And so here I am, caught in this bittersweet changing of seasons and the metaphor is not lost on me. It's hard not to hold my breath and wish that summer could last forever, but there are new adventures to be had and new stories to write, and fall is a beautiful season. If you are looking to keep following me, hop on over to my new blog, The Farmer's Daughter. (I couldn't very well keep writing a travel blog about the D.R. now, could I?) Maybe my stories won't be quite so exotic, but I'm sure I can still manage to russel up plenty of trouble and maybe share a little bit of my barefoot, blue jean country life in rural Illinois. Hope to see you there :)
After a year working abroad, I'm back in my lovely little home town in Illinois, just in time to watch the corn change from green to gold. Its my favorite time of year, the end of summer, the last long days of August, where the days drag on lazy and hot, but the nights are cool and calm and full of fireflies and singing crickets and spinning stars. The gardens are nearly past tending now, unruly zucchini vines overgrow into a jungle of drooping tomato plants, while the peach and apple trees heave with fruit that plop onto the ground with unceremonious thumps. Its that time of year where everything is at the turning point, bright and beautiful and wild; that time of year where the whole world seems to be holding its breath, wishing that summer could last forever and knowing that what makes it so sweet is that it must come to an end.
And so here I am, caught in this bittersweet changing of seasons and the metaphor is not lost on me. It's hard not to hold my breath and wish that summer could last forever, but there are new adventures to be had and new stories to write, and fall is a beautiful season. If you are looking to keep following me, hop on over to my new blog, The Farmer's Daughter. (I couldn't very well keep writing a travel blog about the D.R. now, could I?) Maybe my stories won't be quite so exotic, but I'm sure I can still manage to russel up plenty of trouble and maybe share a little bit of my barefoot, blue jean country life in rural Illinois. Hope to see you there :)
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For all the other wanderers out there.... I mean it. It's OK. You are going to be OK. Society is going to tell you that you are not on track. And your family is going to worry. And people may give you funny looks and shake their heads and wonder what the heck you're doing. And you are going to start to worry too. You will worry that maybe there is something fundamentally wrong with you. You will wonder desperately why you can't get things figured out. You may feel guilty, like somehow you have failed. And you will search frantically for a plan, something to cling to, something to make you feel as if you might have an idea where you are headed. Eventually, you will resort to drastic measures. Maybe you'll quit your job, maybe you'll spend a spring planting trees in Canada, maybe you'll move to a foreign country, maybe you'll become a wandering hippie or run away and join the circus. You will meditate. You will read everything. You will travel. You will try yoga. You will do things that scare you. You will be poor. And eventually, somewhere in your search, you will realize, you are in love with your life. You are in love with every second of every minute of every day of it. You are in love with the challenges, with the new experiences, with learning new things, and you could not imagine settling for a life or a career that does not bring you the happiness you feel now. You won't have it all figured out yet, but you'll know what your life could be like. And you will realize that it's ok that you're life isn't following the plan you laid out when you were 18, because it's going to be better than that plan, way better. And you might not know exactly how, but things will work out in the end. Society is going to tell you that you need a 401K and should find a spouse before 30. People are going to say that you that you need to start thinking about benefits and a retirement plan. Your family may wonder when you are going to settle down and start a family of your own. Your levels of "responsibility" may be questioned. But don't worry. Your success in life does not depend on those things. When has it ever been a good idea to measure anything by society's standards? Live by your own standards. Follow your heart. Don't settle for anything less than the best for your life. And if it takes a while for you to find where you are truly meant to be, don't worry. Keep growing, keep learning, keep loving. Those are the measures of true success. Alright folks, I'm rewinding a bit here with an old post that I never put up. Back in April I started taking a salsa class. I loved it, and I learned a lot, but my attendance only lasted a month. The schedule for the class didn't mesh very well with my own, the class ended close to 10 at night, and the studio was located half way across town. Anyways, for various reasons, I dropped out of the class but hoped that I could pick it back up later in the year, and in turn, finish writing this post. Welp, life happened and I never made it back to salsa class....but...I decided I'd go ahead and finish the post anyways. If nothing else, you get a nice little salsa recipe out of it, and you get to chuckle at my attempts at some fancy footwork. Que disfruten! Salsa for a crowd Ingredients: 1 can of black beans, drained and rinsed. 1 can of sweet corn, drained and rinsed (alternatively, you could use fresh sweet corn roasted on the grill, which would probably be fantastic) 1 large onion 4 cloves of garlic (more or less to taste) 1 large avocado 7-8 roma tomatoes 1-2 limes 1 bunch cilantro pinch of salt 1. Dice up your tomatoes and onions and toss them in a large bowl with your rinsed and drained corn and beans. 2. Finely chop the garlic and toss it in. 3. Grab a big bunch of cilantro, give it a rough chop, and toss it in the bowl. 4. Dice up your avocado. 5. Squeeze the lime all over the mixture and stir it together gently. At this point you can add a pinch of salt, but generally there is enough salt in the canned beans that I don't add it when I'm eating this myself. If you do add the salt, make sure you serve the salsa that day, as salt will draw out the liquid in the tomatoes as it sits in the fridge, making your salsa a bit watery. It still tastes good, but doesn't make for the nicest presentation. P.S. I also really like to add chopped mango to this salsa when its in season. That salty sweet combo just can't be beat! Voila!! Perfecto! And now for a different kind of salsa. Ok so I'm dancing with Jake here. He and Fabian (dancing in the video below with our female salsa istructor) introduced me to the class, which is called La Escuela de Salsa Golden Boy (yes, our male salsa instructor calls himself Golden Boy....I don't think I actually ever learned his first name, haha). In any case, they are much better than I am. I am just trying to keep up!!
