6.18.2011

Getting Ready for the Dominican Republic

Just 10 days away from the 3rd summer trip. This summer its the Dominican Republic which I think is going to be really easy, bordering on boring. I don't expect to be challenged physically, culturally, or emotionally. I am pretty sure I will be challenged financially though!

Still, I have gone through the usual angst in planning. Who knows, maybe it will be much better than I anticipate. Still feel like I am wimping out. Really, who goes to the DR? Practically everyone! When we went to Peru last year we made a point to go the areas least blogged, twittered, and forum posted about. And it worked out great. We rarely saw other travelers, and the ones we did see were way cooler than we could ever hope to be. The people going on a remote cave exploration adventure in the northern wilds, days away from civilization or the botanists who are ground zero for the study of all things plant like in the world. These were the people we came across last year.

Back to the angst. There's the up till 1 am scouring the web for bad reviews of the places I have decided to visit. When I have Google searched every area I can think of I can finally go to bed. I do this a few times a week. Lucky for me the places I have chosen remain free of mass tourism. Here's the place we are staying at in Las Galeras: http://www.laisletasamana.com/english.html. I've exchanged a few emails with the guy and he is going to charge us $50 a night. This seems like a pretty good deal to me, especially since it has a kitchen so we can save by cooking for ourselves.

Another place I have found is a nice little homestay in Moncion: http://www.casadelasanas.com/Home . More expensive, at $140 a night, it does include all of our meals. With luck they will charge me a little less for the kids, becasue there's no way they can eat $70 worth of food in a day!

Other than Las Galeras and Moncion it looks like we may stop in Constanza. No accommodation found yet, so we may have to wait till we get there. And still waiting to hear from a hotel I really want to stay at in the capital, Santo Domingo called Hotel La Residence http://www.hotelresidencia.com/Pages/rates.html . Can't get anyone to respond to my emails, no can I get a response to forum posts on Trip Advisor, dr1.com, or the Thorn Tree.

I think I may have planned as much as I can for this trip!

No comments:

Post a Comment