A Rather Engaging Vacation — Unexpectedly in the Dominican Republic

My plan to propose to my girlfriend in Cancun was completely derailed, will I have better luck in the Dominican Republic?

Well, now what?

As my girlfriend and I stood in the Santo Domingo airport arrivals area — incidentally, the exact place we’d first met a year ago — with our arms around each other after a mad dash all across the Caribbean, it gradually occurred to me that we couldn’t spend all week doing just that, at least not in the airport arrivals area. I thought too about immediately getting down on one knee and whipping out the engagement ring buried deep in my backpack, but surely I could do better than an airport concourse. But we had no plans, outside those airport doors was a foreign country we hadn’t expected to be in until a few hours previously, and nearly all the intervening time had been spent in flight.

Normally I plan a vacation at my leisure on my computer with 40 tabs open to obsessively compare options, or I’ve been working there already and carefully gathered the best tips from locals. We had been here the previous year but didn’t want to repeat the same vacation. On my phone, I googled the other major tourist hotspot in the DR (Dominican Republic) that we hadn’t gotten to, Punta Cana, but all that came up was a whole bunch of exactly identical-looking resort hotels, which didn’t appeal to me much.

But I did have a contact in DR from a project I hadn’t ended up doing there. I messaged him and asked for tips, he recommended the Samaná Peninsula on the island’s north. I googled, it looked gorgeous, almost immediately I found a delightful looking hotel consisting of some hacienda-style buildings and stylized hut-shaped casitas right on the beach. After a quick consultation with Cristina, we booked one of the casitas.

To get there we’d catch a taxi ($25) to the bus station and ride a bus up to the Samaná Peninsula for $16. Our taxi driver, Juan, an honest fatherly figure (indeed he mentioned later he has children our age) asked where we were going and said he’d drive us all the way to our hotel for $150. Nothing scammy about it, he didn’t try to tell us the $16 bus didn’t exist or anything, just that he could get us there faster and more directly. But what pursuaded me actually was that a road trip at eye-level through the country sounded more interesting than being packed like eggs in an egg-carton in a bus and cruising through 10 feet up. So we took him up on it.

As it happens we got quite exactly what we bargained for when Juan got lost and took us on a large accidental detour. He had gotten off the big new main highway, apparently to avoid the “expensive tolls” of a few dollars, and soon we were driving at a third of our former speed dodging around potholes on a decrepit road, among houses of cinderblock and corrugated metal. Soon we passed through a checkpoint manned by armed soldiers (outside the town of Sabana Grande de Boyá), and it was evident the soldier thought taking this route to avoid tolls seemed pretty ill-advised.

We were all a bit nervous about this rural town that apparently needed to be surrounded by the military (there was a checkpoint on the far side too). Cristina’s mother had been carjacked in Venezuela so Cristina was acutely aware of this danger in unstable areas, and she was pretty sure our driver, though a big guy and though he had tried to sound confident was pretty nervous too. It was interesting to see the interior — while what we’d seen previously on the coast looked relatively prosperous, the level of poverty and ill-maintained barely-built infrastructure in the interior reminded me a lot of what I’ve seen in parts of the “third world” Africa. Indeed I struggled to put my finger on in what way I’d be able to distinguish this from somewhere in Africa if I’d just appeared here with no context (everyone has longer hair).

Finally, we arrived at our hotel just after sunset. It’s not the kind of place with a 24-hour reception desk but the security guard called the receptionist, showed us to our accommodation and then volunteered to drive to a nearby town to get us dinner (very good fried chicken, and beer).

As he was showing us to our accommodation, a sort of two-story bungalow in the stylized form of a giant hut (complete with a living room, kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom on the second level), it was so beautifully appointed that I literally broke into a sweat — I remembered agreeing to pay $300 for accommodation, which I thought was total for four days but this looked like it might be $300 a night! As he was showing us around I desperately whipped out my phone to review the transaction … and no, this was the very accommodation I had booked for $85 a night, $300 was indeed the total. I couldn’t believe it.

Day 2: By the morning’s light we marveled at the beautiful grounds of the hotel. We couldn’t believe how nice it was! In front of the colonial-style main building, there was a pool and a well-tended lawn with palm trees and chairs, and just beyond that the ocean waves gently crashed. From the beach out in front of the hotel the white sand stretched in either direction with hardly anything other than palm trees to besmirch the view. We sat in the breakfast patio and enjoyed a delicious breakfast of fresh fruit and made-to-order omelette, then we had a powwow with Gail the receptionist about activities. We could ride horses to a waterfall and go on a snorkeling excursion to some nearby islands (in the end we were unable to coordinate with either of two local diving companies in the short time we had). For both we should start earlier in the morning so for this day we would just be bumming around the hotel grounds … which was in no way suffering!

We swam in the ocean, walked on the beach, swam in the pool, lounged by the pool, and had a delicious lunch (churrasco — grilled beef) and margaritas — the owners (a matriarchal woman and her husband, Gail the receptionist seemed to be their daughter) appeared to be celebrating a birthday in the restaurant at the time and poured champagne for all present, how authentically hospitable! As there were only one or two other couples in the hotel it really felt like we had the place to ourselves and were being personally waited on by some eight staff.

