Bahia Principe Grand Samana

In general is was a fine hotel with mostly pleasant staff. During my stay the there was only 1 buffet and 1 restaurant operating on any given day. The restaurant required a prior reservation for dinner. The buffet was OK though the prepared foods on the service trays were luke warm. Dining at a restaurant or drinking from the bar required you to pay attention to the menu as only items with an asterisk were included in the AI. Top shelf liquors were not included. During the day only the beach and pool bars were open, in the evening only the lobby bar was open.
The rooms were comfortable and clean. It was very quiet and subdued there. If your looking for activities to keep you entertained this may not be the correct venue.
The room had a supposed stocked fridge but there were only two cans of local beer and 3 bottles of pop and a cold water. The coffee maker and local coffee was good, though I had to request a top up when things ran out. There were no snacks in the room. [Details]

Great accommodations, clean, good food, great service, nice entertainment and extremely great welcome. We enjoy all inclusive and don't like being asked our room number at every turn. My complements to the cooks and staff! [Details]

I picked this resort because the reviews that I saw, were of a similar age group to my self. (45-65) Advertised as a 5 star resort. I expected a relaxing time, with some good food, and some evening entertainment, which I could choose to enjoy, or not. I selected a room with a balcony, anticipating sitting out at night relaxing.
What I got was a room over the pool, with constant techno musak blaring out most of the day, and unbearable volume at night until 11.30pm
Had I known this, I would have selected a room as far away from the pool as possible. It's a small resort so just enough distance to make the musak bearable.
The room itself was NOT 5 Star !! the bathtub was literally surrounded in mould. The bathroom ceiling looked like it could cave in at any moment.
The a/c took 4 hours to fix the first night I was there. The small door on the cupboard to the fridge was hanging off !!
The pool water was cold, as was the "hot tub" when I asked about this, I was told people wanted that this way because the weather was hot ! SURE !! ( The sea water was actually warmer than the pool )
This is a very tired resort, and apparently will be renovated soon.
The food was mediocre at best. The Don Pablo steak house, had the right idea, however the kitchen door was always open and the kitchen staff could be heard shouting, and servers often shouted across the room to each other, spoiling any atmosphere they had tried to create.
I tried the "Italian" restaurant, selected to try the "Roast Suckling Pig" which turned out to be dried pulled pork in pastry. ( say no more)
I asked for a reservation at the Brazilian restaurant, I was told yes ! in 4 days !!! Really ?
Premium liquor, such as Brandy was extra ( probably $8-10 extra shot)
To me, an All Inclusive Resort should be just that ALL INCLUSIVE !!
I usually go to Secrets Resorts for quality and service, where everything IS all included. This time I chose a more remote/secluded resort for the relaxing experience that I was looking for. My mistake.
Would I recommend this resort ? NO. To me, this is a 3 star resort at best.
If you can get a deal on the price, and are prepared to accept what you pay for, then all you have to take a chance on is the weather.
On a clear sunny day, the beach is the best. ( in my opinion)
Good Luck, and Safe Travels. [Details]

We loved this small resort only for adults. The food was exquisite in all restaurants and the buffet. The ambiance was what we were looking for smooth jazz music in the morning. The small beach was great and getting our drinks at our chairs was a plus. The employees were professional and went out of their way to ensure we were pleased. Don't forget your tips because people from other countries think that they don't have to put their hand in their pocket to thank the employees for their service. This is wrong. Also to finish our stay we went to the spa and got a great massage for both of us. Definitely we will go back in Februrary to have the same treatment. Once you have taste that resort you will go back. This is the place for couples that want to revive their flames. Enjoy. [Details]

We had a great time. Excellent place , beach, food, stuff.
We will be back next year! [Details]

