Quick summary of Punta Cana

As many of readers know, Jennifer had surprised me with a trip to Punta Cana for my college graduation gift. We stayed for 4 nights, 5 days. She decided to booked through Apple Vacation, because our last trip though them was great. The apple rep greeted us at the airport and took us right to our destinated bus. The bus ride wasn't as bad as some of the reviews that Jennifer had read. (There were tons of pot holes in the road and at times we were zig-zagging down certain roads) Apple had supplied us with a charter bus, so we felt less bumps, compared to some of the other smaller shuttles. The ride was about an hour long, but we were interested in seeing the country, so we were focused on looking out the windows. We arrived to Secrets and were greeted with champagne and a cool damp towel for those who were in shock from the heat. After being refresh by our greeters, Jennifer went to check in and was asked if she wished to upgrade to the Excellence club. Due to past reviews Jennifer had read, she declined and was told that the room wasn't ready. I truly think that this is because Jennifer had declined for the upgrade. We went to have lunch in a buffet setting and came back about 45 minutes later and still the room wasn’t ready. This time we had a drink at the bar and waited the 20 minutes that they said it would be. Still, the room wasn’t ready. Jennifer kicked up a fuss and within 5 minutes the room suddenly became ready for us. The room was a standard garden view room. The room was beautiful. We had a jacuzzi tub, 2 bottles of champagne, a fruit basket and flowers that decorated the room. We were glad that we did not do the Excellence upgrade. We relaxed for awhile and went to the Apple meeting that we were scheduled to attend. (This meeting is usually standard for giving general information about the country and what to expect, highly recommendable) For our first dinner at the Boudreaux, which was amazing and watched the nightly entertainment, which was ok, kind of cheesy but entertaining. Tuesday we just relaxed by the pool and went to the beach party that night which consisted of wonderful food. Wednesday we went on our first excursion, the Outback Safari, this was an extremely long day. They picked us up at 9am and we didn’t get back to the resort until 5pm. We toured a Dominican home, a plantation, tasted sugar cane, green oranges and locally grown pineapples. We were also taken to a ranch and had Dominican food for lunch, we didn't really like the food, but many of the people did enjoy it. We were then taken to a beach to boogie board. The waves were extremely rough, so not a lot of people participated. The tour guides also had us stay in a confined space. By the end of this day we were exhausted. We asked how long it would take to get back to the resort and were told 15 minutes...15 Dominican minutes, which means 1 hour. On Thursday we went on our second excursion, which was deep sea fishing. The man arrived at the resort to pick us up at 11am. We picked a few others up and traveled about an hour to a beach. We hopped on a small boat which took us to the fishing boat and hoped on. We went about 6 miles out to sea. The diesel fumes were extremely strong. People were feeling really sick. We later knew that it was from the diesel fumes and not the motion. After catching nothing we went back to get ready to get off the boat. While waiting for the smaller boat to come get us, I noticed that smoke was coming in from the side of the boat. The boat had caught fire!!! Yeah, that's right we paid $200 to catch fish but instead we caught fire. Luckily, a guy that was with us works on boats, so he knew what was going on. The second boat came just in time to get us back to shore safely. The sad part is, I told the Apple reps and the very next day our same tour guide was at the resort picking people up to go right back on that boat! SCARY!!!!All in all, we had a great trip. I might not recommend the deep sea fishing though. Secrets was beautiful. The staff was nice, not overly nice like Cancun, but nice. Our room was beautiful and clean. The food that we had was very tasty. The drinks weren’t very strong, but Jennifer liked the Pina Coladas. Very relaxing trip for 2 college students in their last year!!