Punta Cana

While we are waiting to go to England in September, we booked a week in the Dominican Republic with Will and Jen and the kids at the Iberostar Bávaro suites.  It's all-inclusive so we shouldn't have to worry about a thing except hurricanes and hot weather.  It will be like the Celebrity cruise we took with Juan and Mandy on their honeymoon and hopefully Iberostar will have some good food too, although maybe not filet mignon and crème brulée every night.  However, the drinks are free so maybe that will make up for any failings in the food.

The Iberostar Bávaro is owned by Grupo Iberostar, which in turn is owned by Spanish billionaire Miguel Fluxà Rosselló, the third generation heir to a shoe-making business, headquartered in Mallorca, Spain.  (Camper is one of the shoe lines of the family.)  Since it is Spanish, we should expect some Spanish food, like paella.

Here's a video to introduce you to our all-inclusivity but it will be a lot more crowded than the video shows.  It looks nice and cool from the vantage point of snowy Pittsburgh but I know it will be very hot and humid and we will be thankful for air-conditioning.  I'm just hoping for cloudy days to make the weather more bearable (but does that forecast hurricanes?).  Cancun in August of 1994 was scorching on sunny days.

The kids should like it:  they can choose their own food at the buffet, there is a pirate ship in the kids' pool, and the hotel offers kids programs.  There's a kids club from 10am to 5pm and then from 7pm to 11pm, while the parents go to the casino.  The playroom even contains a foosball table which should keep Papi entertained.

For the adults they have pétanque every day from 10:30 to 11:00, or so they say.  I'd like to check that out.

Bungalows

There are more than 10,000 reviews for Iberostar Bávaro on TripAdvisor and they run the gamut from "wonderful" to "terrible".  The negative reviews complain most about poor service, especially at check-in, and the hard sell to sign up for Iberostar "timeshares".  Others complain about the awful food, cockroaches (it is in the tropics, afterall) and seaweed on the beach (it is on a sea).   The positive reviews rave about the friendly service and the wonderful food.  For the same period of time you will get one reviewer who hated it and another one who loved it, so take your pick.

Junior Suite

TripAdvisor also has more than 10,000 photos but they tend to be surprisingly similar.  Instead of high rise hotels, the Bávaro accommodations are in two-story multi-apartment bungalows.  The Junior Suite that we booked looks quite comfortable with a sitting area and a balcony.  One reviewer said all the rooms were the same and the price depended on location and whether you had an ocean view.  No, they don't have a kitchen but with all the meals included, who needs to cook?  They do have a minibar that is restocked every day with water, soft drinks and beer, which is good because one review said that the tap water was not "potable".

Below is a map of the properties.  Iberostar has three hotels together and you can go from one to the other and I believe eat at the restaurants on the other properties.  One reviewer preferred to swim at the Dominicana beach because there was less seaweed but liked the Bávaro for snorkeling because it had a reef and more tropical fish to see.  Give me flora and fauna over pristine beaches any day.