Latest Reviews for Samana

This is a quiet resort with the main attraction being a 'pueblo' type development owned and operated by the hotel. There are a few other local shops (incidentally rather a lot of pharmacies for some reason) but very little in the way of restaurants/bars etc. so there's not much in the way of a break from the hotel. Another problem is the local self-employed 'guides' who attach themselves to you to 'help you and show you around' then expect to be paid - watch out for these guys!!

The beach is a scrappy, untidy little place and suffers from a problem after heavy rains. The rains further inland wash a lot of alluvial mud out of the river mouth into the sea which turns the clear water into a chocolate brown soup - swimming not recommended!

With sympathetic development this could turn into a nice little town, but at the moment there is very little to attract one except for the Tuesday (the day the cruise ships visit) flea market.

A lovely building on a very good cliff top site. All the expected facilities are present, but our recent stay was blighted by management issues, namely: cold food at the buffet restaurant, indifferent food quality at the speciality restaurants, rank water in the swimming pool leading to many cases of ear infections, poor response to problems with plumbing, air con etc., and worst of all a total debacle when there was a hotel fire.

The circumstances were complicated but in short the hotel management decided to leave guests asleep during a hotel fire, disable the fire and smoke alarm systems, chose not to involve the official Dominican fire department and generally took a very laissez-faire attitude to it all. This is despite the corridors being filled with acrid smoke - guests had to breathe through dampened towels and stumble around at 0300 hours looking for the fire exits! Many guests demanded (and got) a change of hotel as a result but were told quite categorically that the tour operator (First Choice) would not be making any compensation payments...... Well done, First Choice.... a great P.R. move........ In fact we were asked to sign a document which proved to be a very comprehensive disclaimer, surrendering all our rights to make any complaint or claim on any party as a result.... Needless to say nobody in their right mind would fall for such a shabby trick and the 'Customer Services' officer was told in no uncertain terms what she could do with the document.

In all then, this is a really well designed hotel in a prime location which has the potential to be a great holiday destination. It only needs the hotel management to wake up and realise that they are dealing with Europeans who expect a certain standard.