RIU Palace Punta Cana All Inclusive

Went for an extra long weekend (4 nts) and it was excellent!! The beach is absolutely gorgeous, one of the prettiest I have ever seen. The staff at the Riu Palace Punta Cana go out of their way to make your stay the best it can be! I highly recommend going to the Dominican Republic, it was a very relaxing trip.

The Rui Palace was a beautiful Hotel, actually one of the best on the beach after walking up and down the strip of hotels. Pool awesome too and lots of entertainment during the day for the kids and adults. You didnt need to leave your resort, everything was their for you to do.

Beautiful resort in good location, nice pool and wonderful beach. Friendly & helpful staff. Good food at specialty restaurants and the buffets. Wine & beer selection limited. We really enjoyed evening music & dancing outdoors in "town square" atmosphere.

Overall...good. Some areas that could ne improved are entertainment not too good. The pool bar closed too early. Very little or no entertainment provided at the 24 hour bar. If you are a younger outgoing person...you could get board after 7pm. During daytime, music and entertainment inadequate. On arrival...the front desk was a little chaotic. Staff trying to serve more than one person at the same time, while other staff stood around or just didn't appear busy. No jacuzzi hot spas outside by the pool area.

Wonderful! Sun, sand, beautiful water, great people who made me feel like a queen!

Great set up, nice location, helpful staff Food could have been better

Beautiful grounds, attentive staff (learning as they go but well intentioned), great pool area. Of the various Rui hotels side by side on the beach, this had the most user friendly family grounds. Do not come here if you are looking for gourmet meals. (If you are coming for the free alcohol - mixed drinks not "top shelf" - then this is your place because it flows like water). As to the food, The basic buffet restaurant food is adequate but redundant. The "special" ethnic restaurants you have to sign up for are very average and basic - but again the effort of the staff is infectious. Again, come for the beauty of the property and weather. We went in late March and despite the grim weather reports, nailed gorgeous weather 5 of 6 days there. Check out the zip line day trip through the hotel agent - it is a blast and you drive through and see the real D.R. and not the tourist area of Punta Cana. Safety was never an issue as you could feel comfortable leaving anything on your beach chair. Some silly rituals about getting towels and saving beach/pool chairs but no big deal. Overall, all inclusive is all inclusive and this was a great value if you are not expecting more than what you are paying for. I would go back (ie- saw three weddings held on the property so it looks good to brides too)

The hotel is very well situated and the beach is truly amazing. The staff is fantastic and are always smiling. The check in process was great, terrific lobby and the drinks are just great!

Overall my experience was positive. I love the hotel setup and the grounds were beautiful. Service was good and I never had to wait extensively for anything. The wifi in the lobby was fine but it would be great if there was internet access in the rooms. The food was pretty good. I felt it was better in the buffet restaurant than the other restaurants.

It was probably the worst vacation I have ever had. That wasn't entirely the hotel's fault. One hopes for nice weather on a tropical vacation, and we didn't have that. However, let me talk about the hotel. The building itself is beautiful and the beach was stunning! I would describe it as a one or two star hotel that happened to be located in a five star building. Right off the bat when we get to our room, our safe if broken and our lamps all had burnt out light bulbs. The bed was like sleeping on a rock. At one point I tried to order room service, and we found that our phone was broken too. I went down to the lobby, and instead of trying to fix anything they simply dialed room service, shoved the phone in my face, and walked away. On our second night there, the power went off around 4 am. It appeared to be only our room. The air conditioning and everything were off. We asked for a new room, but weren't even able to move all of our stuff until the next day because we couldn't see our stuff. The food was embarrassingly bad!!!! The worst part was, it actually looked and smelled fine. Please understand that I'm not just being picky. The 24 snack bad is merely a fridge full of the most pathetic sandwiches you have ever seen, disgusting hamburgers floating in grease, and a big container of nacho cheese that you had to scoop onto your chips with a fork and then heat in the microwave. Picture the nachos that you might see at a movie theater, nothing but processed cheese and chips. Those terrible nachos were literally one of the best things that I had to eat over a period of five days. The service overall was mediocre. I joked with some other customers that they are clearly not trying for repeat visits. I also spoke to a woman on my plane when leaving who told me she once had a similar bad experience at the Riu in Cabo. She was barely able to get her kids to eat anything. I will say, that had we had nice weather the trip would have been better. Our snorkeling trip was canceled, and it stormed the whole time. If we had been there for nicer weather, all of the bad things about the hotel wouldn't have been as big of an issue given the beauty of the beach. If you really want to go to this area because you are traveling on a budget, know this. All of the Riu resorts in Punta Cana face the same gorgeous beach. There is no need to pay for one of the nicer Rius. Given the food was so terrible at our resort, it would be hard to imagine that the food at any of the lesser resorts could be much worse. I won't be going again.