Where to stay when you travel to Punta Cana, Dominican Republic

Punta Cana offers amazing all-inclusive resorts along awe inspiring white sand beaches. I spent 11 nights at an all-inclusive resort in Punta Cana, and this is my summary of staying at Bahia Principe Grand Punta Cana.

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Enjoy an all-inclusive stay in the Dominican Republic at Bahia Principe Grand

Punta Cana has numerous different resort options from cheaper stays to luxury resorts. I spent quite a bit of time looking over the different properties in Punta Cana that fit my travel budget. Ultimately, I ended up selecting the Bahia Principe Grand Punta Cana based on the number of positive reviews as well as the cheaper price point for an all-inclusive resort.

This resort is one of a few in the Bahia Principe family that all occupy the same grounds in Punta Cana. The Bahia Principe Grand is one of the more budget friendly properties in the lineup. There are also more luxurious and adult only properties at this location. You access your particular property with an RFID bracelet that you will get when checking in at the resort. You can view the rest of the Bahia Principe resort properties for comparison here.

The town square at Bahia Principe features live music and other activities

If you go to Punta Cana, Dominican Republic:

If you are on a mid-range budget but still want to stay at an all-inclusive resort, the Bahia Principe Grand Punta Cana is a great option. The value received at this resort was pretty great for not being very expensive per night. Below are some pros and cons of staying at this property.

Pros

The resort and the resort grounds are beautiful and there are multiple swimming pools that you have access to throughout the resort. There are also multiple bars and restaurants that you have access to alongside the breakfast, lunch, and dinner buffets.

The property is right on a beautiful beach, so you can access the beautiful shoreline by a short walk or by hopping on one of the golf carts that run throughout the resort.

In addition to the amazing pools, shoreline, and restaurants, there is also nightly entertainment, a sports bar, a dance club, a casino, and a water park for little kids. The nightly entertainment consists of dancing, magic shows, aerial gymnastics, and more. The resort definitely puts in an effort to entertain guests each night.

There is a dive center on the property as well where you can book your scuba diving expeditions. This made it really easy to ensure that I was able to get in a scuba diving trip without having to venture outside of the resort to book the trip.

Cons

I discovered that My room AC unit did not work very well, and I submitted a work order through the app you download for your stay. I never received any follow-up and do not think they came to look at the AC unit.

Some amenities are hard to know if you have access to them. I thought I got access to some fitness centers and group bike rides but discovered that they were reserved for guests of other properties.

The language barrier is pretty steep and made me regret not knowing more Spanish to understand what was included in my stay. That barrier is not the resort’s fault though since Spanish is the spoken language in the Dominican Republic.

The front desk agent will likely try to upsell you. They will ask you to give them a cash payment for them to upgrade your room. Once they hear that you are not interested, they seem to take a very long time to get you checked into your room.

You do not get access to the nicer restaurants every night. I think you get access to 3 restaurants for every week of your stay. The restaurants are quite amazing, so it would be great to be able to make reservations at one of them every night.

There are foul smells at the buffets. This may be due to the large amount of rainfall, but the buffets have a bad smell when you enter, which is not the most appealing when you are about to eat.

Other guests will claim beach chairs first thing in the morning. If you want to enjoy time on the beach in a reclining chair, you will not be able to sleep as you need to claim your real estate before the chairs are taken.

My ultimate recommendation

I do not think I would stay for 11 nights again since the weekly entertainment gets a bit redundant, but this property is definitely suitable for a stay of up to a week. I would absolutely return if I went back to Punta Cana. The cons were a bit annoying but did not detract all that much from the enjoyable stay that I had.

To research the more luxurious or adult only Bahia Principe properties click here. To learn more about what you can do on your visit to Punta Cana, check out my other blog post about staying in Punta Cana here.