Holiday! Celebrate! Part 2.

Wow. I´ve had a wonderful 3 weeks, filled with trips and friends and a fair amount of food and beer. My second visitor, Meaghan, just left and so I spent the day doing laundry, tidying and reading on the beach. But more about Meaghan later. For now I´m going to try and pick up where I left off.

Paul and I went to Santiago from Jarabacoa, which is the next biggest city after Santo Domingo. It was not the nicest city, but it was exciting to be somewhere with a shopping area. There are so many things you can´t get in Las Terrenas, but Santiago has a load of Chinese stores with everything you could possibly want, and lots of things you don´t want at all. For a small town country girl like myself, this was amazing. But Santiago takes it a little too far with Dennys, a shop that occupies an entire block and is 4 floors of complete chaos.

Yep. This is a shop floor. (Photo: Paul Devlin)

(Photo: Paul Devlin)

Dominican mannequins have the dimensions of Kim Kardashian. (Photo: Paul Devlin)

We spent the night in a cheapo hotel and got up early to get the guagua to the 27 charcos, which are 27 connected pools. You go with a guide (and a helmet and lifejacket! How un-Dominican!) and walk, jump or slide from one to the next. They´re pretty beautiful and the water feels gorgeous, but it´s all a bit touristy. Groups are bussed in from resorts to do the charcos, and I know it´s stupid but I hate being lumped with all the other tourists! To a Dominican, I am an American tourist, no matter how Irish I am or how much Spanish I speak or how long I live and work here.

So we did the 27 Charcos  and hopped on a guagua to Las Terrenas, where I was excited to show Paul my town and my life. Unfortunately there were lots of other people excited to get to Las Terrenas. LOTS. The guagua was a 5 hour nightmare of crammed minivan with people hanging out the door and the driver constantly trying to pack more on. Of course we chatted to people and exchanged phone numbers and had a few laughs. What else can you do?

Dubh le daoine on the guagua (Photo: Paul Devlin)

The guagua was particularly bad because it was the Wednesday before Easter, where the world and its mother start to head to Las Terrenas. The town itself was mad - speakers set up on the beach, and advertising, stages and marquees everywhere. It was absolutely packed and everyone was drinking rum and dancing all day and night. It was kind of like a Carribean Funderland without the amusements. We had a ball. It was madness, and lots of fun.

Best place to get seafood - shacks on the beach right where the fishermen bring in the fish. (Photo: Paul Devlin)

Fruit truck (Photo: Paul Devlin)

Ambulance in field beside my house. Normal. (Photo: Paul Devlin)

Paul left on Easter Sunday, and had one more little Dominican adventure without me, He got on the bus to Santo Domingo, it was jam packed full of people so big boy Paul spent the journey practically sitting on top of a Dominican woman. So of course he made friends with her and her family, and went back to their house in Santo Domingo. He had a bit of time to kill before going to the airport, and spent that being shown around their barrio and eating home cooked food. He was a tired but very happy man when he left the DR.

I had Easter Sunday and Monday to do laundry and catch up on some sleep before I was off again. I go to a bar here called Lazy Dog, owned by an Englishman, Eddie and a Canadian woman. Bekka. When my house gets too mosquito-y but I have work to do, I just head over there with my laptop and hang out for a while with a coffee/cuba libre/plate of chicken wings. Eddie has another Lazy Dog in Cabarete which is a surf/kitesurf beach town on the North coast near Puerto Plata, and he invited me along to see it. My friend Nikki (who also works in Lazy Dog) came too. We had a house to ourselves, air conditioning, hot water, a double bed...I´ve never known such luxury. Eddie looked after us well and we had two days of hanging out there, enjoying all the delicious food Cabarete has to offer. Cabarete is like Las Terrenas, but sportier and more American. There´s a strip of beach bars and restaurants, and everyone speaks English. People do yoga, and there is a cafe with organic falafel burgers and the like. That kind of stuff has not reached Las Terrenas, as the foreign money seems to come from older French and Italian people, and they´re not so into wheatgrass shots and meditation.

A strange beach we stopped at on the way. It was very pretty but it absolutely stank due to a disgusting, stagnant pond. 

