Royalton Bavaro, An Autograph Collection All-Inclusive Resort & Casino

Nicole Matthews

Extremely disappointed in the quality of stay at this all inclusive resort. We were immediately pressured by Diego (concierge) to join the diamond club and when we decided not to he said that WE would be the reason he gets in trouble with his boss and maybe “loses his job” because we didn’t go on the diamond club tour. Diego proceeded to ignore us the rest of our trip, and even put his head down when walking past us down a hallway and didn’t even say hello back to us. Most importantly, I felt extremely sick while staying in our room. Every night my eyes & nose would burn and run so bad, couldn’t swallow at all & then found BLACK MOLD EVERYWHERE in our shower. I’m assuming this is also in the A/C vents and this is why I was feeling sick in the room, but not during the day while outside. “Reservation-free” dining is a lie. Food was awful, buffet was the only thing available because reservations were booked every night. The only good thing about this trip for us was getting engaged, and our excursion off premise. For the price you pay, SAVE YOUR MONEY! We expected so much more than the quality of beds, pillows, rooms & service we received.

Nick Muir

ASDA food at Waitrose prices. With added mosquitos. 5* my arse. Diamond Club a must or don't come. To avoid being treated like a second class citizen, you need that Diamond Club - we didn't have one. Check-in is a nightmare. First day wasted as you have no idea what's going on. TUI rep was there the following day which helped, Juli is good and can fix most things straight away. Excursions good. Bring dollars for tips, a couple of bucks for porters and bar staff helps loads. Not quite enough for young teenagers to do at the hotel - we used the flow rider which seems expensive but kids went mad for it. The place and the entertainment seem geared for small children. I've read overly positive reviews on here, which is irritating as they were the reason I didn't switch hotels before the holiday (booked with TUI). Whatever you read, don't come for the restaurants. Probably the biggest irritation. Best bits - pools close to the sea, beach area great, buffet pretty good, waiter service at the pool also good. Just get the Diamond Club upgrade. Tips: Make friends with the 3 grill chefs at the buffet. Steak and grilled fish are great. Ask your rep to help booking restaurants if you must, but they are a waste of time except the Hunter. Beach towels need grabbing from near the pools asap, when you arrive. You'll need them to get a recliner first thing. Leave the portable dehumidifier running in your room all day. Otherwise everything gets damp. The Aircon control is by the bed. Best lunch by far is the lazy river cafe. Book the flow rider the day before, early. Get a room away from the lobbies if you can. The onsite shop is pant-wettingly expensive. Bring more sun cream than you'll need. Up to $45 in the shop. There are no local towns to walk to or around. So it's the beach. You can use the waterpark next door for $35 per person, or free with Diamond Club. Bring small notes for tips. Final report. After waiting 50 minutes, *after* tipping the guy to find me a golf cart to take luggage back to reception, I gave up and carried it 1/4 of a mile myself. Pretty much sums this place up. Ps. Photo 2 is the cockroach that appeared every night and spent on the floor, until we set him free outside.

Elizabeth Haynie

Came here to celebrate my sister and I’s birthday, but we were highly disappointed as we could not get reservations at a single restaurant. We had to eat at the buffet or the bar every night because those are the only places you can go without a reservation. The buffet was good the first night, but the next two nights the food was not good. We could not even sit together at the buffet, we had to have a birthday dinner at the airport on the way home. Really disappointing considering that it’s a Marriott and I thought it would be smoother. The only highlight of the resort was the swim up room. I also noticed there was a ton of hair in our Jacuzzi, it was gross. At night they have music or some kind of performance then everyone goes to the bar that is there. The gift shop is also really expensive. The employees in the gift shop, the front desk and the room service people were really sweet, but everyone else was rude. My sister even got into it with a cook that refused to give her a steak at the buffet. Although we had fun, I wish we would’ve stayed at a different resort. We spent thousands of dollars and couldn’t even eat a good meal together

Naomi Spewak

We recently traveled to Royalton Bavaro (March 1-6). I have to say I was a bit nervous after reading reviews online that weren’t so positive. We booked our vacation with certain requirements- distance from airport, swim-up room, all-inclusive, & price. This resort met all of our requirements. We had a great trip. Our meals were all great, the buffet options were very generous. Overall we had a great experience. I am making this review as honest as possible because of the concerns we had before traveling, there were definitely some cons to staying at this resort, we did not know before booking that most of the restaurants required a reservation. You can only make reservations for that day or the next day, there was rarely availability for the majority of the restaurants. We booked with diamond club so we were fortunate enough to have a butler who was able to obtain the reservations for us but that definitely would have been frustrating if we didn’t have that option. Another con was the musty room smell, we didn’t unpack our suitcases as to try to keep some of the musty smell from settling in to our clothes, we understand with the humidity in this area that it might be hard to keep moisture from causing this problem. Although our room was tended to daily, we constantly had to ask for washcloths, housekeeping would take ours and not leave new ones. This seems like a small problem but if we didn’t track down housekeeping to ask for more, we had to contact our butler to get them for us. We did feel like our room was not thoroughly cleaned prior to our arrival, we felt as though they rushed it to get us checked in an hour early, we would have preferred they checked us in at the normal time and spent that time cleaning our room a little better. Also, we did not use the sofa, it did not look clean, it had visual stains on it. This con is not the resorts fault but some of the guests were slobs, I know you have this anywhere however, guests would just leave empty cups or plates sitting -along the lazy river, on top of garbage cans, basically any surface that was available when they were tired of carrying it. The grounds were kept very well but this seems to be a problem that their staff can’t keep up with. Smoking was also allowed pretty much throughout the resort, other than restaurants, this is not something that we’re used to. They did not seem to enforce the use of designated smoking areas. Almost all garbage cans had sand on top so this seemed to almost be an invitation for smoking throughout the resort grounds. Our vacation was great, we loved the amenities of the resort and room - just wanted to provide honest info in my review.

Robert Freeman

Absolutely disgusted with our experience at the Royalton Bavaro in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. First of all, you can't make dinner reservations if you don't have a butler and are in the Diamond Club - AFTER check in. You'll be stuck at the buffet for the trip. Check in took over two hours! No one cared to do anything about it. Our room was dirty: the floor, the sheets, and the glasses and the phone was broken. The keys stopped working every day. I took pictures of the filth, dirt, scratches everywhere in the buildings, along the walls, ceiling, and doors. Every 30 minutes someone was selling us something, in the lobby, on the beach, walking. Four different people I spoke with all had the same experience. By far the worst all inclusive I have been to. By the time checkout came, I was so numb to the punches and slaps I had to absorb during the stay, that it almost didn’t matter that check out was close to one hour! The people behind me missed their bus because of this. Our experience was regrettable. The Royalton Bavaro is not an Autograph Collection hotel. It is not 5 stars. We were lied to. Marriott should engage in brood reduction, like eagles do, and drop this hotel from its program.