My time-travelling holiday
Have you ever had that feeling of déja resort?
Dominican Republic 2025
Apologies for the recent radio silence, but I have just returned from a gorgeous holiday in the Dominican Republic.
I have been to the Dom Rep four times before, once with friends and three times with the kids, when they were young.
We loved an all-inclusive as a family, it really takes all the stress out of everything and gives the kids a lot of independence.
In the early days we would try and encourage them to make friends on holiday, and we had a steadfast rule of not buying any inflatables for the pool, so they had to befriend other kids with lilos if they wanted to get involved in the floaty-splashing action, which of course they did.
“Go and make friends with the kids that already have them!”
Was our holiday mantra, then at changeover day our kids would inherit the odd Lilo from the outgoing peeps and the circle of plastic inflatables would continue, no doubt until the end of the season.
I’m convinced there are only ever about eight lilos per resort doing the rounds all year long, as they’re passed down from one new BFF to the next.
One year, we felt our son may have taken the directive a little too far, as we spotted him on Day 1, paddling along in the pool in a full-sized kayak!
One of his new friends had liberated the resort branded craft from the closed beach1 a couple of days earlier.
No one seemed to mind.
Luckily, that resort boasted what is often thought to be the largest swimming pool in the world, although because it splits to go down in level halfway along it doesn’t technically count as all one pool.
However, it is incredibly vast, in fact you could probably turn a Hawaiian Outrigger Canoe around in that pool without inconveniencing anyone.
By Day 2, said pool canoe had grown a tail of about five inflatables, helmed by sugar-crazed youngsters, being merrily towed around by its superior paddle power.
Inflatables at an all-inclusive are like bicycles in Beijing.
Never buy an extra one.
Our favourite family resort chain Dreams, (which I cannot recommend enough on so many levels), had the Rolls Royce of inflatables in the shape of a giant iceberg in one section of the pool, which was like a magnet for all the kids to climb up and hurl themselves off.
Friendships inevitably formed during the arduous climb and reckless descent, it really was a giant ice breaker in every sense.
We still reminisce about hearing the kids say:
“Let’s go to the iceberg and get some new friends.”
Immediately after another heartfelt goodbye to the old Mon-Weds crew.
If only real-life were that simple.
As each year slipped by, our childrens’ social skills had improved so much, that by the time they were about 12 and 14 we had to bring in a new rule…
“You must have at least one meal a day with us!”
Such was their busy roster of breakfast and lunch meet-ups, which all-inclusive resorts make so easy to facilitate, as no one is picking up the tab.
Rounds of Virgin Dirty Monkey’s were freely secured from the bar, to facilitate another sugar-fuelled ascent of the, more challenging, North face of the Iceberg.
That’s the kicker with parenting, if you do a good job and they grow up to be confident, self-sufficient individuals… they fuck off and do their own thing… leaving the two of you to fill in the gaps with yet more speculation about how much Burnt-Guy’s shoulders are really going to smart later on.
As a rule we always went to a different resort each year, except once.
The Dreams La Romana resort in the Dominican Republic, was just so outstanding, we went there twice, flouting our own rules.
La Romana is, in our humble opinion, the best region in the Dom Rep for a beach holiday. Don’t head for the North or Eastern Atlantic side, as the Ocean and weather are a lot more lively (which can lead to beach closures and kayak procurement), you want to head for the calmer Southern Caribbean Sea side.
La Romana is the place to be, with gorgeous turquoise waters, kissing lovely sandy beaches. Pure bliss.
I have to say, it was just as good second time around, which is why I suggested it as an option for this latest holiday for just myself and Mr.D.
The resort had availability on the right dates, and I’m sure would be equally enjoyable sans children.
However, Mr.D was having none of it, ever the adventurer, he wanted something new, so I extended the search and found the seemingly unbelievable Hilton La Romana, just along the coast, which rated even higher than the Dreams La Romana on Trip Advisor!
“Blimey! It must be fantastic!” I calculated, astounded at its 5.0 rating versus 4.7 for Dreams. No one gets a 5.0 surely!?! 😳 🎉
Then the dates proved tricky… and there’s nothing like scarce room availability teamed with tricky dates to really get me into a booking frenzy and secure those last two plane seats outta here!
Which is how it came to be that we were heading off on our first ‘Adults-Only All-Inclusive’ holiday to the Hilton La Romana, for what was sure to be a splendiferous beach holiday.
Both very excited to be going somewhere new.
We arrive mid afternoon and lost no time dumping our stuff in the room and heading to the beach, hoping to squeeze in a couple of sundowners at the pool bar.
As we walked across the pool divide to the beach (pictured below) we couldn’t help but notice how similar it was to our much loved Dreams resort.
Although it had been about 8 or 9 years since we’d been there, we kept noticing similarities in the layout.
Mr.D prides himself on his sense of direction, always knowing which way North is, whereas as you know I struggle to make it back to a restaurant table after a trip to the restroom.
So on our initial evening mosey around the resort, Mr.D took on the persona of what I can only describe as a clairvoyant tour guide.