Cabarete beach

Nikki killing it at bottomless pancake breakfast. We had a competition, she won. Nikki - 15, Kate - 12.

I came back to Las Terrenas on the Thursday, and Meaghan arrived on the Saturday. Meaghan is one of my favourite people in the world, a beautiful lady that spreads joy wherever she goes! We met in Madrid, now she lives in Seattle. We hadn´t seen each other for over a year so it was truly wonderful to get to spend a week together and catch up. 

In one week Meaghan had a lot of Dominican experiences, starting with when she got off the bus. I was waiting at the spot I had told her to tell them to let her off at. A bus went by, but it was a small guagua and I didn´t think she´d be on that one, so I continued waiting. Eventually she turns up behind me. Turns out the driver decided to let her out at another stop, where they told her to get on a moto, with her suitcase and all. She did as she was told and they drove around asking people where Casa Paz, my house, was. Eventually she got there, and luckily my housemate was sitting in the garden. The next day we went to the arroyo, the natural swimming pool, in El Limón. We lay in the sun, played with a baby and had a few beers. After that we went to a barbeque in Nikki´s place with Nikki, her boyfriend and all her boyfriend´s friends. We danced bachata in her garden and drank rum. It was lots of fun.

Girls on guagua

Man, fully dressed, casually sitting in water.

Nikki and Betsy, her puppy.

The next morning I had to go back to work after two weeks off, which was pretty hard. But, I finish at 2:30 and spent every afternoon hanging out with Meaghan, so that was pretty sweet. Meaghan has a busy life in Seattle so was happy to chill out on the beach during the day and chill out with me in the afternoon.

Manipedi time!

 I got to take the Friday off as a personal day so we went to Cayo Levantado/Bacardi Island. We got up too late and so didn´t have as much time as we wanted there, but it was heavenly nonetheless. Last time I went was with school, so this was infinitely more relaxing than the last time.

Coco loco of course!

 

On the way home in the guagua I took this picture. Sand that looks that white against my skin has gotta be pure as snow.

On the Saturday we had a crazy night out in Las Terrenas with girlfriends where we danced loads and had one too many santo libres (rum + Sprite). The next day, Meaghan´s last, we dragged our hungover asses straight out to Playa Bonita, where we spent the day napping on sun loungers, drinking Coca Cola, eating pizza and reading. It was pure heaven. Best way to kill a hangover.

Bestie selfie

Holiday! Celebrate! Part 1.

This past week I have enjoyed lots of new experiences in this country, for two reasons.

1. I travelled around.
2. I travelled around with a man.

Travelling with a man changes everything. You feel invisible, in the most refreshing way possible. Nobody hisses at you on the street. Nobody tries to grab your attention. Nobody makes eyes at you. Nobody tells you they are falling in love with you. To these jerks, you don´t exist. And it´s very very nice.

My friend Paul came to visit (my first visit!) from Madrid and we travelled for 4 days and had 4 days in Las Terrenas. Paul is a big, tall, fair, rugby-playing Irishman, with a Madrid accent so thick that some people here couldn´t understand his jokes. He arrived into the capital, Santo Domingo, last Friday and I met him there. Santo Domingo is fine, but nothing impressive or beautiful. There are historical buildings there that illustrate colonialism´s story on the island, but mostly it is loud and dirty and busy. For the foreigners here, Santo Domingo is important - sometimes you just need to go to a mall or an Ikea and get stuff done (or in my case, drink a dark beer). We, however, had no need for malls or Ikeas, so we hopped on a bus the next day to Jarabacoa.

Extremely excited to find a beer that is not Presidente.

Jarabacoa is in the centre of the country, and is a place where people go when they want to hike, be in a cooler climate and get away from the city buzz of Santiago and Santo Domingo. After spending 3 days there, I left with the impression that it was a beautiful countryside filled with the friendliest people and the cheapest, simplest food. We ate rice and beans and roast chicken and aubergine and tayota for a couple of euros each, and drank Presidente beer with everything. Tayota is apparently called chayote in English, and belongs in the gourd family. 

