Hotel Riu Palace Punta Cana

We loved the resort complex, amenities and rooms. The staff provides entertaining and top notch services, great treatment. Lovely beaches and great pool area. It also has a disco inside resort area. If you like to gamble they have a casino near the other hotel. The bids at the poker tables are not that high which we liked alot. We got free chips to start playing and ended up winning a jackpot. Totally what we wanted and expected. Will definitely come back.

Overall, it's a beautiful, even stunning resort. The rooms and grounds are very well maintained. The beach is beautiful with plenty of shade for us melanin challenged people (though still bring your hats, shirts, and buckets of sunscreen). The staff are incredibly friendly and helpful, and man do they hustle! I'd like to give a special shout-out to Jazmine, who seemed to mostly work in the Daiquiri bar and in the lounge area, and was always a friendly face and made sure to check in on our extended group (and even helped us find each other when we got separated 😄). Big gold star for Jazmine. The food is also very good, especially at an all inclusive. We especially liked the Krystal fusion restaurant. The cons: we got to the hotel around 18:30 and found that the hotel was overbooked and we didn't have a room. They were going to put us in the Bávaro for the week instead, even though we had pre-registered for the punta cana palace. After a long day of travel (and something of a language barrier, which I'm pointing out not because I expect English fluency in a Spanish language country, just that it was one more wrinkle when I was already tired and jet lagged) it was really frustrating. After I said that we had family staying at the PC Palace, they changed it to our party staying at the Macao for one night and then coming to the PC Palace the rest of the time. This is the only time we really had significant problems with the language barrier, we didn't have any issues with the rest of the front desk staff. But having to stay at a different place one night, having to organize our stuff, and make sure we got to the PC Palace on time for check in the next day, it definitely threw off and relaxation plans for the first few days. You need to get out at the crack of dawn to get any beach or pool chairs. Otherwise you are out of luck. And it gets *crowded*, especially in the pool area. It got a bit stressful. Lastly, as noted, the staff was very attentive and friendly. The legendary charming Dominican personality is definitely in full swing here. But sometimes the non-stop flirting was a bit much, especially at breakfast before my coffee. 😉

Visit was great. The RIU Palace was well worth the price. I was only there for for seven nights so a-lot of site to see. You did have daytime access to the other RIU resorts right beside the Palace. We did not venture too far from the Palace. Lots of shade areas if needed around pools. Wish we took advantage of the room service but not enough time. Decor was nice in rooms and house keeping was very good cleaning rooms and providing enough towels etc. Usually elevators went out of service during housekeeping times so that was annoying, but acceptable, we where on the 2nd floor… A lot of walking, be prepared. General drink service was great throughout the whole resort. Disappointing: Most of the Food was very good but most of the time at the general buffet for breakfast the food was Lukewarm to cold… (bacon, eggs, hash browns) so the last few days my husband was eating the fresh cut fruit and yogurt…. It’s already cold. You could get a freshly cooked omelette if you care to wait or maybe toast if you care to wait in the lineups. The other specialty restaurants where small and/or very hard to get into. First come service. We were a group of at least 8 to 11. You needed to line up about 45 minutes in advance if it opening and maybe you would get in. We did get the front desk involved a few times so we could ALL enjoy at least two specialty restaurants for dinner. For dinner service, The specialty restaurants (we observed) and I think the general buffet, did have a dress code for dinner and did not allow men and women and kids with bathing suits sit and eat, until others that where dressed were seated…. Most people where dressed acceptable for evening dining. Check the dress requirements for the resort. Washrooms around the pool area was not convenient because we had to use a restaurants ( steakhouse) washroom, which was interesting since a lunch buffet was served….Wet bathing suits and clothes not nice. Overall…… Hands down the best resort in a while. We will definitely return to enjoy again.