So remember last post when I said "dinner was quite the experience?" Well let me tell you all about it. I was wondering around the beach front in the evening, looking for a cheap dinner and a nice view to people watch and see the sea. I perused through several menus and finally settled on La Perlita, which seemed to be a pretty happening little outdoor restaurant owned by a Spainiard (Spain will always have my heart when it comes to my stomach). In any case, I found myself a cozy little table and took a seat. Not too long afterwards, a gentleman from the next table called over to me, "Are you American?" "Yep," I smiled back, partly at the question, partly at his Southern drawl. I hadn´t heard one of those in a long time. "See," he said proudly to his companions, three fair-haired chaps and brunette girl who all chuckled good-naturedly at their friend´s obvious delight. "We were debating, but I bet that you were American. Would you like to come join us?" I paused for a mili-sec....don´t get into cars with strangers!...but the pre-school advice drilled into my brain didn´t seem seem to apply. "Sure, I´d love to." Best decision ever. We chatted and dined, and come to find out, what I had originally assumed to be a family on vacation was actually the crew for a private yacht that had sailed down from Florida. Get out of town! The crew themselves came from all over the southern U.S. (meaning they all had beautiful southern accents) They were hired full time by the owners of Caterpillar (the machine company), and when they weren´t sailing around the world, which they spent 3-5 months out of the year doing, they maintained the fleet, yes fleet, of boats that the CAT owners docked in Florida. In fact, currently, they didn´t just sail down with a yacht, they had also brought down a large sport fishing boat and a smaller "fountain" boat. All of these crewed by just 5 people. Currently, all of their boats were docked at Casa de Campo, the ritzy country club/resort in la Romana, but they had driven over to Bayahibe for dinner tonight to get some local flavor. Needless to say, I thought this was the coolest thing ever. At the end of the night they kindly payed for my dinner and asked if I would like to go sailing with them in the next couple days. In my mind, my jaw was doing the cartoon equivalent of dropping to the floor while fireworks exploded in the background and my feet began to dance an Irish jig. In real life I thanked them all and replied that I would love to. I walked home with a smile as wide as the Florida panhandle on my face and a number to call in my pocket. The next day I called and it was decided they would come pick me up the following morning on their "little" boat and we would sail out to Catalina island. So the following morning I donned my finest swimsuit (haha) and flip flops and strolled around the beach front lazily in the morning while waiting for my ship to arrive and carry me away. The crew arrived shortly to sweep me off into the wild blue yonder....but not before treating me to a seafood and pizza lunch. Southern gentlemen really know how to treat a girl right. Fueled up, we were ready to hoist in the anchor and set sail. John, the yacht captain, had some electrical wiring to do back on the yacht, so Jason (driving the boat currently) piloted us back to Casa de Campo to drop him off and then when we were on our way. We cruised up to the shore of Catalina island, but as the water was shallow, we couldn´t pull up to the beach. Instead, Jason dropped anchor and pulled out the fancy snorkel gear. Then we threw ourselves overboard to swim to the island. (I had to depart with the camera at this point.) Except I totally Tom Hanksed it, like in Castaway, and crashed into some coral. Checkout minute 55-56 of the link below....it happened just like that: http://megashare.info/watch-cast-away-online-TWpFNU5BPT0 For real. Not even kidding. That´s what happened. Ok, maybe I´m being a bit over dramatic. The real story is that we ended up snorkeling up to a rocky/coral-y part of the beach. I was trying to take my flipper off when a nice little wave washed me backwards against the coral where I managed to scrape up my lower back and elbows and tear a nice little gash in my finger. To make matters worse, it was extremely difficult to stand up since the waves kept knocking me back over and I was flopping around like a beached whale with my flippers on. How embarrassing. Luckily Jason was there to rescue me. Unluckily, I was bleeding profusely. Jason quickly offered to swim back to the ship for the medical equipment. Not too far down the beach was a crowd of people, tourists, partying