You can drop the name 'Luxury' from the name Luxury Bahia Principe Samana.Basically, there are toooooo.. many stairs to climb. Yes they have an elevator. The cleaning staff were not great. They took our key card out of our air conditioning and when we got back into the room it was hotter than hell. They did not leave us enough water or coffee for our room. We always leave a daily tip for the cleaning staff but after a couple of days we cut back because of the above issues. They had nightly shows but spoke in Spainish. Hey guys 99.9% of your audience were English speaking. If you want to go into town to the market it will cost you $40U.S. and $40 U.S. back which I think is a rip-off. Go with a group and share the cost. The island that they advertise for free is within a boat ride from Samana. It is a nice beach but little shade. They have vendors on the island. Overall I did not like the place and besides it is an hour from the airport to the resort that's if you do not drop off people at other resorts. Your looking at 2 hours in that case. The food was good and that Thursday nite was Lobster nite in the buffet. The Lobster was terrible. However, the el carte restaurant (Brazilian food) was great. Don Paublo you can stick up the wazoo. [Details]

Having stayed at her sister hotel Cayo levantado which has how changed to a family hotel we tought we would try this Adult hotel.
First day arrived in afternoon all good, Reception good Room lovely, bottle Preseco waiting as it was our 25th anniversary great. Next day get up for breakfast, never seen such unhappy staff, not a smile to be seen. On to the one pool (we knew there as only one) alittle cool but geat. Then at about 9.30 they inflate a big island in the pool and start the exercises. So no pool for anyone else. Then the leave Bob Marley playing for the next few hours, no getting away for it because the speaker is in the downstairs lobby, so even if you go upstairs for a relax in bar you can here it just as well. Following day repeat of first day. Brazilian Restaurant good. My suggestion would be to put the speaker down by the pool bar, so the one end of pool and center lobby area does not get blasted by Bob Marley etc.
Found this to be unacceptable on what was suppose to be a relaxing holiday so on the forth day asked to be moved to Cayo Levantardo, $367cad more but well worth. These two hotels are like chalk and cheese, the only reason I see that this is a Luxury Bhia Principe is because it is Adults only. [Details]

We booked this hotel for a one-week much awaited vacation end of January 2017. We were traveling with another couple and had reserved 2 junior suites with ocean view. Drive from Samana airport to hotel is about 1 hour and 20 minutes, arrived at hotel at about 4 pm. After filling out the paperwork we were informed that our room was not ready, when we asked how long it would be we were told “I don't know”. Our luggage was left in the lobby and we patiently waited to be called. We returned around 6 pm to find that our room was still not ready and still didn't know when it would be. Only at that point were we then informed that they did not have any junior suites available and we would be downgraded to a regular room for at least 2 days. Our problem did not seem to be unique because since we ended up spending a lot of time at the front desk we started speaking with several people who had or were having similar problems. I find there is something quintessentially wrong with a hotel who manages to mess up so many people's reservations.

We ended up getting 2 (standard) rooms at past 7pm and a promise of (hopefully) getting the rooms we had reserved the next day. We finally got our rooms around noon the next day, but this only after much arguing with the unfortunate employees at the front desk and the manager. We found this to be a very unpleasant experience as this was not how we had planned to start our vacation.

The information we pieced together was that many people were shipped to this hotel from nearby overbooked Bahia hotels and as an incentive were offered room upgrades. Was this done in an effort to fill up a hotel that (from several reviews I had read) was often only half-full? I guess there is nothing wrong with that, unless of course by doing so you are punishing the people who actually chose to stay in your hotel in the first place. After this unpleasant experience we won't be choosing this hotel again.

WHAT WE LIKED MORE:

-The hotel/rooms are very clean
-The view is awesome, and it's the nicest thing about this hotel
-The employees in all areas of the hotel who work very hard and very long hours
-The food at the buffet was quite good and in our opinion the buffet was the best restaurant option on the site
-The 4 evening shows they had during our 7-day stay were very nice

WHAT WE LIKED LESS:

