Log #43I The Dominican Republic

Written at: Cayo Santiago (a.k.a. Monkey Island), Puerto Rico

March 11, 2007

Luperon (19 53.88N, 070 57.29W), a sleepy rural town, and a port of entry to the Dominican Republic, is one of those cruisers' havens, well protected, with many cruising boats anchored short and long term, organized activities, a twice weekly VHF radio net, easy access to town with many services, a co-operative cruiser-friendly marina, some hurricane holes, dinghy docks at the marina and the town quay, tourist facilities and tours available in town and from the marina, several expat-run restaurants and businesses, buses and publicos for transportation to anywhere in the DR, access to internet, a hospital, pharmacy, discos, hardware stores, markets, laundries, loud motor scooters and friendly people. Unfortunately it is a polluted harbour with a small river washing down debris and waste, in which one would not wish to swim, operate a watermaker, or use overboard water for anything. It is on the north coast, west of Puerto Plata, but without the heavy resort development of that touristy town.

We saw several boats we had encountered before, including several met up in the Turks and Caicos Islands such as San San and Abracadabra, and we were pleasantly surprised when we noticed the catamaran Bravo Two anchored a couple of hundred yards away. Graham and Wendy are from Peterborough, Ontario, a small city where I taught for several years and where the Millard family settled when my grandparents came from England in the early 1900's. We first met them in Prickly Bay, Grenada last March, again in Bequia, then in Deshaies, Guadeloupe, and Nelson's Dockyard in Antigua. This is one of the pleasures of the cruising life, meeting friends en route.

Some navy officials came out with a local fishing boat to take down our particulars and let us know where the customs and immigration offices were. We were advised that it was acceptable to give them a little donation or gift for their services, which we did. The fisherman was Papo, a local who also provides a range of services to cruisers such as bringing water and fuel out to the boats, arranging for laundry, and will even get fish and vegetables and other local products if requested. We topped up with diesel and water from him before leaving. We then went ashore to the customs and immigration shed to complete more forms and pay a few more fees (less than $50.00 in total), including an agricultural inspection of Veleda.

We spent only three days there as we had to press on against the easterlies to get to Antigua for our plane reservations on March 20. The third day we took a trip down to La Vega to see their Carnival parade, a chaotic affair of groups of celebrants in shiny semi-inflated silvery costumes like monsters out of Star Wars (see pictures below) wending their way through several city blocks to the throbbing rhythms of large pulsating sound amplifiers. There were no bands, no floats, no organization of marchers, although we and many other spectators walked along parts of the "route"; as far as we could tell, there was no fixed path for the parade, no one point from which it could be observed. The only "tradition" we could discern was the unfortunate one of marchers carrying leather reinforced balloons on tethers to slap spectators on the behind "to beat out evil". These assaults were sometimes in fun, but in many cases were painful whacks at full force causing bruising on the rear. We had to watch our behinds constantly to avoid full force slaps. The safest position to watch was resting against a tree or wall so we could not be attacked from behind. Earlier in the morning, before we left for La Vega, there was a "Carnival" parade in Luperon, but much more organized, with a local marching band and school kids in coloured T-shirts from different community groups.
 

Upon our return to Luperon, we left at 2130 to take advantage of lighter evening winds, wending our way through the anchored boats in a moonless night. It was a challenging exit, and while manouevering through the narrow entrance we grounded on a sand bar for a short period until we successfully backed off. Picking out the one buoy which we had to pass on our port side was difficult, but after that it was straight out into open water, heading east into easterly breezes.