His commentary was a heady mix of what we were looking at, and what he believed to be around the next corner…
“Here’s the boat where they chop the fresh fruit… next to the lunchtime beach grill… which I think leads up to the main pool… yes!… and there’s the kids zone… they even have the baseball nets! Unbelievably similar!
And if I’m not mistaken the French Bistro will appear on our right, followed by the Italian restaurant…
… and if we turn left here we should be looking at the Casino!”
Not unlike a walking bus tour, but without the history lessons thrown in.
I was confirming the familiar layout, with each corner we turned.
We even made a short video of the beach front tour so we could send it to the kids and squawk:
“Isn’t it similar! Don’t you remember all this?”
Which they did.
Assuring us that we weren’t going mad, or trapped in some kind of holiday time warp.
Our discussions continued to the point where we were wondering whether the Dreams Architect had just done a ‘Save As’ and sold some identical plans to Hilton to construct a replica!
By Day 2, I was floating the somewhat controversial suggestion that perhaps it had been Dreams who had copied Hilton, and not the other way around as we had first assumed?!
The plot was getting thicker.
By Day 3, we were enjoying a couple of Cuba Libres in the ‘On The Rocks’ bar one evening and we spotted ‘Est. 2019’ in small letters below the signage.
Huzzah! A clue!
Hilton must have copied Dreams, as we had visited Dreams La Romana way before 2019!
Determined to get to the bottom of this mysterious real estate Doppelgänger, we consulted with Perplexity AI:
“Which resort copied which, Dreams La Romana or Hilton La Romana, as they seem to be identical?”
The answer came back…
“The Hilton Group acquired the original Dreams La Romana resort in 2017.”
I have to say this news freaked us out momentarily, as despite absolutely, 100%, NOT BOOKING the Dreams La Romana resort, that we loved so much, we did appear to once again be standing in it!!!
Mind blown! 😳
After Hilton’s acquisition, it underwent a total refurb and had a number of additional buildings constructed, before they split it into the freshly labelled: ‘Family resort’ and ‘Adults-Only resort’.
Mystery solved.
I was quite incredulous that I’d inadvertently managed to book us into the exact resort (albeit new and improved) that we had decided not to revisit!
Zut alors!
And yes, ladies and gentlemen, imagine the full horror, if I hadn’t been persuaded out of booking what I thought was the original ‘Dreams La Romana’, we’d have ended up in their new resort instead!
A full 0.3 points down in the ratings and my family reputation as the Holiday Booking Supremo in absolute tatters! 😭
We appear to have dodged a bullet.
Let’s celebrate with another Cuba Libre! 🍹
In summary
If you are looking for the perfect tropical beach holiday for either just you adults, or en famille, the search is over. The ‘new’ Hilton La Romana has everything you’d want…
… and only a few things you probably don’t want… like booming techno music accompanying the surfboard yoga (why oh why?!)… but don’t get me started on that.
Happy holidays!
K8x
PS: We did, of course, play our usual game of Celebrity Star Spot, here are the results:
Winner = K8 with 4.5 pts
Celebs spotted: Melvin Hayes (1pt), Belinda Carlisle (0.5pt), David Walliams (0.5pt), David Baddiel (0.5pt), Gru (0.5pt) (yes, that’s Gru from Despicable Me, particularly funny in this instance as he was enthusiastically enjoying the silent disco), Lando Norris (0.5pt) and Donna Williams (1pt) (not the writer, the Policewoman in ‘Only Murders in the Building’).
Runner-up = Mr.D with 3pts
Celebs spotted: Matt Groening character (0.5pt) (ok, this one is a big vague, but if you’d seen her, at least half a point did need to be awarded, just too good), Mr Miyagi (0.5pt), Heston Blumenthal (1pt) and Billy Connolly (1pt).
Join in the comments below:
What’s your favourite place to holiday?
Have you ever accidentally ended up in the same place?
Do you play Celebrity Star Spot?
Thank you for being here, please ❤️ (below) if you enjoyed this piece, it really helps others find it.
This resort was on the Atlantic side where you get much bigger weather, leading to occasional beach closures, hence the super-sized pools I guess.
Our non-inclusive Dominican experience is one that would encourage everyone to only go all-inclusive. Insert an eroded beach overrun by aphids and a local 'grocer' that sold only wilty cabbages, bologna and corn flakes that were so hard it was like eating our own molars. In our jungly hut, our 'neighbours' had a sex-a-thon for the entire week and come nightfall, the main street became an unofficial contest of whose speaker blared the loudest. Samana had more speakers than a Rolling Stone concert. The furniture at our accommodation was designed for The Flintstones---I should have snuck into your all-inclusive and poached a "lilo" (*never heard this term before!).
I love talking and reading about both disaster and gorgeous travels---thanks for the trip, Kate! We haven't played Celebrity Star Spot---instead it's an ongoing round of "how does this motley crew of people know each other?"
Only 0.5 for Belinda Carlisle?