Dreams Flora Resort & Spa — Hotel in Higüey

✍🏻 A bit of a mixed review I’ll admit. We’ve done lots of 5* AI resorts in both the Caribbean and Europe, and this is not on par with some of them.|🌴Resort - is beautiful! Lovely setting, well kept, totally tropical. Reminded us a lot of Mauritius. The staff work hard to keep it clean and well maintained.|🛏️ Room - We upgraded to preferred on arrival, but not the bedroom as there was no availability. However our room for the four of us was great! Really good size. Nice sofa area and separate bar stall area too. Large bathroom with separate toilet. Loved these robes and slippers and the intense stick in the bathroom too. I was surprised however that the family room was so close to the entertainment! (Block 13). We could hear it every night! Not ideal for families.|💁‍♂️ Preferred - We upgraded at resort. There were some bonuses - the seaside bar and grill for breakfast was definitely the best, followed by the preferred pool. I feel our butler could have been more visual having seen how others were like visiting the pool everyday etc and a a few requests took a few days (like the preferred tote bag).|💦 Pools - We used the preferred and water park. We liked the preferred pool as it was quieter and close to the seaside bar which was a bonus. The watersides are good fun but wouldn’t spend more than an hour there at a time. I found on the racing slides, they hurt my back so recommend a rash vest if going on that one. It’s well run and the life guards were good. The adults only pool is smaller and quieter but the staff didn’t come around and take your drinks order, you had to go to the bar.|🥧 Food - as someone with dietary requirements I found the buffet extremely hard to eat at. No signage and no one seemed to know what was in what when I asked. I was also surprised at how small the buffet was for such a large resort! The smallest I’ve seen! The restaurants were easier as they had dietary symbols on the menus and some alternatives, like gluten free pasta at the Italian. But still a bit hard. Also a bit repetitive, only eating fish, it was salmon at most restaurants and mostly undercooked too.|🍴Restaurants - Our favourite was the seaside grill, especially for breakfast, so nice to eat there every morning, lovely sea breeze too. I was surprised there was no booking system except for the Habachi. The Habachi show felt a bit rushed but the food was nice. Also was unaware that the Bordeaux restaurant was adult only.|☕️ The CoCo cafe was good, especially the first few mornings when we were awake early with jet lag! The banana bread is delicious!|🏖️ Beach - Yes the Sargussum is bad. They clean and clean it. The smell some days was pretty rancid. By day 6 they had really cleaned it and it was the best we’d seen but still there was seaweed and the water was murky. The sand is lovely, white and clean. There were people on beach that were pushy trying to sell excursions.|🧖‍♀️Spa - We used it day two for my daughter to get braids but by the next day three had fallen out. We went back and they redid them and they are much better. I had a facial and the hydro experience. It was very relaxing, however would’ve liked some time to lay and enjoy the serenity before/after treatment.|🛣️ Excursions - My husband and children used Sea Pro and completed their PADI after having a complimentary try at scuba diving in the pool. They enjoyed it and the instructor, Jennifer, was nice. Other than that we didn’t do any excursions. |☎️ Concierge - I visited for assistance with the airport but it was all very relaxed and they ended up not being able to help so bit of a waste of time.|🛍️ Shop - Well stocked but expensive! Was surprised there was no mozzy repellent.|💁‍♀️ Staff - again, mixed. Mostly were welcoming and helpful, others I felt like I was an inconvenience to them or they didn’t want to be there. We tipped and spoke our best, basic, Spanish too. Some really stood out as they were great though.|🪰 Flies/Mozzies- there seemed to be sooo many flies! By the sun loungers, by the food, it wasn’t pleasant. There are Mozzies! By day 3 I’d got about 10 bites|Would I come back? No. But I like going to new places. However, for example I would go back to Jamaica…so gives...

