Secrets Royal Beach Punta Cana

Just returned from 7 nights at Secrets & could not have been more satisfied with our stay. Room: we stayed in a Junior Suite Swim-Up Room. Room was spacious and clean, with no musty smell. Patio had lounge chairs with palm tree shade & the lazy river-style pool was just a few steps from our patio door. Lots of people floating by all day but very few who stopped or relaxed in the lazy river, which gave us a lot of privacy and the ability to relax poolside on our own. Note: the tile floors in the room & on the patio were veeeeeery slippery when wet, and with the pool right outside of our patio door it was hard NOT to track water in. Grounds: zero complaints. The resort is absolutely gorgeous, well maintained, well laid-out. At night it is romantically lit and jazz floods the air. So perfect. Pools: lazy river-style pool does not have a current but is awesome for floating around, or even swimming laps. We did not spend a lot of time in the main pool, but during our stay we did attend two foam parties ("water festivals") that were a wicked time. Any time we were in the main pool there was great music. Bars: soooo many frozen drink options! Just be clear on which flavor you want - we got the wrong flavor a couple of times and some of them were not so delicious. Strawberry daiquiri and mango were our favorites. Lobby bar has interior and exterior service counters, which was especially awesome when watching the evening entertainment. Service: we did not really have any issues with service. There is bar service all along the lazy river, so while relaxing poolside we could have drinks delivered right to us (talk about being spoiled!). Services at each of the bars was great. Everyone was very friendly. At times, the buffet service felt aggressive... they would clear some things from our table while we were still eating, or make it difficult to get spoons to eat our cereal with, but for the most all okay. The only negative service experience we really had was at the Spice (Asian) restaurant at the neighboring NOW Larimar. We had reserved a table for 8, and within 45 minutes felt like they were pushing us out the door. They didn't even wait for everyone at our table to finish eating before putting dessert in front of us. Beach: nice, big, white sand beach, with lots of chairs... half of the beach has palapas and the other half offers a lot of shade from palm trees. Quite a bit of seaweed, though the team did do a good job of cleaning up the bulk of it before beachgoers arrived in the morning. There were a lot of non-resort employees on the beach trying to sell various things - excursions, water sports, photos, trips to local shopping centers, etc. Some were more aggressive than others, some made inappropriate comments toward women, but for the most part if you just ignore and keep walking they get the hint. Food: we were very satisfied with the food on the resort. Breakfast buffet had an omelette station every day, lunch buffet offered a pasta station as well as a meat station. There was usually something like a ready turkey or pork roast, as well as fresh meat that one of the cooks would prepare for you on the spot. Beach grill was AMAZING for lunch and/or snacks... burgers, hot dogs, chicken, pork, fish, nachos. Delicious. Portofino (Italian) was delicious, but Oceana (seafood) was our favorite a la carte directly on the resort. It was so, so good. My husband does not eat seafood, but they have a steak option with zero seafood on the plate that he loved. Recommendation: mussels. You won't regret it! At NOW Larimar, we ate at Spice (Asian), Bluewater Grill (American), and Tamarindo (Mexican). Spice had great food. Bluewater Gril was great on our first visit, but left something to be desired on our second visit (recommendation: seafood chowder). Tamarindo was fantastic and was my favorite on the Larimar grounds (recommendation: shrimp burritos). Pay attention to the dress codes for each of the a la cartes - it's easier for ladies; some of the restaurants require men to wear close-toed shoes with long pants and collared shirts. We witnessed one group being denied service at Oceana because (from what we could see) the men were not all wearing close-toed shoes. If you leave the resort, you have to carry a room card with you (which you would likely do anyway) in order to get back onto resort grounds. WiFi worked well. The resort store was well stocked & had just about anything you would need, but was considerably overpriced. Some things were only moderately overpriced ($5 USD for a regular-sized Red Bull) while others were a little more steep ($20+ USD for sunscreen) ... but at least it is there in case of emergency. Overall, we loved our stay at Secrets and would absolutely stay at another Secrets resort in the future!

