Casa De Campo Rating: 4.0 Pearls

La Romana, Dominican Republic

The beach scene

Golfing is the draw here. Teeth of the Dog, the daringly named on-site golf course, is easily one of the best courses in the Caribbean, alongside the White Witch course at the Ritz-Carlton in Jamaica. Golf Magazine even named Teeth of the Dog the 43rd best course in the world. On the walkway adjacent to the course, I spotted the maintenance guys pruning the foliage and picking up dead leaves by hand. It’s that kind of place.

Think big space and not many people. Unlike most Dominican resorts, no one’s piled on top of one another here. With more than 11 square miles of property, there’s room to roam, even on a sunny day at Minitas Beach, where guests sip sparkling water with lime and watch their children play with plastic shovels and buckets by the calm oceanfront.

There are a lot of white-collared shirts and slacks at this massive resort co-owned by the Fanjul brothers; they also run Flo-Sun, a huge sugar and real estate empire that owns, among other companies, Domino Sugar.

Frequented mostly by Americans and Spaniards, some of whom own private villas on the property, most guests come for the renowned golf courses; in addition to Teeth of the Dog, there's also Dye Four and The Links. It's reported that Sammy Sosa, Julio Iglesias, and many business tycoons own homes at Casa de Campo.

Many staff members have worked at Casa de Campo for more than 20 years -- longer than most Dominican resorts have even existed. Everyone is a seasoned, hospitality veteran. Incidentally, everyone speaks perfect English.

Service is prompt and especially professional. A porter, clad in a red uniform with a mandarin collar, opened the door to my taxi as soon as I arrived. Housekeepers, all wearing prim green-gingham uniforms, routinely clean every room by 11 a.m. They even refold the ends of the toilet paper into a triangle and replace all the towels and toiletries. The nightly turn-down service is equally attentive, and they always asked me if I needed extra towels or ice. My room-service order (a Cuban sandwich) arrived in 15 minutes, even though it says on the menu that it could take up to 45 minutes. Housekeeping then picked up the tray within 45 minutes.

Complaining to management can go a long way. I spoke to a couple from Westchester County, N.Y., who said the resort called a month before their visit to inform them that they wouldn't be able to play at the Teeth of the Dog or Dye Four golf courses because of a private tournament. When they complained, the golf director squeezed them in for some special tee times and gave them nine free holes one day and 18 free holes another day, and upgraded them from a two-bedroom villa to a three.

At The Beach Club by Le Cirque, I spotted the manager taking inconspicuous laps around the restaurant to ensure everyone's water glass was filled, candles lit, and food delivered. When he noticed that one person's soup at the table next to mine hadn't been delivered with everyone else's appetizers, he offered free Champagne and dessert to the entire table.

View on a Larger Map

Casa de Campo contains 7,000 immaculately manicured acres. Though technically in La Romana, which has some of the D.R.’s best beaches, the resort feels like its own separate city (it even has its own signs on the highway).

That said, you’ll need to either rent a bike ($23 a day) or use your golf cart liberally (included with the room rate) to get around the property. The main area with the pools, spa, and a few bars and restaurants is manageable by foot, but the beach is a 10-minute drive (by golf cart). It takes between 15 and 20 minutes to get to the marina, and that's putting the pedal to the metal. The tennis courts are also far away.

The resort is about an hour from Santo Domingo International Airport and 70 minutes from Punta Cana. The hotel uses a car service through Tropical Tours, which charges $140 one-way from Santo Domingo and $180 from Punta Cana, but you can negotiate a cheaper rate with a cab service at either airport. The real jet-setters fly in via helicopter to Casa's private heliport, or sail their yachts to the marinas.

Lounge chairs at the beach

Private to the resort, Minitas Beach is immaculate -- there was not a single piece of garbage to be found anywhere. The sand is soft, and a man-made reef several hundred feet out keeps the water especially calm and safe for young children. Even better, lifeguards are on duty from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily.

The Beach Club by Le Cirque, the southern outpost of the renowned French restaurant based in New York, Le Cirque, is a great place to dine for lunch, and an even better place to have dinner. Guests can grab a table on the patio and eat fresh sea bass under the stars.

Rates for snorkeling gear, windsurfing equipment, Sunfish sailboats, paddle boats, and sun floats start at $9 per day. Check the hotel’s Web site for complete listings.

