About us: who runs these boat trips in Samaná

Excursiones Samaná is a local operator based in Santa Bárbara de Samaná. We organise and run the boat trips on the bay ourselves: we are not a platform or a middleman, and the person who answers you on WhatsApp is the same one who coordinates your trip.

Who we are

We are the same local team behind Four Wheels Samaná, the peninsula’s ATV rental, and the SamanaOnline travel guide. This site is the boat-trip side of it: Cayo Levantado, Los Haitises National Park, Playa Frontón, El Limón Waterfall and, in season, the humpback whales of the bay.

Our Google listing is under the name Excursiones Samaná, in Santa Bárbara de Samaná, with the same WhatsApp number you see on this page. If you want to check that we exist before writing to us, that is the place: our Google listing.

What you can check before writing to us

You are about to send money to a business in another country over WhatsApp. Wanting to know who is behind it is normal. This is what you can verify on your own, without asking us:

• The Google listing. It is under the name Excursiones Samaná, in Santa Bárbara de Samaná, with this same number. It has no reviews yet: we would rather the first one be written by someone who went out with us than fill it in ourselves.
• The same number in three places. +1 829 887 5800 is the number you will see on this site, on Four Wheels Samaná and on SamanaOnline. Same team, same phone.
• Instagram. @excursionesensamana.
• The photos on this site are not ours yet. They come from photographers who published them under a free licence, and each one carries its credit underneath. Photos of our own trips are on the way; when we upload them you will notice because the credit disappears. We would rather say so than pass off a photo as ours when it is not.

Where we depart from

From the Santa Bárbara de Samaná pier. It is the boarding point for the Cayo Levantado and Los Haitises trips and for whale watching. The Playa Frontón trip goes by sea from the east of the peninsula, and El Limón Waterfall is reached on horseback or on foot from El Limón; each page explains its own.

If you are coming from Punta Cana, we arrange the transfer to the pier and the boat trip; write to us and we will work out the day with you.

How we work

• Every departure is arranged around the date and the number of people. That is why prices are not published: they depend on the package and the group, and we give them to you on WhatsApp together with availability.
• Direct booking. You talk to us, not to a booking centre. No third-party commissions in between.
• What the page says is what there is. If a beach has no facilities, we say so. If you cannot swim with the whales, we say so. We would rather you arrive knowing than get a surprise.

Who regulates what we do

Whale watching in Samaná Bay is not a free-for-all. The bay is part of the Bancos de La Plata y La Navidad Marine Mammal Sanctuary, and the activity is regulated by the Dominican Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, which each season issues the environmental authorisations for the boats allowed to go out and watch; for the 2026 season it announced 46. We go out with the corresponding authorisation and under the sanctuary rules: at most three boats with the same group, 30 minutes with the whales and 20 with a mother and calf, engines never switched off next to them, and no swimming with them. The numbers are explained on the whale watching page.

How to book

Message us on WhatsApp with your date and how many people are coming. We reply with availability, price and package options, and we agree on the meeting point and time. In whale season it pays to write ahead.

Ask for price and availability

Where to find us

• WhatsApp: +1 829 887 5800
• Instagram: @excursionesensamana
• Google: Excursiones Samaná listing
• Santa Bárbara de Samaná, Dominican Republic

All the trips we run are on the home page. If you have a question no page answers, write to us: it is faster than searching.