Traveling seems like all I do recently and let me tell you the Secrets Royal Beach is by far the best Dominican Resort I’ve been to. The greeting at the lobby with drinks and cookies followed by their incredible court yard area then making a short walk to your room was almost too much to take in. Palm trees and greenery wherever you look and everything was so clean! So clean infact if you brought a water bottle down to the beach and decided to play volleyball it magical vanishes! The rooms were spacious, tidy and a perfect temperature to take pre-dinner naps. Balconies included a tub with jets and a set of chairs to enjoy the Caribbean view. Our fridge was regularly stocked with all sorts of pop and Presidente. The most surprising and coolest part was turn down service! What a luxury to have your bed ready to slip into after a long night dancing at the disco! Let’s talk about food; everyone’s favourite. The buffet always has something different each day from different types of eggs, fruit and pasteries for breakfast. Followed by French friends, fresh fish, pizza and pasta for lunch. Finally, their dinner menus had a variety of meats with vegetables, rice, pasta, garlic bread and desserts anyone could ask for. I should mention the beach hut which is open during the day for snacks and lunch, wonderful nacho selection as well as fresh chicken, fish, hamburgers and hotdogs. Now for the dinner restaurants. I think I speak on behalf of our 18 person group when I say the Hibatchi restaurant was incredible! Service, showmanship, food, drinks and atmosphere was so great we actually booked a second reservation during our stay!! The seafood place was delicious having a wide range of choices on the menu including many gluten free options. The Sea Grill’s spinach dip was delicious as well as their main course, of which mine was massive!! Finally, we ventured over to the Thai restaurant on the sister resort ‘Now’ where we were treated to yet another delicious meal consisting of sushi, spring rolls (or whatever apitixer you select), Pad Thai and a yummy dessert! The food was absolutely delicious!! Beside the physical features of the resort the personal touches and relationship you form were amazing. They have incredible wait staff who always greet you with a smile; bartenders who do fancy bottle flips (Carlos), teach you Spanish toasts (Frernado) and make ‘mystery drinks’! Now for the entertainment... our main man, Spaghetti (Yes, that’s his name) is one of the funniest dudes you’ll ever meet. He’s always smiling and trying to get you to play various sports like water polo or beach volleyball. With his good hearted nature our group automatically adopted him and whenever he would see us we were his “family” as he was ours. When asked where we were from on the first night we responded ‘Punta Canada baby!’ And from there on out everyone knew who we were. During the day activities were constantly popping up and the chance to win resort money for the tri-weekly auctions tended to make most events even more competitive. Not be out done by Spaghetti, another entertainer, Eddie Murphy (they have the funniest stage names) was equally as charismatic and charming. If you want to play water volleyball or have a water fight he’s your man. There was never a dull moment when Eddie was around. I can’t forget to mention the performers and dancers who were fantastic!! Their shows of Rock and Roll, Karaoke, International dances and even FIRE, during the ‘Beach Party’ are not to be forgotten. Watchout for the Fireman, if you scream, he’ll get close enough you can really feel the heat (all in good fun)! All around I would highly reccommend this resort to any adults looking to have a wonderful relaxing holiday, any young-adults looking for a party holiday and to any couples looking for an entertaining and luxurious honeymoon vacation (they’ll even put a cute sign on your door!!) Thank you Secrets for giving me, my family and friends memories that will last a lifetime! Signing out from the UK but way better known for being part of the best Punta Canada group around, CG

This is a gorgeous resort! The place is kept immaculately clean and well-maintained by very friendly staff. I mean everyone was friendly, including the guys cutting the grass. We got the preferred club, which gave us a private butler! Marcelo was fantastic--he was available the entire time we were there to get us anything we needed. We also had access to a special pool bar where Juan was on the spot refilling our drinks all day. The pools were absolutely perfect in every way, and we never had trouble finding a good place to park our group of eight, some of whom wanted shade and some wanted sun. Speaking of sun though, be prepared to spend $30 per bottle of sunscreen if you didn't pack your own. Price-gouging on such a necessity is inappropriate. We sampled the Riviera buffet and three of the onsite restaurants. Food was tasty overall, but a couple in our group had some stomach sickness. I suspect it may have something to do with the guy at the grill using the same utensils and dishes for all types of raw meat prep. They need to work on that IMO. Service was good at all the bars, but we especially liked hanging out with Santa and Israel at the Portofino bar. They made us good drinks and were very personable as well. One note though--if you want quality liquor, you need to buy the preferred club, and then you can only get the good stuff at certain bars. Kind of a pain if you like the people and ambiance of a non preferred club bar. We spent five days, and I would have gladly spent more time at this resort. It was our first time at an all-inclusive, and we will certainly consider planning another trip in the future.