Travelling in the Time of Covid - Part II

(I lost my camera whilst on tour there, so the pictures for this report are all from my phone, and I didn't get everything.)

We were at the Catalonia Bavaro. There are signs everywhere explaining how to clean and distance. You are supposed to wear masks when you're not at your table in restaurants. Some facilities are not available due to limited capacity.

We upgraded to Privileged, so we have a more exclusive beach, with its own bar (premium spirits are available to us here), and room that is close to the beach, the pool, and the pizza stand. The upgrade cost us less than $100 CDN each, so infinitely worth it. The service at the beach is mind-blowing. 

The room itself was pretty good. Two queen beds with king-size pillows, two sinks in the bathroom across from each other, and two showers at opposite ends of the shower stall, suitable for social-distance shower with a buddy (thankfully only one toilet, though), a living area with chairs, a bench, and a tv clearly visible from the beds. There was also a closet with an umbrella, safe, and the standard amenities. The balcony view we had was of the buildings opposite but we hadn't paid for a view, so that was fine. The only thing we found odd there was that there was a long unfurnished section along the room with everything crammed into a square in front of the sliding glass doors. The everything was a hammock, set high and unevenly on the walls between the door,  and the patio set.

I wasn't thrilled about the buffet (the food is never going to be that good, you know?) but the pizza stand was open Monday to Thursday from 10:30 am to 5:00pm, so there was a safe option for brunch those days. There is also a snack bar option, but it is also a buffet, and you can't take the food away. It's just hamburgers, hotdogs, tortilla chips, and fries anyway -- and you have to wear shoes, and sit at a table in the dining area: no takeout.

I'll cover the a la carte restaurants in another post; but while I'm talking about the resort, I definitely want to mention the most important parts of the resort: the water and the bars.

The Pure bar is the Privileged beach bar, and the bartenders and servers there are phenomenal (special notice to Johanen and Miguel). They had premium spirits for us, so that was nice. They do serve the sunbeds and loungers in the exclusive area as well, so we were able to stay well-hydrated. It should be mentioned that there is an even more exclusive area, with access to top shelf booze we couldn't get. I am not sure how you get to those things, but I didn't want to ask for fear the answer would involve a high pressure timeshare pitch.

There was also plenty of space and loungers at the free form pool, which had a nice bar, lively music, and a good water temperature. Due to the plague, the swim up bar was closed, but we managed anyway. 

Next: the Restaurants