We found the location in the resort and set up of the hotel ideal,it was clean and the staff were friendly those with children be aware that they try and shove you all into a room with one kingsize bed, once they know you are not having it they move you , it's best to make it clear when checking in.

The food and variety was good, we have been on numerous all inclusive holidays and by comparrison it was not bad, the drinks we found were ok--if you wanted a proper glass all you had to do was ask, it was not a problem.the childrens entertainment/club was poor and not up to the standard we usually expect.

The only thing for us was that our room overlooked the pool, so we had to endure the dire entertainment like it or not,unless we went to the quiet pool which was as it said.
Be wary of porters who put tje bags on coaches and at the airport-they are out to take the mick and try and rip you off, which spoilt things for us really, beware any one getting married here , they made the poor bride walk around the busy pool, playing wedding music over the tannoy, it was cheap and nasty!!!!

So good holiday in general would even consider going back one day.!!

I really didn't want to leave this hotel.

The staff worked extremely hard to make this a memorable holiday.

The 'Animation' team were good fun - especially Adonny, Santos, Manual and Keuris. They were so energetic and lively.

The hotel was extremely clean (as soon as it stopped raining they were mopping the floor!). Being there in Hurricane season, we had a few days where it rained and we were on 'hurricane alert' but this just meant that they worked harder in providing plenty of activities to keep everybody occupied and happy.

This is definitely the place to go if you want a bit of fun - although some of the evening shows were a bit repetitive - but you can forgive them that as they all worked so hard.

Be prepared to get up and dance and learn the Merengue!

The Gran Ventana Hotel was beautiful..... very clean and presentable. Maid are up cleaning from 7am until well after midnight.
All staff were very pleasant and willing to sit and chat to you throughout the day.

Although the food was lovely, it was very repetative. For example, chicken and pork every night. The chefs worked exceptionally hard and the food was cooked to a very high standard but it was the same every single night. We were fed up with it towards the end of the two weeks.

The entertainment staff also were excellent, but the evening shows, again were very repetative and very boring. As you are limited to where you can go, you have no choice but to stay in the hotel. We were in our room by 10pm some nights - thank god for the tv in the room!!!

There is a disco and casino in resort but i wouldn't bother. The drinks are expensive and the casino is a rip off - no-one ever wins!!!

For our honeymoon we spent two weeks at the Gran Ventana hotel, all inclusive and me and my husband thought the holiday couldn't of gone any better.

I have been abroad alot of times and I'm very fussy at the places I stop at. The hotel was brilliant on cleanliness as when I normally go abroad I tend to pick up bugs which I didn't in the Dominican!

The food had a variety of every meat going so you wasn't stuck for choice. The vegetables were good too. There are also 3 restaurants for a change of different food, but you can only go once to them.

When we arrived at the hotel, you notice the big pool and swim up bar, also you have the beach which is a little walk from the back of the hotel.

The hotel staff were very polite and helpful(they even help you carry your luggage for you)The rooms are basic but you dont need much, as you don't come abroad to spend all the time in the room.

I found the entertainment for kids and adults alright, I can't grumble I have been to many 5 star hotels and they have had basic food, drink and entertainment neither have they been clean.

Can I just say my honeymoon was brilliant and i wouldn't of gone anywhere else. They treat you very well! Which is what you want on a holiday.

The hotel was brilliant.The staff were really friendly and would stop to help. The hotel was always clean. The maids did and excellent job in the rooms. Every time you saw the maids they were always cleaning but they would always stop and say HOLA to you.
The bar staff were really friendly and they did a excellent job to please everybody.

The food was excellent and the three other restaurants that we went to in our hotel were also good .The restuarants were always clean .

The hotel location was excellent becuase you only had to walk about a minute and get onto the beach .The things that you could do on the beach were excellent .

