So my husband and I returned from the Hard Rock yesterday. The hotel is great but I did expect it to be better with the way the hotel is described. I have seen a lot of people moan about the food. The food was fantastic! The Toro steak restaurant was are favourite and the bar was amazing! I have been to the Moon Palace in Cancun that was slight better but we paid £3000 more for that holiday so you get what you pay for! The people who complain about the food are wanting 5 star Mitchellin food for only a few thousand. The room we had was the standed suite which was great. It was clean , huge bathroom and shower as well as a massive hydro bath in the middle of the room. We also have a huge queen size bed which was really comfy. We were located in block B close to the lobby which Is where the shops and main restaurants are so that was great. I was disappointed with the main area as I expected more bars for the size of the place. There's is only 3 bars and the main one doesn't even have aircon! They actually shut this one (moon lounge) half way through our holiday to refresh which I thought was ridiculous! They need more for the amount of people definitely. I was also annoyed to find 2 restaurants shut for refurbishment which they offered us a holiday at 50% off for the inconvenience. However it doesn't work out at a discount with taxes and flights from the UK. Unfortunately we paid the $420 dollars to get this deal without looking at the taxes, activation fee and flights. I think it actually works out more!! We did the legendary tour as we were thinking about joining the legendary membership. Daniel was fantastic but he handed us over to his boss and he was rude and nasty so we didn't bother! We received a $200 dollar voucher for the restaurant in the casino this is so a rip off! I thought we might have to pay some tax but we ended up having to pay $144 dollars on top of the voucher! It was a scam in my eyes don't do it. We did get a bali bed on the beach for $80 dollars instead of $175 for going to the tour and this was excellent! We had champagne and a waitress which was a great experience! The spa is absolutely amazing and value for money! With the resort credit you get 75% off its fantastic go!!! Another issue with the hotel is the buggies! There are far too many of them around for the size of the place. If you can then why not walk???? It's a big place but not hard to walk around! They were annoying!!! The pools were great especially the one in front of the Toro restaurant near the beach. Make sure you book wine tasting it is absolutely amazing and only $28 each!! The staff were all amazing except for some of the staff that work behind the counters in the market restaurant they need people skills! Other than that the staff were excellent!! Make sure you tip them! Even though I have moaned about a few things the holiday was fantastic!!! We would return again at some point. Thank you Hard Rock! I would like to give a special thank you to Ana who helped us book activities she was amazing thank you!…
The Hard Rock In Punta Cana is by far our favorite vacation destination. This facility is spotless, beautiful and a true non-stop ride...I need a vacation from my vacation. The list of the to-do's is a mile long and everyone is exceptionally nice and engaging. My diet was wrecked from all of the delicious foods and the variety of restaurants. This is the true WOW factor. You can't walk 50 feet without some type of food offerings, even at the pool, shopping mall or even outside the casino. We can't wait to go back at Christmas for another visit.
10-Beautiful beach, gardens and staff other than pushy salesman. 7- food and drinks A lot of loud remodeling and nightlife being altered to check in lobby. So many parts of the lobby had poor A/C and smelled like smoke (casino). would recommend going in a year when remodel is complete.
