Iberostar Selection Bavaro

Where do I start? This was my husband’s first trip anywhere outside of Canada & the U.S, and my second. We chose the Iberostar based on their stellar ratings, and in the hopes of having some vegan food. THE ROOM We got the Junior supersaver (?). The room was quite nice - with a balcony ground floor garden view, which was very peaceful. The room did have a slight musty smell all the time, and the bathroom wasn’t entirely cleaned or re-stocked upon arrival. However, it was cleaned well when requested. The shower was totally open so the water would go right into the bathroom. We put a towel down which helped. Water also leaked from the ceiling light sometimes. But housekeeping was friendly and pretty thorough, bar fridge and coffees, towels stocked. The coffee was subpar in the room but excellent at the buffet. THE BEACH The beach was beautiful and the main attraction for us. You can walk the beach for miles - the resorts all around ours didn't have nearly as beautiful a beach front. Many huts and lounge chairs to choose from - you could find a spot no problem, even midday - but if you wanted to snag the best spots you do have to get up by 630am or so. Some people would leave their towels out overnight which was a bit irritating. I was super upset to see captive monkies and macaws being exploited for a quick buck by private photography companies. It was the greatest upset of my trip. PLEASE do not support this. They were peddled up and down the beach all day in the heat, owned by the photography companies. The beach is also not quiet most days by any means but can be early in the day and later in the afternoon. There are helicopters going back and forth almost constantly some days, taking people for tours. Lots to do on the beach for water activities like parasailing. The activities at the pool happen daily and can be noisy, but it didn't impact our enjoyment at all. Servers regularly come around for bar drinks. ENTERTAINMENT We were fortunate enough to attend during RD Independence Day celebrations which were lively and fun. They had little shows each night for the kids to participate in, and the staff encouraged the guests to dance prior to the entertainment. It did start late, around 930pm, which was too late for my husband and I to enjoy most nights. But the dancing and singing were lively. However there were some salesmen at the resort itself who were pushy and sold us items marked way up that we could buy at the market for much less. Live and learn. Just be firm with them. SAFETY We felt very safe the entire time. Security everywhere, but obviously you’ll want to be cautious at dark, especially on the beach where anyone can come from off site. Don’t give your credit card to anyone, and everything can be haggled for. I probably wouldn’t have felt as safe if I had been alone. You get harassed on the beach pretty much all day but if your firm and say no and / or ignore them they’ll move on. Some will try to give you free things to lure you in as well. One note - upon coming out of our room one afternoon after showering up before dinner we found our “ahora no” or “do not disturb sign” torn in half and thrown on the steps by our room. It looked like someone had deliberately taken it off the door handle while we were inside and ripped it in half and left it on the steps. We thought it was odd, but used an elastic to put it back together and put it on our door again since we didn’t want anyone to clean our room that day. After going out to dinner we came back to our room at dark and found it was again taken off our door handle (this thing slid on there snug and did not blow around) and this time a man, a staff member, came out of the darkness of the utility room across from our door (we are right on the end and there are no rooms beyond ours) as we approached. He came by us and as we went to enter our room he pulled out a screwdriver. My husband tapped the light which then turned on. The man said “that’s what I’m here to fix”. It startled us both at first, but we realized the two incidents were likely unrelated. But we are at a loss to understand why our door sign was removed twice and vandalized. It certainly didn’t put us at ease. When we tried to explain to the front desk they didn’t seem to understand and ordered us a new door sign. This one did blow off regularly because it didn't fit snug to the door handle. We had no further problems, so I'll chock it up to the wind. STAFF The staff were very friendly. Everyone was smiley and welcoming from the security (which was plentiful) and the general staff. Francisco, one of the welcoming guys, did push the time shares and tried very hard to guilt us into attending. He kept telling us that if we didn't show up, he doesn't make any money and he's doing a bad job. He said it would only take a few minutes of our time. We felt bad, but our Sunwing rep told us that it would actually take up 3-4 hours of our vacation, so we're glad we didn't go. Ernesto at the front desk is a hoot. Our Sunwing staff were on site and warned us of what to look out for and helped us out when needed. Mario at the buffet was attentive and kind. As was Fransua and Angel, and really all the ladies and gentlemen we dealt with. But Mario was our choice the entire trip. SITE & AMENITIES The site was beautifully kept, and there were always staff working hard to keep it clean. Wonderful foliage and plenty of local fauna including some flamingos, many bird and duck species, and tortoises. NOTE: please don’t feed the birds & animals by the buffet - all day long we watched people throw hunks of bread to them, in total ignorance of the fact that bread is terrible for them. Please, the staff feed them and although it’s cute to watch them feed, if you loved them you would feed them minimally, and only foods that are good for them like halved grapes, oats, etc. Also there were two sweet little resident cats that we enjoyed seeing and petting. They looked quite healthy. There is plenty to do on site from fitness classes to the disco. BUT! Make sure you have adequate small bills