim is our regular daily habit and that's pretty difficult here. You have to zig zag between the coral heads. As I like to do back crawl I was mostly unsuccessful with painful results and swim suit damage. There's also numerous sand banks covered in sea grass at a depth of less than a foot.

Wonderful hotel. good food and friendly, efficient staff, but poor for swimming etc! We also enjoyed the bathroom with bags of hot water and a shower that worked well, the firm, comfortable king size bed and the almost nightly barbecue on the patio. Saturday was lobster, Sunday steak. We alo found the resort very quiet especially as the bar closed at 11:00 PM - great idea!