A new adventure in the Dominican Republic: Cabarete Long Weekend

Well its been a little while since my last post this is where we are...

Puerto Plata Cable Car

There has been a few developments with the house. The quote came back from the architects that we were going to use to draw up the plans for the house so we can submit them to Patrimonial and apply for our permits to start work. Unfortunately the quote was out of our reach so a couple of Katherine's friends who are architects are drawing up all the plans for us. We will have them by 19th November which is awesome and they gave us a pretty good price. On the 11th November the dogs that we inherited with the house will be gone so I can finally get in there and start clearing the trash and junk. We got our first quote back for the restoration and I almost had a heart attack - it was more than we paid for the house! I know it needs a lot of work but that just isn't going to happen. I am not to worried though, we will be able to get the quote down I am sure of it and I plan on doing some of the work myself - so not hitting the panic button just yet.

Relaxing at the pool

We decided to go away for the long weekend up to Cabarete - I decided I was to white after living in the Caribbean for the last year so I needed to get my tan sorted. So me Katherine, Fabio and a few others headed up to the North Coast. We left at 6am to try and beat the traffic - its about a 3 and half our journey - its a good road until you get past Santiago - thats when the pot holes start. Now for some reason whenever I try and avoid a hole in the road I end up hitting it, I am like a magnet for them - seriously, my poor Jeep I thought the wheels were going to fall off.

Every time I have been to Cabarete previously it has rained, but it was looking good and we cracked the rum open at 10am - I love the DR! We were staying at the Hotel Kaoba which I would recommend if anyone wants a cheap place to stay, its right on the strip - nothing fancy but cheap; just make sure you call to make a reservation, if you book online its almost twice as expensive. After the rum we hit the happy hours along the beach where I had a bit of a shock - there is an Irish bar there and I was craving a Guinness - it used to be all I drank so we asked the waitress how much one was... $20 USD! Now I know its imported etc but that is crazy - I even sent Katherine to go and ask again incase she got the price wrong, nope.

We went back to get ready - then it happened the heavens opened... I have never seen so much rain - I almost thought that Hurricane Sandy had turned around and come back. The rain put a bit of a downer on the night but a good time was had. We decided not to stay another night in the rain and went to Puerto Plata where there is a cable car that goes up to the top of a mountain. Katherine was a getting scared on the way up (as you can see in the pictures. We went up there and it was surreal as we went up through the fog. Luckily it cleared on the way down so we could see the awesome view. We made a quick stop in Santiago for lunch on the way down to end an enjoyable weekend.

Hopefully by the next post I will have the completed plans in my hand...