Day 3: At a comfortable time in the morning as we finished another delicious breakfast, the man from the horse riding excursion came to pick us up. We proceeded about a half hour along the coast along a pleasant winding road to the small town of Barrio Las Flores. The light traffic was mostly motorcycles and motorscooters, the houses were small but cute, gaily painted and overhung with lush vegetation.

I quite rather like horseback riding but as a non-horse-owner one is pretty much limited to sad little trail rides where the horse just proceeds down a course known so well to it it could go with its eyes closed. This was a classic example of that and no amount of applying my heels would make the horse go an iota faster, nor would pulling back the reins slow it, nor pulling to the left or right would make it consider for a moment altering its route.

Notwithstanding the stubbornness of the horses, it was a beautiful trek down into the wild forest of some kind of national park. We descended down to where a cool clear river flowed in lazy slow curves through its own gorge in the forest, and proceeded along the stony river for a bit before climbing out and up a steep path among the trees, occasionally having to make way for people coming down with horses laden with baskets full of coconuts.

Finally, we came to an overlook with some rough corrals for horses and a simple open sided cafe overlooking the waterfall. We stopped here a few minutes for our guide to rest, and changed into our swimming gear. Then down the path on foot!

The El Limón waterfall plunges 52 meters (170 feet) into a deep pool of refreshingly brisk water, there were many pasty European tourists in speedoes present (as with last year I saw no evidence of other Americans) but it wasn’t overly crowded and we enjoyed swimming for an hour or so. Back at the overlooking cafe, we had pina coladas out of actual pineapples, which always makes me feel like I’m really on vacation for sure.

At this point, it felt like we’d done a whole day’s worth of stuff already, but it was only early afternoon! We proceeded to go swimming in the ocean and walking along the beach. Traversing over more than a mile of beach we passed a mere handful of people, and one man on horseback.

After watching the sunset from out amongst the waves in the warm sea, we got cleaned up and changed and came back out for dinner. The four kitchen staff had been happy to idle about chatting amongst themselves until we arrived at which point they whipped up a delicious dinner of grilled prawns. I continued to feel amazed that this was rated as a 3-star hotel, it felt more like 5-star service!

Day 4: Unfortunately we had to return to Santo Domingo this day. And we needed a hotel there for the night. Here I came up with an interesting solution — after last year I had written a travel article on the Dominican Republic which I submitted to the Los Angeles Times. They had rejected it by 9:02am the next morning, but for the article’s requirements I had to suggest hotels in Santo Domingo, which I had duly researched to the best of my abilities at that time. So I dug up the article, contacted the hotel I had recommended, and we were off to check it out!

This hotel had an extremely chic and trendy looking lobby and atrium, a rather disappointing breakfast (omelets cost extra?!), unimpressive room (possibly just overshadowed completely by the super nice atrium, building your hopes up before you arrive in a very mundane little room), but it totally redeemed itself with a rooftop jacuzzi! The receptionist emphasized so strongly that we could book it for privacy (“you and your wife will want privacy of course ::creepy knowing smile::”) that, though we did book it, we were possessed of a fear that other people had been making el sexo in it. But we were also allowed to order drinks and food up to it so we ended our vacation in a rooftop jacuzzi with a view to the illuminated oldest cathedral in the Americas not far off, eating pizza and drinking mojitos!

As Cristina was sending some pictures to her friends I heard her mumble to herself “best vacation ever!” and I smiled remembering what a disaster it had begun as.

But wait, what about the engagement? Well for purposes of not overshadowing the rest I’ve been holding out on you till now. The first night, after we’d checked into our accommodation we went down to the beach. “Es profundo” (it’s deep / it’s profound) she said softly as we beheld the waves crashing in the starlight. There on the soft sand, under the infinite stars and limitless ocean, I went down on one knee and asked her to marry me. Her eyes were luminous, her smile brighter than the moon. “Siiiiiiiiiiiii”

Epilogue:

We were going to get married the following April (2020) at that same hotel we’d liked so much on the Samaná Peninsula. Unfortunately, two months later the Dominican Republic imposed strict visa requirements on Venezuelans that would have made it impractical. So we changed the plan to the Bahamas, still in April 2020, and commenced making plans.

April 2020. Let that date sink in a moment.

So Covid happened, torpedoing our plans, and we were unable to travel for three years. Then she was busy finishing her residency as an anesthesiologist, cruelly though as a doctor she was on the Covid front lines, a lot of the training she’d have normally undergone in non-Covid areas had been pushed back so she couldn’t take any time off even once I could travel again (and I can’t travel to Venezuela, see last post), but finally, August 18th of this year (2023), which should be less than a week after this posts, we will meet again in Colombia after a separation of 3 years, 11 months, 12 days, 8 hours, and 25 minutes (but who’s counting 😉 )