Dominican Replubic, Punta Cana – December 2015
I found a deal that we couldn’t pass up for an all-inclusive trip to Punta Cana with the family. We decided that it was going to be a surprise Christmas gift to the boys from mom and dad. We drove down to Chicago to visit great grandma Shirley Ciorba and stayed the night at the 4 Point Sheraton hotel. We told the boys that we would just wake up super early and drive them to school in the morning. When we got up Heather and I broke the news to them that we were going to head to the airport instead of going home. The looks on their faces were priceless.
We arrived in Punta Cana after a very long 5 hour plane ride. The weather there was hot, just as expected. We checked in at the Memories Splash Resort. The resort was nice and had all the amenities that we needed. It is a combined resort with the Royalton (luxury resort on the beach). The restaurants were for the most part excellent. The fresh Grouper that I had was out of this world. Heather’s steak medallions were very tasty as well.
Most days at the resort were spent at the waterpark. There were 7 water slides and a small wave pool that kept the kids entertained for hours. There were 2 large pools at our resort and both had swim-up bars. Our favorite drink was Miami Beach/Miami Vice depending on the bar you ordered it from. We also had some Presidente’s at the end of the day. The kids enjoyed unlimited drinks and ice cream cones. Evan was double fisting chocolate cones on a daily basis. He didn’t care for the milk which he drinks a ton of back home. We ate at the buffet in the morning for breakfast and had burgers, hotdogs, and fries at the pool for lunch before going out to a nice restaurant for dinner.
We went on a dune buggy adventure one day. It consisted of a beach and cenote tour. We headed to the Macao Beach first. The beach was beautiful with white sand and turquoise water. We had time for a quick dip and some pictures with a monkey. After the beach we headed to an agriculture facility with a cenote onsite. We learned about how they produce sugar cane, coffee, coco, and tobacco. We had some samples of each. Aiden, Evan, and I took a quick dip in the cenote to clean off from the muddy dune buggy ride. The trails were super bumpy and filled with water. I had a blast driving through all the mud puddles and getting everyone dirty.
Our next excursion is unforgettable. We took a day trip to Manati Park for the kids to swim with dolphins….oh ya Dolphins. The park was awesome. They had so many awesome animals. Our guide as extremely helpful and gave us one of the best tours we could have ever asked for. We saw and held most of the animals that they had. The kids loved swimming with the dolphins. At first Evan was scared, but after Aiden got a kiss from the dolphin he calmed down and got one too. Dolphins can be very intimidating when you are in the water with them due to their size. The kids favorite part was when they held onto the fins and had a dolphin take them across the pool. There was also the dolphin show that was pretty cool. They jumped super high out of the water, clapped their fins, gathered hola hoops, and stood up in the water.
What a great time!
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