because breaking a 20 is impossible even at the market. They’ll give you change if you buy something but wouldn’t break a 10 into smaller bills. The front desk did break two 20s into 5s and 10s but they were barely able to do that. Each time we asked we were told no, that they didn't have any small bills. We even walked all the way to the casino and they wouldn’t give us more than $5 in ones. Lesson learned- bring ONLY ONES lol. SHOPPING The market on site was nice with plenty of neat little trinkets and well priced. We did venture to the other shopping area closer to the Iberostar PuntaCana & Dominicana but there wasn’t much there. FOOD Let me prelude by saying my husband and I are both vegan. We covered many steps in picking this resort - we read many reviews that the Iberostars are well known for accommodating. We emailed Iberostar and our resort directly, spoke with our travel agent in advance. All assured us that we would be well looked after. We enjoyed the on site cafe many times where specialty coffees were made for us. There were two buffet options, one by the beach which was very convenient, and one by our room. Fresh filtered water less than 50 ft from our room. The buffet - was excellent. We were hesitant about the selection but there was something different for us almost every day. And each meal offered a new selection as well. Breakfast was my personal favourite - ample fruit, rice cakes, bagels, potatoes, fried bananas, cereal (with dairy free milk), etc. My husband was upset that there were no oats without milk, but we made out well enough still. Plenty of rice and bean, veggie options, guacamole, salsa, chips, hot & cold salads (I would stay away from the salad bar though), okra, yams, habichuelas, chickpea salad, potato salad. Literally walked away with a heaping plate of delicious vegan food every single time. AND they even had vegan desserts - some mousse and flan, as well as vegan cakes!! So tasty and labelled vegan. However stay away from the cold veg as they’re pretty bland. All the sauces were delicious. And everything was pretty well labelled with allergen alerts so it was easy to identify what we could and could not eat. We looked at the menus in advance of making dinner reservations just to ensure we weren’t totally out of line. Some, like the Steakhouse and Star Rock were out of the question for obvious reasons. We picked the Jambalaya, Il Forno (Italian), Kabuki (Japanese) and the Oriental diners. Our first reservation was at the Jambalaya (Cajun) restaurant. I have and do make delicious Jambalaya at home and thought rice & beans & veggies would be an easy dish to whip up - especially since its components were at the buffet. Upon arriving, all dressed to the nines and excited about our little “night out”, we informed our server that we were vegan. “Yo soy vegano”. “Oh,” his face dropped. He understood, and wrote down “plato vegetales”. I suggested a simple rice and beans which was already on the menu, without the meat. The server instructed us to the buffet where there was white rice and a tasty sautéed veggie dish. We had some as an app. After 15 minutes or so a lady brought us out two small plates of vegetables, and two huge chunks of bleeding meat. I was horrified and told them it was not our food. She insisted and tried to serve it to me again. I declined again. Another server approached. In Spanish, I reminded him “sin carne, sin leche, sin juevos”. He smiled, nodded, and returned to the chef. A few minutes later they brought us back about 4 pieces of cooked broccoli each, some sautéed mushrooms, carrots and tomato. About a fistful of food total. We were disappointed to say the least. We ate and left immediately. We were a bit shaken as it felt like we were inconveniencing them simply by asking for something to be made. Fortunately we went right next door to the buffet and had a wonderful platter of beans, rice, chickpeas, grilled vegetables, sautéed veggies, etc. And wonderful service from Mario, as usual. We skipped the Kabuki after deciding it probably wasn’t worth the hassle but my husband really wanted to try Il Forno. Before sitting down we decided to ask again in advance. Sin carne? No problem. There were a few menu items labelled vegetarian so we ordered, and I requested, en Español, no meat or cheese. We took a gamble on the spicy penne and a spaghetti pomodoro. The spicy penne came with meat despite us asking for it without. Maybe our bad since it was probably made in advance WITH the meat. But my pasta came with cheese on top. We were a bit frustrated at this point but chocked it up to a language barrier (although I was clear in Spanish) and an inability on their part to make adjustments to the menu items, and again decided it just was better for us to go to the buffet. The restaurants seem to cater more to a fine dining scene, so the servings were accurate but quite small. The food was delicious nonetheless. We picked out the meat and cheese, but we still felt terrible it was wasted. For a better selection the buffet cannot be beat. At the end of the day, we were very happy with everything. A few minor hiccups, but nothing that made our time there any less enjoyable. A few lessons learned, but we appreciate everything the staff had done for us to make our time enjoyable. A fairly high-end resort (not as high-end as the Bavaro Grande adults-only resort next door), well worth the costs.

This was our second visit. It is one of the most beautiful hotels we have ever stayed at. Beautiful during the day and at night the lighting makes it feel like a fairy tale land. We loved our Junior suite. Lots of space. The employees were all very helpful and friendly. The food was good at the buffet near the pool, central buffet near the reception area and at the restaurants. But, beware of hard-sell, time-wasting people on-site.

Accommodations excellent, room always tidied twice daily, beach area much larger than adjoining hotels, food enhanced by very friendly cooks and a special thanks to Orlando. Food variety just outstanding and again our very special thanks to Orlando.