The entertainment team were brilliant .I loved them.They made the holiday.They were always having fun .The games that they had us playing were excellent.My best people out of the fun team were lewis, adony, ana, maguel and santo.They always made me and my family laugh .The latinos dance was excellent !I hope when i go back next year they are still going to be there.The shows that they put on everynight were brilliant .The fun team are all really good dancers.

We will be back Next year to the gran ventana hope it has the same fun team and hope it is as good as this year.

We have just returned from a two week stay at this fantastic hotel (29 May 04 - 12 June 04), the only complaint is the weight we put on during our stay, even our teenage daughters!

The hotel was kept spotless, by an army of workers, washing the paths, sweeping leaves and even lining the sun beds exactly straight on an evening with a straw in order to create such perfection. The rooms were kept extremely tidy, the nice little touches by the maids with the flowers and swan creations with the towels were appreciated and made things just that little bit more special.

The beach was lovely, the coral wasn't the best I've seen as people had probably damaged it over a period of time, but this didn't effect the snorkelling too much, my two teenage daughters spent countless hours enjoying the variety of tropical fish, and as was mentioned on here previously we took the odd banana and egg to feed the fish out of our hands. The beach is north facing so on the rare occasion we were unable to find a bed with shade, we just layed under the countless palm trees.

The wind did pick up on a couple of occasions in the afternoon making it uncomfortable to sit
on the beach, we enjoyed the pools, so this was no hardship.

The guys on the beach (Wellington, Negro and Merlin) in charge of the water sports equipment were so helpful and a big hit with the girls, my daughters used the facilities to the full, the banana boat was 7 US dollars and the jet ski 26 dollars for 15 mins.

The pools were great, the large one was pretty well used, water volleyball was a laugh and water aerobics weren't too strenuous, for those who want to participate in the games at the side of the pool or just chill at the pool bar there were no pressure either way. With having a toddler I appreciated the shade from the pool bar, which also covered a small percentage of the pool, I found this a benefit during the hottest time of the day.

Food.. What can I say but "food glorious food", I am having trouble reducing the old calories whilst back in the UK.

The main buffet - breakfast time:

Omelettes and fried eggs made to order just choose the ingredients, waffles cooked fresh, crispy bacon, sausages, rolls, bread for toast, cereals, fruit juices, coffee and tea, the list goes on.

The main buffet - lunch: we didn

A lovely modern hotel complex, very clean & well maintained. Despite the brochure claiming otherwise our 2 rooms were inter-connecting. None of the rooms have an ocean-view & a limited number have pool-view but I believe they all overlooked pleasant grassed garden areas. Rooms were great with sat tv & free mini-bar stocked with beer, water & fizzy drinks restocked daily. Our Queen bed was huge and our 3 daughters (aged 13,11 & 4) shared 2 double beds in the adjoining room.

Apartments were quite large, clean & well furnished, no bath but showers were adequate. Air conditioning made life comfortable and is operated by the fob on the door key, we signed out second keys from reception so we could leave the air conditioning on whilst out. Safety deposit boxes are also available at US$18 for 2 weeks. Maids came in everyday and did a thorough job with some pleasant touches like leaving flowers in the bathroom and inroducing a new skill of decorative towel-folding. Laundry service was also worthy of note, we filled out the form left it in the bag in our room and called the Laundry service for normal next-day service. By 3pm it was back in our room washed and ironed and on hangers, only came to 880 Pesos (under

What can I say, I would definately go back to the Gran Ventana. The hotel was very clean, I have never known a place where the staff are always cleaning, at 6.30am in the morning you could here them scrubbing the floors round the pool outside, always tidying round. The mini bar in the room was very good it had 2 pepsi, 2 7up 2 presidente beer and 2 bottles of water, this was restocked every day. The rooms were very clean and the nice touches with the floweres and towels shaped like swans were very welcoming.
I could not fault the food at all, breakfast, lunch dinner and snacks there was something for every taste and pallet. My son is a very fussy eater but he never had a problem finding something to eat. There was a different variety every day, though some foods were the same e.g salads and pasta and sauces but the roasts on the carvery were amazing. The dominican section of the buffet restuarant was very nice try the dominican fried chicken absolutely gorgeous.