The resort has set up a small dock and restaurant at Catalina, a small island inside Parque Nacional del Este, just 30 minutes offshore from Casa de Campo by boat. Though it can be crowded because of local tours and cruise ships anchored offshore, it's beautiful. The island has some of the southern coast's best coral reef and scuba diving.

High, vaulted ceilings, separate entrances from the main room, views of the garden and golf course, marble-topped vanities in the bathrooms, and sitting areas -- the 550-square-foot luxury rooms (I had #306) feel more like small, one-bedroom apartments than hotel rooms.

The room's biggest fault is the lack of soundproofing between the rooms. I could hear my neighbor leave in the morning and return in the evening, as well as when housekeeping knocked on his door.

In my luxury king, the view was somewhat shaded by trees. This means that there was natural light midday, but the room was rather dark in the mornings and evenings. It was hardly a sunny Caribbean feel.

A significant chunk of Casa de Campo’s property consists of privately owned homes and villas that guests can also rent. Villas range from two to seven bedrooms (and sometimes more), and include fully equipped kitchens and often pools, marble bathrooms, children’s playgrounds, or whatever specific amenity guests may request. Some are oceanfront, others have golf and garden views, and one of the add-on packages even includes a staff of butlers and cooks. Prices vary greatly among villas, both size-wise and seasonally, but they usually start at about $350 per night in the off-season and go up steeply from there.

All rooms include: • King-size bed with a pillow-top mattress and Egyptian cotton sheets • LED flat screen TV with cable • Blu-ray player • Alarm clock with docks for iPods and iPhones • High-speed, wireless internet • Walk-in closet with two tiers of hanging racks and three waffled bathrobes made by Boca Terry (two for adults and one kid-size) • Mini bar with espresso/coffee machine

Clay tennis courts

The map of Casa de Campo and all of its amenities practically takes up an entire windshield. But amidst the 7,000-acre property, there are only two small pools: a rectangular lap pool and a more active pool with a waterfall and swim-up bar. There's also a small, shallow kids' pool.

The gym, which was renovated in 2009, includes treadmills, stationary bicycles, and free weights. Need to work on your golf game? There is a section in the gym just for improving your swing. There are also 3.1 miles of trail loops around the premises for joggers.

At the marina, overlooking the yachts, there are more than 30 shops, including high-end Danish audio manufacturer Bang & Olufsen, French swimwear boutique Vilebrequin, and sailing clothier Murphy & Nye. The resort offers chartered fishing trips on the Chavon River, which is known for its snook, as well as deep-sea fishing in the Caribbean Sea. Chartered trips are available out of the marina on boats ranging from 22- to 60-feet for both half and full days. Common fish caught in the sea include wahoo, kingfish, marlin, barracuda, and dolphin (aka mahi mahi).

The La Terraza tennis center has 13 Har-Tru courts, all in excellent condition, and 10 of them are lit in the evenings. Lessons run $76 an hour, hitters are $12 an hour, and ball boys are $3 per hour.

The equestrian center offers guided trail rides, as well as lessons in jumping, riding, and polo, which is played November through March. The resort also hosts domestic and international polo tournaments.

Casa’s shooting center (trap and skeet) is one of the most extensive private shooting facilities in the world. It has 250 stations on 245 acres and a 100-foot tower that projects clays up to 45 yards into the air.

There's a small staffed business center in the central area with six PCs and a printer. A 15-minute session is $3.46 (including tax). The main areas of the property are Wi-Fi enabled, but I found access to be spotty. A 24-hour pass costs $15.

The golf course

In 2008, Travel & Leisure Golf ranked Casa de Campo the top golf resort in the Caribbean. The resort's signature course, Teeth of the Dog, which was redesigned in 2006, is ranked No. 43 on Golf Magazine's top 100 courses in the world.

There are three courses on the property, including Teeth of the Dog (6,888 yards, par 72), Dye Four (7,770 yards, par 72), and The Links (6,461 yards, par 71), all of which were designed by World Golf Hall of Famer Pete Dye. Each course has 40 groundskeepers assigned to it, which doesn't come as a surprise -- I couldn't find a blade of grass out of place.

Caddies are $25 per day, and, though not required, several guests said they're extremely helpful since the holes aren't especially well-marked.

In most circles, the Casa’s greens are as good as they get, but there's plenty of competition in the D.R. Check out this Travel+Leisure Golf article.

