Fairy Tale Access & Fairy Tale Access~ible Destinations™: Yike's Vacation Accident! Tips & Surprise's

Dominican Republic Punta Cana 2015

Hi, so what do you do when visiting the Dominican Republic? There are so many exciting side visits to take!

From my most recent trip in June 2015, I found the best tour operators with all inclusive packages to be the following. Mostly because they had representatives on site to help you with arrangements for side trips, transfers to the airport and anything that came up really.

I took a JetBlue Getaway package on this trip and found on arrival they do not have rep's at the sites you go to, to help with problems that can come up at the Grand Bahia Principe Turquesa and/or their resorts in the area such as the Esmeralda or Bavaro which I checked out extensively.

Accident's can happen as I'll explain below; but this Apple Vacation Rep who had met my mother on another trip was truly an award winning rep (even though this trip was booked through JetBlue Getaways!)

*****Apple Vacations your rep in the DR at a Principle Property

Jean Marte

*****Green Services Tours this rep Stella Vasquez Yndalecio, goes the extra mile as well for her guests and she is very interested in meeting them all!

The Following had consistent Representation on Site:

Amstar, HotelBeds, Nolitours, Soltour, Tony Pereza, Turi Adventure.

TRAVEL INSURANCE - TO BUY OR NOT TO BUY

The one offered and purchased at Jet Blue Getaways "Allianz" was useless, bad costumer service, in fact none (even in light of great reviews online). There is no follow up care coverage upon return to the United States, as you'll see we didn't need it anyway (except if there was a chance you may cancel for medical reasons; but then they don't even cover the whole trip if it was medically induced.) Check your credit cards, they may have better travel insurance for this purpose.

We decide to try a excursion and did so with Hotelbeds booked with Yunior Benitez an excellent and courteous travel rep.

While embarking on what was to be a wicked tour by Speedboat

to a Catamaran Cruise to sail to Saona Island a government protected nature reserve...

We found the staff to be exceptional, except for when my mom cut her foot in the speed boat, upon transfer to the catamaran it was bleeding excessively, the medical kit on board and simple first aid training was not something they had on board. Luckily there was gauze to wrap and put pressure on the wound until we could get to medical care.

I have to say our tour guide was fantastic at his inquiry and my request he immediately called another speed boat in to pick up my mother and bring us to shore.

Upon arrival a young and very strong young man lifted my mother out of the boat like a small child and carried her to shore. Where he and two other Hotelbed employees wait with us only minutes for a taxi to take us to the closet medical facility...

It's cute and small and oh my gosh it's not a hospital! But you can't be deceived by the cover of the book.

Dr. Ramirez spoke English well, Medial Tourism, his office was clean and everything was sterile! Plus his bedside manner and stitches "12" on this trip were second to none! We enjoyed talking with him about his love for New York and full knowledge of the subway system there. We left feeling confident in his care and crossing our fingers that a New York hospital get's such a great doctor.

On our way back our taxi driver didn't speak a lot of English and my Spanish is limited but for the hour and a half drive we were able to converse with our driver through my Google Translate App about the day, his family, sugar cane harvesting and bananas. The App far out weighs Bing which I have found to be consistently wrong. Bonus! When you find you can't pronounce a sentence Google App did it for me and when I didn't catch what the driver relayed he could talk into it and it would give me the translation! That is so Fairy Tale Wicked because I travel not just to the destination; I ❤ meeting new people and finding out about their country through their eyes.

Hotelbeds took care of the medical bill, taxi back and provided a full refund for the trip without any issue! (Hence, Travel Insurance Not Needed) Truly a pleasure after such a mishap. I will be using them should I go back.

The Grand Bahia Principe's Collection of all inclusive resorts is great as far as the service, wait staff, drivers and bell hops at all locations you will find them truly accommodating and engaging.

What lacked at the Grand Bahia Principe, Turquesa was the hotel management. Specifically Jefferies and Samuel and their front desk staff, slow, not accommodating. For example, upon arrival there was a 5 hour wait for our room, the manager Jefferies sent us to a restaurant that was in fact closed! Great he really knows how his facility runs. Once we got in the room it still had a huge puddle from a pipe leak and they were still working on it, that's almost always not encouraging after a 5 hour flight.

Then, they claimed they had no other rooms! Maid service then lacked every single day we were there, even leaving the patio doors open twice letting in a ton of mosquitoes! The assistant manager Samuel offered us a new room on Thursday evening, we were leaving on Friday morning. He said he offered us a return trip but as happened throughout the week they never delivered.

Even after arriving back and being in need of a wheel chair, the front desk staff was unaccommodating. Thank's to Apple Vacation's Jean Marte, he had my mom accommodated in ten minutes! That's gold star customer service!

Every resort you go to will have views like this with many activities for families, couples and singles. Just a small sample from my Nokia Lumia 929 - 20 mega pixel camera!! I❤this phone!