-Front desk concierge was very helpful and accommodating. -Rooms were good, however we found the bathrooms slightly dusty on floor, shelves, mirrors and handles, we also had a leaky sink handle that left water all over the counter and the bathrooms had dingy repairs on wall that makes it look cheap. -Pools were amazing and resort had a lot of pools each serving a different atmosphere which was great. Pool bars and food cart need more staff. Constant lines and we basically served ourselves for drinks and snacks. We have had better service at other resorts. MANAGEMENT needs to hire more staff. -Beaches are beautiful and clean. Lots of lounge chairs some with shade/umbrellas and some without. -Shows at the theatre were in poor to terrible production. It was more like a middle school play than entertaining. We do not blame the performers but Hard Rock needs better shows at the theatre. -Club was closed the entire stay and we were not aware when booking or when looking at their website. They also closed the lounge bar when we were there. -Restaurants were good including Ipanema, Isla, Zen, and Toro. However service was slow at most restaurants, you had to get up and go to bar to get water, soda and drinks. Hard Rock needs to hire more staff. The italian restaurant Ciao was bad, service was slow to nonexistant, food was served cold, food was not good, however the breakfast their was good. -Overall atmosphere at the resort was good. Outdoor gardens, walkways, trolley were beautiful and clean. Shuttle drivers were GREAT and FRIENDLY. -In summary, be prepared to be your own server for drinks and snacks at bars and restaurants. Long lines at pool bar. Do not eat dinner at Ciao. Make sure clubs and lounges are open before booking. We do NOT recommend shows at the theatre, go to the Eclipse Patio for entertainment. No help is offered with bags when checking out. *And again be prepared to serve your own drinks, it was annoying getting up from the restaurant to find bar and ask for glasses of water, juice, soda or liquor. Management needs more serving and bar staff. …
Pluses and minuses: This is a great place for families with kids of all ages, but communication was a serious problem! Some of us stayed in family room suites which are very spacious, although kind of dark, with very comfortable beds, large showers, (a soaking tub in the sleeping area is a little less private than it should be) with a very large patio/balcony, located in Bldg 1c and 3c. We were next to the main hotel lobby and casino, hotel restaurants like Zen, Ciao, Med Bistro, and Market place buffet, arcade, escape room, etc. and not far from the theater and water park. Fairly easy walking or taking a trolley to the beach and other pools. The pools are all different and there's pretty much something for everyone from the little kids waterslide area and the sports lovers volley ball or basketball pools to the eden pool with its foam parties and the quieter infinity pools. The property, as has been repeatedly noted in reviews, is HUGE. If you are hoping to be near the beach and pools you won't want to be in the buildings by the main lobby hotel itself. The restaurants are fair to good. Nothing exceptional but we didn't go to the Monserrat Manor which is at an additional charge and may have been excellent. Old and young enjoyed the Zen Hibachi, just wish we could have gotten a choice of protein. The burgers at Market Place were surprisingly good but it's really noisy in all of those in-the -hotel restaurants. Ciao was another favorite, service was especially great there! Out by the beach we loved Isla for breakfast (still a buffet but less crowded and less noisy than Market Place). Dinner there was fun, a Mexican trio serenaded us (I guess there's no more Mexican restaurante?) Toro for dinner was average (if you want a great steak think about Monserrat Manor- I don't even know where that one is or if it's still available!) Ipanema for lunch buffet had a good variety to choose from but we preferred to eat mostly at the pool grill by the main pool which had hamburgers, grilled chicken, pork and nachos etc. all very good. There's also a food truck with a little patio and umbrellas where you can sit and eat burgers or hot dogs, though not as good in our opinion as the ones at the grill or at market place. The Flowrider was a big hit with everyone who tried it, worth the money for the experience, most days the vendors on the beach were pleasant and easily accepted a "no thanks" if you weren't interested in their wares. The beach is long and beautiful but the water was rough (maybe that time of year, maybe that location more Atlantic than Caribbean). They raked the seaweed at toro beach every day. We did not do any off property excursions - were plenty busy and never even opened the books we brought! Drinks were readily available at the restaurants and on the beach and pools and we had no serious complaints about the selections although we're not that picky on our beer choice - not sure what the craft beer drinkers in our group thought, but presidente was fine, as was grey goose vodka. The problem was trying to get a drink in the main lobby hotel during the day. At virtually every other all-inclusive we've been to someone greets you on arrival in the lobby with a drink of some sort and there's