Travel Adventures – Dominican Republic
Travel Expectations
Travel Adventures – Dominican Republic. This travel experience was great, and it was much better than I anticipated. This is because shortly before my trip, a friend shared highlights about her travel to the Dominican Republic. The stories she related were quite different than the ones my family and I are able to tell following our trip. Hers were more on the negative side.
I am not sure if it was the a different part of the island, or just the weather that made the difference. One of the things she mentioned was there being rough, high tides, and not being able to enjoy walks along the beach.
Actual Travel Experience
Visit Instagram Reels & Highlights to see more images of the parts of the Dominican Republic we visited. In this video above I tried to capture a few images of art and culture. I thought of adding some of the additional videos which show a pretty good summary of what we did while there. However, they would slow down this page way too much, and so I didn’t.
We enjoyed great weather, fun adventures, delicious food, nice people, & beautiful landscapes. The only negative I would have to say was the driving conditions. The drivers were extremely aggressive, both the automobile and motorcyle drivers. Some of the roads were in good conditions, but there were areas where the roads were not that great. The drivers, however, were more problematic than the roads. You’ll find a short video of this on the app mentioned above as well.
The main areas we visited were Puerto Plata and Las Terrenas. We stayed in two different resort/hotels and we made stops at a couple of other municipalities as we traveled from one location to the other.
The best part of the trip besides the favorable weather, was that it felt like we had the beach all to ourselves. Most of the time we were the only ones on the beach and in the ocean or the pool. Similarly, we didn’t encounter crowds during other excursions. It turns out that we travelled during what is considered low season. This means that we didn’t have to deal with any of the headaches of overly crowded tourist attractions.
Another great attraction for me were the palm trees by the water. We have palm trees in semi-tropical South Texas, but you can’t find any on the beach. Also, many of the tropical plants that I encountered I recognized because they also grow in south Texas.
I am glad that our experience was totally the opposite of what my friend related. The water couldn’t have been calmer. Obviously, after her comments I didn’t know what to expect, but the water turned out to be amazingly relaxing and beautiful.
Travel Suggestions
I would travel again during the low travel season of the year to visit other parts of the island.
If you travel to the Dominican Republic and plan to be the driver, be cautious and don’t bypass the rental auto insurance policy. Even animals in the wild pose a risk of causing accidents, especially in narrow winding roads.
I don’t know about the capital city or other inland communities, but the coastal areas we visited felt very safe. I actually asked someone about the crime rate, and he explained that because tourism is extremely important to their livelihoods, there are extensive efforts on the part of the community as well as law enforcement to deter crime. He acknowledge that in bigger cities they did have more problems with crime.
Another consideration that I would suggest is to have plenty of cash on hand. Dollars or the local currency. This is because there are many establishments that do not take credit cards. Not having cash pretty much puts a dent on your ability to purchase from smaller establishments who provide more variety of traditional foods and local hand crafter products.
Travel Maps
The first thing my husband does to plan a trip, right after the destination has been established is to acquire a travel map of the city or country to where we are traveling.
Even if the trip is a short one, and we are not covering a large distance, it is very helpful to study a destination map. It is particularly important if you are traveling to more than one location by ground transportation. This will allow you to study the terrain and will prompt you to research whatever you see in the map as pertinent to your planning.
If you are new to traveling internationally, I strongly recommend you establish a similar rule for yourself. You could use the internet, but there is nothing like being able to see the map spread out in front of you. Obviously it is not a requirement and a lot of people don’t plan things in this way, but it is something worth considering if you want to become a world traveler and plan great adventures.
Read this article to learn about how to keep track of your travel plans.
Other Stories
If you want to read a story relating to some of the images on the video above, you can be find it on the corresponding Instagram Reel here.
Explore other travel stories and feel free to submit a comment or a question.