The Cygalle Healing Spa

Opened in 2007, the Cygalle Healing Spa was voted one of the 10 Best Spas in North America by Vanity Fair. The spa uses 100-percent organic, live-ingredient formulas that are mixed daily at the spa's own pharmacy.

Highlights include the 3D hot stone massage, Swedish massage, reflexology, chakra balance aromatherapy, and a water ritual suite that includes a sauna, steam bath, and hot and cold water plunges. A 50-minute massage is $90, a 100-minute mermaid mint sea wrap is $180, and combination packages start at $245.

The monumental Altos de Chavon lies on the northeast corner of the property. Commissioned by Italian cinematographer Roberto Coppa and built in 1978, this remarkable structure doubles as a working artist's village (there's an art gallery, an archaeology museum, and an art school affiliated with Parsons School of Design in New York) and as an enclave of restaurants (including La Piazzetta). Though it's kitschy and feels somewhat out of place in the tropics, the stonework is beautiful and the views of the Chavon River are magnificent.

Frank Sinatra, Julio Iglesias, and Gloria Estefan have all performed at the amphitheater, and Alicia Keys filmed Karma, her music video with the pink piano, on the stage. Enrique Iglesias performed a week after I left, and Andrea Bocelli three weeks later.

The "Family Fun Zone"

While Mom and Dad play golf or sun on Minitas Beach, the kids are well-taken care of at the kids' clubs. (Kids age 1 or older are welcome.) All counselors are trained in first aid and CPR, and the staff-to-child ratio for kids under 3 years of age is 1 to 3. CPR-trained nannies are available day and night. Rates are $12 per hour, or $77 for eight hours.

Some of the activities for toddlers include arts and crafts, face painting, puppet shows, musical games, or just hanging out on the playground.

Kids ages 4 to 7 have organized treasure hunts, pony grooming, or balloon-animal lessons.

Tweens (kids 8 to 12) can kayak, ride horses, play tennis, or get whipped around on banana boats. Teens do much of the same, plus they have a full-size billiard table, air hockey, movies, and more.

If kids are averse to the clubs, there's tons of stuff for families to do together. Outside the beach, families can ride horses, fish in the Chavon River, or bike around the property.

All restaurants have children's menus and high chairs.

My room was well-cleaned, but some of the bathroom grout was yellowing from natural age.

Dessert

There are more than 20 restaurants on the property, and they're all some of the best in the D.R. However, the excellent quality comes at a very sizeable price tag. Few entrees are less than $25. And although the food is very fresh, some of the portions can be stingy.

There are six options for dinner. The most noteworthy two are The Beach Club by Le Cirque, an award-winning French restaurant with a romantic, candlelit atmosphere right on the beach, and La Piazzetta, which serves up delicious homemade pasta in Altos de Chavon, a section of Casa's property that's open to the public and is an exact replica of a 16th-century European village.

At Le Cirque, I ordered the specialty, sea bass with crispy potatoes on a bed of leeks. The same entrée is famed at all four Le Cirque locations (New York, Las Vegas, Paris, and Casa de Campo). Still, for $30, the dish was a bit overcooked and a little bland.

At La Piazzetta, I started with a green salad that came with three grape tomatoes and three shavings of Parmesan -- all for an outrageous $15. However, the ravioli stuffed with ricotta and spinach and topped with basil butter ($18) was delicious. For dessert, I had a tasty, warm chocolate torte with vanilla ice cream ($9). A live band with a guitar and an accordion arrived just as I was leaving, playing several recognizable tunes from The Sound of Music.

The Pot Bunker Sports Bar, which has seven sports-tuned TVs and is open for both lunch and dinner, is a good place to catch a midday snack. My chicken quesadilla was served with fresh pico de gallo and fresh guacamole.

The only restaurant for breakfast is Lago Grill, which overlooks the golf greens. The buffet costs $22 (plus an extra $3 if you want a bottle of water). Omelets are cooked perfectly, and there’s a wide assortment of homemade breads and pastries like brioche, chocolate croissants, and petite Danishes. The fruit is sweet and fresh and displayed in small quantities on clean, white plates. The orange juice comes freshly squeezed, and there’s also someone making fresh juice and smoothies (of your choice) every morning.

Other notable restaurants: the Asian-themed Chinois at the marina, open for lunch and dinner; Tropicana, which serves a mix of European, Asian, and American cuisine; and La Casita Marina, which specializes in seafood and overlooks the yachts docked at the marina.

All restaurants have children's menus and high chairs.