Night winds are supposed to be lighter, and possibly even providing land breezes. That's why the "Passages South" pilot recommends night sails or early morning (dawn or earlier) departures for short 20 to 30 mile hops working east against the easterly trade winds. With plane reservations from Antigua for March 22, we were under time pressure with only a month left to get there. We still had to go to the east end of the Dominican Republic and southeast across the Mona Passage to Mayaguez on Puerto Rico. However after 56 miles we put in at Rio San Juan (19 39.31N, 070 04.75W), an open anchorage protected by some offshore reefs, at 0835. This area is an interesting national park where the San Juan River enters the ocean and we made note to explore it when we return to the DR in a year or so. As we had checked out of the DR in Luperon, Judy did not want to chance going ashore or exploring the river entrance. We left at 1800 for another night sail (motoring) with light winds OTN (On The Nose), hoping for light winds to be able to transit the Mona Passage in a two day voyage. However as we rounded Cabo Cabron, the northeast cape of the DR, we decided not to try a direct run across the Mona Passage and put in to Santa Barbara de Samana, arriving there (19 11.96N, 069 19.99W) at 0930 next morning after an 81 mile passage. Judy wanted to be legitimate and so we checked in with the local Commandante, hoping we would not have to go through a full entry procedure, then exit procedure, for what we hoped would be a 24 hour lay over. Fortunately we didn't and the office was most co-operative requiring only an entry form to be completed and requested that we complete the exit form before leaving next day.

Samana is a pleasant town that we intend to visit again on our next more leisurely visit to the DR. We got a few supplies and had lunch ashore before going back to Veleda. We were asked to pay $15.00 for a security patrol and security services at the town dock, a worthwhile endeavour. It is a monthly (or any part thereof) fee for anchoring. Unfortunately next morning we found ourselves dragging our anchor, and had to re-anchor using much more rode as the winds were howling down the bay at 25 to 30 knots. We were not going out in those winds, and so stayed a second day. The third day we took a Publico (bus/van) up into the mountains to Le Limon where we then had a horseback ride further into the mountains to see a lovely waterfall. This is a beautiful verdant area of the DR. Again we left at 1800 after the mountain trip and checking out with the Commandante, as we had a good weather forecast of light 10 to 15 knot winds. Ha!!!

We pounded out of Samana Bay into 20 to 25 knot winds OTN, hoping the lighter winds would show up in the Mona Passage. Our speed was down to 4 knots and we had over 150 miles to go to get to Mayaguez on Puerto Rico's west coast. As we turned SE outside of Samana Bay, we were still heading into SE 20 knot winds. Murphy's Law - when we were going NE up the windward Passage between Cuba and Haiti, we had strong NE winds; and now going SE down the Mona Passage between the DR and Puerto Rico we had strong SE winds! An interesting phenomenon was the moon, as it seemed to be a new moon with the old moon in its arms, as we could see the outline of the rest of the moon above the curvature of the new moon. But wait, it should be a full moon! We were unknowingly watching an eclipse of the moon! Interesting.

On we plowed, tacking off shore into the open waters of the Mona Passage. We had to go off shore to avoid the Hour Glass Shoal off the DR west coast. This is a deep shoal that we could cross, but the depths are so great in the Mona Passage that these shoals, even though 300 to 400 feet below the surface, create heavy surface wave action from the Equatorial currents welling up from the 7000 foot Puerto Rican Trench, the second deepest trench in the world, between Puerto Rico and the DR. We skirted this area, tacking northwards to avoid it and the storm clouds off the central Puerto Rican west coast. We had a bit of rain, but were able to see the cloud formations and sailed (yes, we actually sailed for a few hours going due east or just north of east) around them. Just before sunrise, but still in the dark, we finally arrived to anchor in Puerto Rico at Mayaguez (18 12.97N, 067 09.64W), the port of entry, at 0630, 36 hours and 155 nautical miles after leaving Santa Barbara de Samana in the DR. This was par for the course according to our pilot of two nights and one day for the passage, We were exhausted and Judy was getting increasingly depressed about the ongoing voyage, pounding into easterly winds like these for another 500 miles.

Although we stopped in only three locations in the DR, we were favourably impressed with the country and its inhabitants, and are looking forward to exploring it more leisurely in another year, under less pressure.



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