-The beach is extremely small and the waters are very, very rough. The first day-and-a-half (and every night) access to the beach was closed off altogether and every day of our 7-day stay was a red flag day. I believe there is a free daily shuttle to a public beach on Cayo Levantado, we did not go as we did not see the point of paying for a resort and then having to go get hassled at a public beach.
-There is only 1 pool (not a very large one) and most of it is deep
-Smoking is allowed pretty much everywhere on the site, except inside your room (allowed on room balconies), the lobby and within the restaurants. There seemed to be a lot of smokers on the site and we found this to be a problem, especially the cigar smoking around the pool, which literally drove us away one day as we couldn't take it anymore (the day the guy selling cigars set up his table right next to our loungers and then proceeded to smoke his products non-stop). This has never been an issue for me at any other resort, but perhaps it's because this resort is very small.
-Another day it was the very loud music at the pool bar which forced us to move (I understand that it's so everyone around the pool can hear it, but maybe place another speaker at the other end of the pool so the people closest to the bar don't get their ears blasted off).
-The à la carte restaurants were not worth the bother you needed to go to in order to get reservations. Rodizio was ok, the food at Bella Italia was seriously over-salted and Don Pablo seriously over-rated.
-There isn't much in terms of activities and although the activities we took part in were fairly enjoyable, we found them to be very short (yoga, pool aerobics only lasted about 20-30 minutes)
-There's a jacuzzi but when we used it we found the water to be unpleasantly cold

So if you're thinking of going to this resort:
-Go for the view, go for the people, and for the decent buffet food and clean surroundings, if you don't mind the smoking and have no specific room requirements
-Don't go for the beach, the water, the activities, nor if you prefer a (mostly) smoke-free environment and expect your room reservations to be respected [Details]

This is a very beautiful hotel. Location is perfect and the scenery is breathtaking! Front desk staff is very helpful and go out of their way to please, especially one of the managers, Jennifer. Cleaning staff does a great job and everything is spotless, minibar daily stocked with your preferences. Daily variety of activities all around and the evening entertainment is absolutely first class. Rolando is in charge of entertainment and you see and feel his love for his job. The buffet has an amazing variety of food for each meal and lots of fresh fruits...Elias makes awesome omelets, smoothies freshly made to your requests. Timings for each meal are great because they allow you to sleep in or just arrive late afternoon for lunch and rest before a late dinner. Snacks at 4 p.m. every day and variety of evening shows start a bit late but has perfect timing as there is always dancing afterwards and the beautiful evenings make you want to stay as long as you can in the open air and reluctantly drag yourself to bed in the wee hours of the morning. Would definitely recommend this hotel to friends and family. [Details]

This is small resort in size, but high in quality. The staff is very attentive, always willing to help, with a smile. The pool area is not as large as some resorts in the area, but was never crowded, you never had to reserve a pool chair, and the bar service was excellent. Thanks Jose! The small beach is well maintained with a small bar. Chairs are abundant. [Details]

This was our third visit to this hotel. We had some post hurricane concerns but there were none. The only visible signs were a missing beach bar, and bottom stairs from the suite section (which were under repair during our week).
Since we were here before, we have a favourite section and floor where we like to be and this request was again met.
As the hotel was only about 30% full, not all restaurants were open for dinner every evening but every one was open at least once or twice during the week.
Service and servers were excellent at all venues.
If you want to get to the beach, the only way to get there is down and up approximately 80 steps from the pool level. The beach is narrow but the sand is beautiful and water temp is perfect. There are not enough palapas on the beach for shade so if you want one, get your towel out early.
The only somewhat negative comment is that the food at lunch at Las Olas restaurant is very slow in coming. I am not sure where it is prepared. The view from that patio however is beautiful.
Another great visit, and we will be back! [Details]

my husband and I have just returned from a vey relaxing 7 days at this beautuful resort.This was our first stay at a Bahia Principe, and this resort met all of our expectations. [Details]

This was our first time in Dominican Republic and our experience was very pleasent. The Luxury Bahia Principe Samana is a beautiful resort. The staff here is very polite and inviting. The house keeping and accomodations are second to none.
The only changes I would make would be,
1)Possibly adding a night club or bar that stays open past midnight
2)More activities for guests to interact such as beach volleyball games etc.
In closing I would highly tecommend this resort to anyone who is looking for first class service and accomodations and quiet relaxing get aways. [Details]