⭐ Dreams Flora Resort – Mixed Experience (Pre- and Post-Travel Review)|Pre-Travel (Written 11 October 2025)||I’ve stayed with Dreams Resorts before, including in the Dominican Republic, and have always had great experiences — which makes this situation all the more disappointing.||I’m due to stay at Dreams Flora soon and have contacted the resort on four separate occasions with a simple request: that our room comes with two queen beds instead of one king. I initially made this request at the time of booking (back in March) and followed up multiple times — most recently in October, the same month as our stay.||As of today, I’ve still not received a single acknowledgment or reply from the hotel — not even a basic confirmation that the request is being looked into.||I sincerely hope this lack of communication is not a sign of things to come, as I’m celebrating my 50th birthday on this trip with a longtime school friend.||I’ll be posting a second review after the holiday, and I truly hope I’ll be able to report a much better experience once we arrive. So far though, I would suggest not to raise your hopes when making contact via email — as the service is very poor and could vastly be improved!||Post-Travel (October 2025)||Unfortunately, the disappointment continued on arrival. At check-in, my travel companion and I were left waiting over two hours for our room, eventually gaining access after 6:30 p.m. (rooms are vacated from 12 p.m.). The front desk advised that the room — which was supposedly ready — needed cleaning. Understandable, but given the turnaround time, this should have been completed much earlier. Another couple with two young children faced the same issue that day. Not a great start.||Once we finally got into our room, I was pleased to find it clean, well-presented, and comfortable. The layout with two sinks, a separate WC, and sliding doors was a nice touch. The beds were comfortable, the minibar was fully stocked, and water was replenished daily. I particularly appreciated the workstation with plenty of power points, and the large TV. The balcony was on the smaller side, but the view was lovely. Dreams might consider adding mosquito netting to the balcony doors — it would be great to enjoy the sea breeze without worrying about bites.||Service overall was good, with special recognition for Edwin at Patio 2 Bar and Marolyn at the World Café — both went above and beyond, showing genuine warmth and enthusiasm. Vanessa and the entertainment crew also did a fantastic job. However, I was disappointed by Katherine at the front desk, whose curt attitude left a negative impression. When I requested a late checkout (given our delayed check-in), I was surprised to find her unwilling to accommodate even a 1:00 p.m. extension — instead, she “negotiated” a 12:30 p.m. checkout. After celebrating a milestone birthday and waking early for a beach run, that extra time would have been a small but meaningful gesture.||The food was a little hit-and-miss. I enjoyed the Japanese restaurant and the lively entertainment it offered, as well as the dessert selection in the World Café and the excellent breakfast choices. However, some menu items lacked balance — for example, one slice of pizza was absolutely doused in chilies (a light sprinkling would’ve been plenty!).||Overall, I’ve visited Dreams Resorts for nearly ten years — from Punta Cana to Mexico and Europe. The gym here is fantastic, and the resort itself has a lot of potential. But the poor communication before arrival, delayed room access, and lack of flexibility or warmth from some staff really detracted from what should have been a special 50th birthday celebration.||Dreams Flora could easily be on par with the brand’s other properties if they paid closer attention to detail and staff attitude at the front desk.||Lastly, I’ll say this: guests shouldn’t be concerned with how many people a resort needs to serve — our concern is simply getting the experience we’ve paid for. If you can’t manage large numbers effectively, then focus on fewer guests and deliver the exceptional service Dreams...

I would probably give it 4.5 if there was an option. We are from London and just returned from 9nights vacation with our 1.5 year old. We booked preferred club double garden view room. Prior to arrival, we asked to change our room to king as our son sleeps in our bed and it was ready for us on arrival which was amazing. The room was comfortable , the bed was enormous and really good, it felt a bit like they ran out of money when renovating the bathroom a little bit but everything worked and was clean. Shower pressure was really good and temperature was great, we didn’t even need a kettle to warm up baby bottles as water from sink was roasting. The resort grounds are beautiful and very well maintained. Beach was very nice and super clean, small amount of seaweed was cleaned every morning. The resort has huge numbers of staff ensuring guests are looked after. Against some odd comments I read prior to going, vast vast majority spoke a very respectable level of English, we had no trouble communicating at all. The resort has an app that allows you to make bookings or order room service so you don’t even need to phone if you don’t want to. With regards to preferred club, the a la carte restaurant for lunch was totally worth the upgrade, also a separate quiet area of the beach and location of rooms close to the beach. Preferred Lounge was a major let down, check in was nothing special (we weren’t even offered a welcome drink) but we could go up to the bar and get one ourselves, the supposedly premium drinks selection had nothing premium about it, cocktails were probably the worst we had on the whole resort and food/snack selection was not nice, ultra processed junk or same sandwiches you get in the coffee shop. We are fussy eaters and we found the food at the resort overall to be quite decent for all inclusive, it was not as nice as the Hyatt (expectedly as Hyatt has a much higher price tag) but it was much better than excellence el Carmen, where we moved out from because we really didn’t like the food. The only thing I’d say is I would have liked kids corner to be healthier, I understand that most kids just want nuggets and chips and ice cream but I wouldn’t feed my child that, our son mostly ate from the main buffet or preferred lunch restaurant and that was ok but obviously impossible to control level of salt intake. My main comment would be about drinks, first, every bartender makes them their own way, often loaded with sugar syrup or just have obscene amount of alcohol in it, I feel staff should be trained to make drinks one way and follow some kind of recipe/guideline for measurements as there is none. In the end, we mostly opted for simple drinks like aperol spritz or wine as most cocktails were just not nice. I should say however that Jose the preferred pool bar and Jessica at the pop up bar in front of Asian restaurant made lovely cocktails and listened to our requests, so special thank you to them. We would like to particularly thank restaurant manager Jose who was so lovely to us, catered for all our requests and brought my son avocado every time as he loves those. He was by far the star of the service we had. Overall, service was really good. Special thanks to our butler Mariel, she was fantastic and attended to all our requests and our made Katherine who made our room sparking every day. My son got sick whilst we were there with strep, I really don’t think it had anything to do with the hotel was either airplane or another child that he played with. We went to see the doctor at Hospiten clinic on site, I can’t remember his name but he straight away identified that my son had sore throat and recommended that we don’t wait long if he doesn’t improve and take him to main clinic in Bávaro. We ended up going same day as he took ill, they took blood tests and put him on antibiotic straight away and he was more or less fine within 24 hours. Mariel asked about him every day and asked if we had special request so not much else we could ask for. I would definitely recommend this resort, we had a great...