Hotels near Río los Cocos Beach, Samana

We stayed at the Bahia Principe Luxury Samana March 11-18. Here is our feedback There are some potential “negatives” about this resort, although they were not issues for us (except perhaps the last one) 1) Resort is a small boutique 140 room resort, if you are looking for nightlife and party atmosphere, go elsewhere 2) The beach is rather small and little washed out, but nonetheless very accommodating and private 3) The resort has a lot of stairs, there are elevators in certain areas but be advised that you may need to use your legs! That’s good since the food and drinks are so excellent you need to burn off calories 4) The road is close to the resort, depending where you are you can sometimes hear the noise. Thankfully the rooms have soundproof doors that work well to hide the noise 5) There is nowhere to walk outside the resort, road is not safe to walk As for the positive, there are so many to list I don’t know where to starts 1) The Food – So EXCELLENT, really (like really!) good, at both buffet and “a la carte” restaurants. They are all really good, and great attention to service by staff. I loved the option of pre-booking all our restaurants 5 days before our arrival, very nice 2) The views are amazing, from every location, all you see is the sea, absolutely stunning. Our favorite was the view at breakfast and lunch from the buffet, we even saw whales swimming in the bay in front of the resort 3) The drinks and bar service are superb, we enjoyed the “Drink of the day” every day. They always use fresh ingredients (fruits etc) and top shelf spirits for mixing. So good!!! 4) All the staff are so nice, I can’t compliment them all personally here, but special shout-out to Dario (Mamajuana!) and Rosa at lobby bar, Ingrid was our favorite server, Daurelin at front desk was always smiling, and Leandro for his Yoga/Pilates/Workouts. Really amazing people 5) Free Day-trip to Cayo Leventado was really pleasurable, beach there is amazing (but public) 6) Rooms are nice and comfortable, we paid for Junior Suite upgrade and honestly, I think the standard Balcony Room would be great 7) The resort is so small that you get to know all the guests, which was very nice. Met some very nice people from Canada, France and Germany. Adults-only is also nice! We definitely recommend this resort for those looking for a peaceful, relaxing and intimate holiday with great food, good drinks and panoramic views.

We drove 3 hours to Las Galeras and were told at the the gate that we could not enter the resort. When giving our reservation number and showing our email confirmation we were told their system was down and they did not have our updated reservation information. They then were able to find my husbands reservation but did not let us through the gate because it was booked for 1 person. They would not allow my husband to go through the gates even after his name was confirmed at the gate. We were then told to cancel and modify our reservation. We modified the reservation and the management refused to answer the gate attendant’s call to allow entrance into the resort. We waited over 2 hours for the management to answer while we tried to find new accommodations ( but because it was at the last minute, there were no hotels with availability.) The lack of professionalism to make us wait at the gate instead of figuring out their mistake at the front desk was baffling. When we were finally let in we asked to speak with the manager/supervisor. The person at the front desk (who we thought was the management we were speaking to) and security guards said they didn’t know the managers name nor what time they would be at the hotel. We were told we should come back tomorrow morning. The front desk attendant by the name of Johanny was extremely unprofessional. She was unable to get into the front desk computer to even check our reservation but asked us to modify our reservation a third time. Johanny told us Wyndham could honor our first reservation but charge us an extra $140 to add an additional person. However she had already told us to cancel and then refused to take payment. My family and I have stayed in many Wyndham resorts before and have never been treated so poorly.