Excursion d'une journée à Paradise Island - Cayo Arena

This tour was great, the bus ride is a bit long, but once you get to the island you forget how long it took you to get there. The water is crystal clear, there are a lot of fish and marine life in general. The guides bring fruit and drinks, and some snacks. You can take pictures, snorkel, or just relax in the water. On the way back we went through the mangroves, I was not very interested on that, but I was pleasantly surprised, the boat ride became a thrill ride, I loved it. After that you go to have lunch at a nearby place. I have to say I was disappointed with the lunch. It was not enough, it was no good nor tasty, and there was not even candy as dessert. This is the reason why I do not give a 5 on this review. After lunch, on the ride back, you stop at a small farm where they show you how to roll tobbacco leaves and how to grind coffee, it was a very interesting experience for my kids. Overall, it was a great tour except for lunch.

I wish we stayed at the paradise island longer. It was a long day of transportation and lots of stops to pickup n drop off people at their hotels. The island itself was an amazing experience and it couldve been even more memorable if we stayed longer to enjoy.

The island is a great excursion destination. The team was seh friendly and we were the only two Germans, nevertheless the tour guide also translated everything into German.

Overall the trip was fine but way too disorganized for our liking. Here were the cons to the trip: Our transport bus was way too cramped with little to no AC at the beginning, it’s hazardous and a potential death trap with locked windows. Although we were moved to a bigger bus with better AC and space, there were way too many people to be picked up and dropped off. Priority was made to mainstream hotels in Puerto Plata rather than those at the outskirts (Ie. Cabarete and Sosua). This means we spent four hours on what should’ve been a two hour commute to the island. The island is a sandbar with no space to sit down or shelter from the sun. The water provided may have been tainted/polluted which could result in poisoning for some folks. There wasn’t enough equipment for snorkeling and the guide did not wait for all clients to see if they were interested in joining. Our initial driver did not stay with us to provide us with transport at the end. We stayed longer than expected in the bigger bus until we got another driver. Despite these flaws, there were several positives. The employees really do go out of their way to be accommodating, our guide (Mendy) was super knowledgeable in both cultures and languages, the workers on the boat tried their hardest to help us feel safe while also having fun, and the food at the restaurant was delicious! My recommendations: the disorganization is a management/owner problem, not the employees! They are focusing more on maximizing profits rather than client comfort. I would suggest management focus on providing different packages based on location:one for puerto plate hotels, the other package for the outskirts (Cabarete and Sosua) with each different transport and guides. This should help with the disorganization. Build stronger and safer huts with seats in the sandbar, provide bottled water rather than tap water for guests. Provide an option button for snorkeling during reservation. This way guides can document who needs equipment and who wants to join. Overall there is potential in this trip tour but management has to be willing to make the changes to get better results and better client reviews. Hope this helps!

Very nice tour! I enjoyed getting to know the isla bonita despite the rain. The bus was very nice and had air conditioning.

The charted bus picked us up from our resort. We drove about 1hr & 40 minutes 2 the destination. We stopped in 2 different places to snorkel. The water was beautiful. They had champagne, rum punch & snaps for us. The crew & the captain was very kind & friendly. We then went 2 paradise Island for about 2 hrs. We returned to a delicious lunch of gumbo, lobster, beans & rice, salad & dessert. It was an amazing day. I'm glad we decided 2 do it. I do recommend

Excellent! The staff was friendly. We were swimming with the fishes, also, the boat ride through the mangroves was amazing! i would recommend this experience!

Paradise Island trip was awesome, we enjoyed the Snorkeling, the Service was good, the Crew very friendly, we recommend!

It was a very good experience, we had a lots of fun doing the Snorkeling in the Island and enjoyed of the Crystal clear waters , it's 100% recommended,

We loved it , it was a great tríp , tris is the most beautiful Snorkeling of the Island . We highly recommend it.