13 Mar 2023
Overall an average tour compared with other city tours I have been on.
Firstly despite my accommodation being listed as a location that I could be picked up from, the evening prior to the tour I was informed that they would not pick up from my location (Macao beach) as it was too far out. So I was forced to order an Uber to the closest pickup point that they would pick me up from (Hard Rock hotel) - so additional cost and inconvenience. Do not list pick up locations if you don’t service them! Have to credit the driver on the way back though as he took me back to my hotel as he was a bit worried about my safety dropping me outside the Hard Rock at night. Legend.
As other reviewers said, once in the minivan you are taken to a service station where (after a while) you are transferred to a larger vehicle to travel to Santo Domingo. I had no issues with this but two poor guys got on the wrong bus and so ended up in Santo Domingo with us (they were supposed to be going to Soana Island for the day)!!! The communication from the guys at the service station could have been clearer in terms of which bus you needed to get onto for onward travel - I can see how this error happened!
Tour itself wasn’t too bad overall. Saw the main sights in SD and the lunch was pretty decent. Far too much time however was spent with the group being taken into souvenir shops. Would much rather we had extra time to take pictures/spend more time at key sites. All the tour groups seem to be taken to the same stores so I can only assume that the operators have struck some kind of deal with these stores.
Guide tried his best to communicate in English for myself and a couple of Germans on the tour but he was a little hard to understand.
Average overall - but I suspect a lot of the tours in general in the DR are a little disorganized/try and get you to spend as much $ as possible.
So wouldn’t advise not to book - but go into it with your eyes open!