Tayota

We ate all of it. (Photo: Paul Devlin)

We stayed one night in Rancho Ruiseñor, where we played with the owner´s 5 year old daughter and their many dogs. We met an American couple and went out dancing with them, which was lots of fun. We saw a live group of bachateros, a 10 piece band playing bachata and merengue and did lots of dancing.

Me doing some sidewalk bachata. (Photo: Paul Devlin)

With bleary eyes the next day we went on a (possibly ill-advised after drinking) adventure – paragliding. I´m not someone who particularly likes running off mountain tops but Paul is, so he convinced me. And I ain´t no chicken.

Flying Tony came highly recommended with all the guide books, which reassured me. They drove us up to the top of a mountain, hooked a parachute and an instructor onto us and told us to run off the mountain. I did not like that idea. And if your friends jump off a mountain are you going to, too? Apparently, yes.

Luckily I didn´t have to really feel the sensation of running off a mountain – I took one step and the parachute filled and I couldn’t go forward anymore and then WHOOOSH I was in the air clambering to sit back in the little basket-like seat they have. Paul reckons he got a good 10 steps down the mountain face before he took off – the disadvantage of being a big rugby player becomes apparent in this sport. I flew so high – right up over the mountain peak I had just run off and into the clouds. In the clouds it was white and colder and I could see nothing but white, it was crazy. For the rest of the flight my instructor gently navigated us over the green, mountainous farmland of Jarabacoa. It really is quite a peaceful experience, unless you want to puke the whole time as I did. My instructor said that was really common and suggested he do a spin, tilting my little basket seat to one side so I could puke over the edge on not on us. Eh, no. No way, Jose.  So when I saw Paul landing (gravity didn´t permit Paul to fly so high) I said I was done and could land. I managed to keep all the puke in and did not look like the scaredy cat that I am. Hurrah.

Paul looking slick.

Me and Marcos, the man responsable for my life.

El Salto de Jimenoa as seen from above (and my shoe). The waterfall is in the opening scene of Jurassic Park,

Jarabacoa countryside from the air.

That night we stayed in Jarabacoa Mountain Hostel, run by a lovely couple called Molly and Rodolfo. Molly came to the DR from the USA many years ago as a kid, because her mother was a Jehovah´s Witness missionary. There she met Rodolfo, and now runs the hostel with him, while they build a small hotel and produce bouncing babies. They are the picture of glowy happiness.

The next day, a local guide called David brought us to a waterfall that people scale up and jump off. Paul, being a big brave man, did it. I watched and thought about whether or not I could drag his body back down to the road.

Paul and David 

Thankfully, Paul and David survived, and I got a awesome video of Paul jumping, so he never has to do it again.

This is how pineapples grow. Mad.

 Our final night in Jarabacoa was spent in Sonido del Yaque, which is an ecotourism project run by a women´s cooperative there. To get there, we crammed in the back of a guagua with all our bags until eventually they dropped us off at the side of the road and pointed downwards to our destination.

"Sure it´s all an experience" (Photo: Paul Devlin)

We dragged our bags down a gazillion steps until we arrived at the cabañas.  There are several cabins split into two rooms, each room with a bathroom, shower (HOT WATER!!!), a bunk bed and a double bed. You can swim in the river, go hiking, or just chill out and read. 

These two photos show where some of the community live, the little yellow building is their school.

Claribel´s house, where we ate a delicious dinner and breakfast.

Claribel´s kitchen (the other side of the house, where they sleep, is properly sealed).

Our cabin, with Claribel´s mom and Antonio.

Antonio, Paul, Claribel´s mom and Claribel in the kitchen.

Inmerlin, Claribel´s 5 year old daughter. A bright, sweet little girl.

After a couple of months of observing the back foot that women in this country start on from birth, and the inequalities doled out until death, it was wonderful to see an example of an autonomous women´s cooperative that collaborates with the men in the community. They are poor, but they have a lot, as the grandmother said. They all boasted of how intelligent Inmerlin was and they were so open and welcoming to us. Our one night there was full of conversations and eating together and being outside and healthy happiness. And for the cabin, 2 dinners and 2 breakfasts it cost less than €20 total. I will definitely go back.

From Jarabacoa, we continued on. But that is for another post. Because I have a pool party to get to. It´s a hard life.