We went into all the buffet restaurants and thouroughly enjoyed them all. The portions were huge. The atmosphere in all the restaurants was very pleasant and welcoming.

The pool was a very good size and the swim up bar serving cocktails was a godsend through the day as it was very hot.There was also a quiet pool, which was very relaxing if you didn't want to be in the midst of all the fun and games.

The location of the hotel was in an excellent spot, right on the beach and if you fancied a walk the shopping plaza with the many colourful shops was only a 5 minute walk away. The vendors on the beach were ok becuase if you weren't interested in what they were selling and said no thank you, they left you alone. King Louis (as my son called him)who was on the beach selling the watersports, snorkelling etc was great, he was a star.

I have never been anywhere where the staff are so friendly, they really make you feel welcome and make your holiday, the entertainment staff were very good especially Manny and Carlos tehy were great with kids and Manuel(are you alone) he was strange in a funny way but a really good laugh. My favourite was Miguel who did the 6pm to 2am shift serving snack and after time drinks he was jsut wonderful.

While we there my son had his 11th birthday, they made him a cake and brought it to the restuarant at night where we ate our evening meal, it was no trouble for them at all, I thought that was a lovely touch.

The entertainment was very good in the daytime, there were games in the day, ping pong tournaments, pool tournaments, crazy games in the pool, water areobics and volleyball. The evening entertainment seemed a little repetitive as they seemed to be all dance shows which were performed by the entertainment team, but credit to them for the amount of hours they were in that hotel on a daily basis they did very well, the costumes and dance routines were very good. Friday night was karaoke night which was a laugh, if you didn't want to be in the midst of all entertainment on a night there is also a quiet bar near the italian which was very relaxing.

The drinks were very strong, especially the cocktails as they were nearly all made with 151 the local rum (like rocket fuel) apparently they call it the local gasoline. Drinks were available from 10am to 2am on every night except sunday where bar closed at 12am.

The only thing that was dissapointing was the reserving of the sunbeds, the hotel tried to stamp it out but people brought there own towels and they were reserved as early as 5.30am some mornings (sad) especailly when people still had them reserved and it was 1pm or later in the afternoon when they started to use them. There were plenty however nobody ever went without.

I would definately visit the Gran Ventana again it was a throughly enjoyable holiday that I will never forget.

We stayed in this hotel in August 2003, food was excellent cant say that about anything else really. Entertainment was awfull very hi de hi if you like that type of holiday then youlle love this hotel. We arrived in the afternoon and had to wait for our room when we arrived the patio was cracked waited three days for another room. Room we moved to was better but still not the luxury i had expected after paying nearly 4 grand!!
Staff were friendly especially the hotel rep, dont book excertions with hotel go to the shopping mall. Weather was terrible 5 days of rain in August found out later this is to be expected.Plenty for the kids to do lots of dancing around the pool (take ear plugs)
Beach was very busy with sellers but nice and relaxing after you tell them to go away!!

All in all our holiday was a disaster but this may not be the case for you!!

I have stayed at the Gran Ventana twice now and also at the sister hotel - The Victoria Resort. We found the hotel to be fabulous on all counts.

The cleanliness was superb and all day staff were washing/scrubbing/sweeping the grounds. The pool was always very clean which isn't easy at the hiehgt of the holiday season!

The location was superb with a shopping centre and bars 5 mins away and the trips were all do-able in a day. The trips were fantastic and the waterfall climbing was out of this world!

The staff were fabulous and we went two consecutive years and were remembered by both the hotel staff and the beach sellers who we made very good friends with (they're not all pushy - just trying to earn a living for their families). We were greeted with hugs and cries of " My family - you have come back to us!"

The entertainment is typical of the caribbean. Lots of merengue dancing and games which were hilarious!

We would definately go back, but the problem is there are so many places we want to visit as well!