Cape to Milan

After enduring the grit and grime of Santo Domingo, I desperately wanted to cleanse myself in some non all-inclusive resort slice of the Caribbean. Enter Puerto Plata, a convenient base for our next journey (the waterfalls about a half hour away) as well as a sufficient beach front.

Maybe sufficient isn’t the word. All-inclusives work in the DR because someone is there to pick up the trash. Elsewhere (like here in Puerto Plata), the beach kind of becomes a tragedy of the commons– and an excellent anti-plastic advertisement.

Though we did take one adventurous dip in the sea, most of our water time was spent in the Damajagua waterfalls or the hotel pool. I don’t know which was the better pool time view– the mango trees stretching above us or the kitsch fountain.

With plenty of distance from the trash, walking along the Malecon is quite pleasant (or at least entertaining, as when we saw two guys carted off by the police for unknown reasons while their friends–blasting Dominican rap at 120 decibels, much to the chagrin of EVERYONE else on the Malecon–were left completely alone). That is, until the storm comes in. We did choose to travel in hurricane season…

… but the storm wasn’t that bad. We managed to take shelter before the downpour. And it gave us plenty of time to blog!