Catalonia Punta Cana - All Inclusive

We visited as a family of 6 and stayed for 14 days in the standard rooms. I have seen a lot of mixed reviews and wanted to provide people with a very honest review. The rooms - they are what you expect, they are ok. If you expect brand new, modern, amazing air conditioning and luxury then you will be disappointed. But there is nothing wrong with them at all. Everything worked fine. The air conditioning is ok, it hovered around 22-23C and was enough to get a good nights sleep and escape the heat. Cleaning times were a bit erratic, one day not cleaned at all. Sometimes the mini bar not restocked. But trust me that’s just being picky. The rooms are fine without blowing you away. Had one issue with toilet not flushing, called reception and was fixed immediately. Same with the other room, same issue but fixed immediately. The air conditioning in the girls room did however have a not pleasant smell a lot of the time. The service - Seen lots of reviews where there were a lot of moans, not sure why. The vast majority of hotel staff from bars, restaurants, entertainment, maintenance and maids, were friendly, helpful and happy at all times. I found reception on arrival a bit disappointing, nothing was really explained and after a long flight and being tired I would have expected a better induction as to where things were and what was going on. One of the rooms was also not ready and the two rooms were quite some distance apart despite being requested in advance when booking. The next day we had been directed to Michael a concierge and to his credit a very helpful and friendly guy who told us everything and sent us maps and details for everything we needed. The Restaurants - It should be noted we did not do the A La Carte Restaurants. Not for any bad reasons we just preferred the buffet style. The buffet was very good, plenty of selection and choice, the staff are brilliant in there and really helpful. The food is of good quality, exactly in line with what you expect at an all inclusive. But with plenty of freshly made options, there is something for everyone. I have nothing at all bad to say about the food. We all enjoyed our meals and nobody got ill or anything remotely like that. It’s kept clean and well maintained at all times. There is also plenty of options during the day from the bars and there are snacks. My only criticism would be the pizza snack bar is just a bit pointless, the wait is t worth it, especially when the person in front of you takes everything that’s just been cooked. The snack options were a bit limited tbh. Bars - Bars are excellent, wide range of drinks, staff superb and table service on the main piano bar was something I had not expected and was great. The selection of free drinks was way beyond what I had expected and was a really positive. Entertainment - It’s ok, it’s hard to be really objective here, we didn’t really engage with the entertainment much but those that didn’t oppressed to enjoy the evening entertainment and the daytime stuff around the pool and beach. Pools - Excellent, clean, well maintained. Gets busy as you would expect and as with every hotel is mainly spoiled only by other guests getting up at 6am to take the best and shaded beds. Not a problem for us as our room was next to the pool and had no desire to sit on sunbeds all day. The Beach - Brilliant. Loved it. That’s why we came and weren’t disappointed. Yes the area has sargassum sea weed, but it only effected going in the sea on one day. Other than that we are in 2 or 3 times a day. Crystal clear waters and you could Literally walk way out to sea in shallow water. Superbly well kept and maintained. The Sargassum does. Smell sometimes but do not let that put you off, it’s a superb beach. The bar is great, loads to do. A pleasant surprise was the free kayaking and paddle boarding with other excursions free or at a small cost from the on beach centre. The on beach sellers are there of course, they aren’t too bad, they are well martialed by security and are friendly enough. They appear to have been vetted too. The excursions - we had some issues before we arrived with pre booked trips being cancelled but that’s not the hotels fault. The excursions are plenty and mainly decent but these are not hotel related so won’t go into detail. My biggest gripe is fairly minor but was annoying. On certain days they had stalls set up by reception and near the pool. These were external vendors selling the usual tourist gifts and we did buy stuff. But they are very very very pushy, you expect some being sold to, but this was another level and I’m very surprised the hotel have them in. You could visibly see them annoying guests. They would wait for people by the buffet and target you, you dreaded going up there to eat on those days. We actually wanted to browse and look but you just couldn’t, they were so intense. All in all a brilliant holiday. Good food, amazing beach, great pool and superb bars. That’s what you come for. The hotel grounds are exceptionally well maintained with loads of chill out areas and things to do. It looks every bit like the brochure photos, you cannot ever complain with the general upkeep and hotel presentation. The rooms do the job, being average/good should not put you off coming here, they are no worse than any other places I’ve been of equivalent type. Would we recommend Yes Would we come back Yes