always water (distilled in an urn or bottled in buckets or coolers) available at all times. Trying to just get a coke was not that easy in the main lobby hotel. Seemed crazy to have to stand in line at Market place just to grab a bottle of water. They did have bottles at the cafe but we didn't know to look for the first few days. We were very disappointed that there are no tennis courts or pickleball courts within the gates. When we originally booked last year it appeared there were at least two and they were on the property. The resort actually leases one tennis court from a private facility just outside and you have to make a reservation and get the bell captain to get a trolley to take you there. Carlos, who is in charge of the court, was wonderful and provided chalk and a measuring tape for making pickleball court markings on the tennis court, (our group played both tennis and pickleball) but the process for getting a court was extremely frustrating - no one knew where the courts were, kept referring us to other people who referred us to more people, the concierge who should have been available to make the reservation was who knows where, spent over an hour on the phone and never did get through. Finally just showed up, then made reservations the next day through a different concierge. Part of our group stayed in Bldg 2A which is convenient for the isla pool if you're one of the privileged vip or rock royalty folks, and it is an easier walk to the other pools and toro beach which was our favorite hangout. The downside is they had ants in their bed which were discovered at 2 am crawling on the sleeping occupants. No bites and room was fumigated but pretty disappointing. The Eclipse Terrace was our evening hangout, Glynnes was our fabulous bartender, the music and Dominican night especially was so much fun. The shows at the theater were fine for something to do, the kids enjoyed the Lion King, though if you've seen the real show you probably don't want to go, more like a high school production, as were all the shows. Impressed with what they did with limited staging. A couple of the gymnasts with the Beatles tribute were pretty amazing. All in all we had a great time, and almost everyone was very friendly and tried to be helpful but repeatedly when we asked how to get somewhere, how to do or arrange something was there were serious communication issues that did not seem to be caused by language but simply by staff not knowing anything but their very own small area (example: there's supposed to be an area for teens, no one knew about it; there was supposed to be a recording studio for kids recording a video of singing or being a rock band, multiple people sent us all over the place to no avail). There only seemed to be one of the map sign boards on the property that had a "you are here" sticker. In a place so large it's very easy to find yourself walking around in circles. They need to get gps markers like golf courses have! Or at least give you an updated paper map that includes the water park with the tennis courts (in the actual place they are) that you can mark up when you arrive. The app with the map is too small to figure out where you are and where you're going!…
Roaches all over rooms had to switch rooms and still had roaches when I went to complain to desk again the agent told me I was imaging them even though I have pictures. The resort it’s self is nice but it is massive but they have a tram.
Everything was wonderful! Lots of food choices and friendly service. Make sure to bring your walking shoes though, the place is really big. If you don’t want to walk though there are a lot of trolleys that circle the property. We especially liked spending time at the adult pool.
Be careful renting the tours. They do not mention the transportation is not included. I wake up early with my family to realice that was $20 per person. Ending canceling the trip. They do not try to help you and unfortunately apologized is not going to fix the bad moment and the waste of time.
We had as many negatives as positives with this resort. Negatives- food prep and safe handling issues, one in the party had food poisoning and many experienced stomach upset and vomiting from coconut cocktails like coco locos and coconut daiquiris. Rooms poorly cleaned, garbage around pools- cups and water bottles. Positives- amazing chef prepared dinners at Toro and on the patio near the Legendary Building that were superbly prepared, cooked, presented, and served by some amazing staff. Bongos pool bartender Yadanila is a great drink mixer and awesome service- happy, fun, positive! A few other wonderful employees were our butler Judith, the cook at the Bongos Pool,
We stayed for six days in may and had a fabulous time. We set aside time to meet with the wedding office and more specifically, Melissa. She was extremely helpful and patient with all of our questions and concerns. She took the time to walk through everything with us and show us all they had to offer and how we could make the spaces our own. She was a pleasure and beyond professional. If we choose to book our event there I will be doing it because she was so fantastic to work with.
Own or manage this property? Claim your listing for free to respond to reviews, update your profile and much more.
Claim Your Listing