Back Home.

It was nice to be somewhere tropical over Christmas. We went with the Mrs's family, (her Dad paid for the trip), along with her brothers and their families, 16 of us total. We went to a all-inclusive resort in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic.

Ended up being 2 different trips. During the day, when we were at the pool, it was great. 7 pools, all gorgeous, beautiful beaches, very clean. It was 85 and sunny every day. The kids LOVED IT. The grounds were extremely well kept. The bars were convenient and quick with a drink. Too bad I didn't get drunk once on the trip because the alcohol was either watered down or very weak. My brother in laws got drunk a few nights but they were drinking beer only.

Now to the bad part, and by bad I mean AWFUL. This place is rated 4 to 4-1/2 star. If you rated the rooms only, it would be ONE star. The rooms were TINY, the mattresses were 3" old coil mattresses flopped onto wood frames. Our first room reaked like a combination of must and sewer. IT took the front desk two days to move us and my wife literally crying in the lobby to do it. They moved us across the walkway to a slightly better room. Unfortunately, the shower had ZERO water pressure, but it was better than Room #1.

Regardless, I woke up every day with a wicked backache. After the 2nd night I couldn't wait to get home and sleep on a good bed.

The food was pretty awful too. It was a buffet for breakfast and lunch, (very limited and of low quality), and then either the same buffets for dinner or if you were LUCKY enough you got reservations into one of the 5 restaurants. Out of 8 nights we ate at restaurants on site 3 times, one other time we went off site, the other 4 times at the crappy buffets.

The best night of sleep I got was in the Airport Hotel in Toronto when we got back at 3am on the 31st. The beds were soooooooo comfortable after 8 nights of cardboard mattresses.

Never go to The Lifestyles Grand Ambar in Puerto Plata...

Oh, and Happy New Year...