under a large tiki hut. It looked like a gathering of multiple tour groups, so while Jason snorkeling back, I decided to make my way over there to see if I could get a band-aid, since I was getting tired of holding pressure on my finger. Although my injuries were very minor, by the time I made it to the tiki hut, blood was streaming down my arms and legs from the scrapes on my elbows and back and my finger was leaking blood everywhere. Judging by the worried faces of the staff when I arrived, I probably looked like a multiple stab wound victim or possibly like I´d just had a battle with a shark, since they hurriedly shuffled me to the back of the hut away from the partying tourists. Then they kindly poured stinging alcohol into my wounds (ouch)and bandaged me up good as new. I arrived back to the beach just as Jason was making his way to shore. We walked the length of the beach and back, just to check out the surroundings; layed in the sun for a smidge; and then, feeling parched, snorkeled back to the boat. It really was a lovely little island...just not so good for swimming. Anchor´s away! Farewell Catalina! P.S. here are some pics of the offending coral cuts o my back and finger....snapped later in the day. After sailing through some mildly rough seas, we were soon docking next to the rest of the Bluewater Cat ships. We hopped off and I got the full tour, from bow to stern, through the multiple bedrooms, the galley (kitchen), salon (living room), and even the engine room of both the multimillion dollar yacht and equally impressive sport fishing boat. They also let me sit in the Captain´s Seat..... And drive the boat!! Honestly, I don´t know what they were thinking. Next up, I was getting a golf court tour of Casa de Campo and Los Altos de Chavon. Los Altos de Chavon is a small village built in the 1970s in the style of an ancient Roman town. Sitting on a cliff overlooking the Chavon river, this picturesque little site is now home to ritzy art vendors and a smattering of high class restaurants. The village even boasts an old Roman ampitheatre that to this day hosts famous artists from around this word for live concerts. See that building hanging off the cliff there in the picture below. That's where the crew decided to take me to eat later in the evening. Truly, they spoiled me rotten. We headed back to the ships to wash up (for me this included brushing my hair and throwing on a swipe of chapstick) and then it was back to one of the fanciest restaurants I've ever been in, "The Club", for dinner. Look at those handsome faces. True southern gentleman every one of them. For a sea-faring crew from Florida and LA (lower Alabama!), I quickly discovered that they were all land lovers when it came to food. Steaks all around.
The night ended with a mooonlight boat ride back to Bayahibe, and although I insisted I could take a taxi back no problem, they woudn't hear of it: "I don't know how they do things over here, but in the South, we make sure our ladies get home safely." I was even escorted to my hotel door. I crawled into bed and almost had to pinch myself to make sure the whole day hadn't been a dream. Turns out, everything you've ever heard about Southern hospitality is true and chivalrous gentleman still do exist. Thank you so much to the Bluewater Cat crew for an incredible day. I arrived in Bayahibe late Sunday afternoon. The guagua dumped me in the middle of town and I wondered around the winding streets (only mildly lost), until I found my hotel. Bayahibe really is quite small and it didn't take me long. The hotel, much to my happiness, is more like a set of apartments than it is a hotel (hence the name Aparta-Hotel Villa Baya), each room coming complete with a kitchenette, free wifi, cable tv, nice stone floors, and the cremé de la cremé? a beautiful balcony. By far the best hotel of my trip, and the most economical to boot at $30 USD a night. I ditched the suitcase and headed off to scout out the town and the beach as I like to get my bearings on a place right off the bat. After sufficient perusal (you can traipse through the whole town in less than 20 minutes) I stopped for a nice little treat of fresh lambí.... ....and grabbed a Presidente to take back to my balcony. Might as well put it to good use after all! Alarmed by the grumbling of my tummy later in the evening, I made my way back towards the beach in search of some dinner. There´s just something beautiful about anchored boats sleeping at night time. Dinner actually turned out to be quite the experience...but I´m not going to tell you what happened. Not yet anyways. I´ll save that surprise for next post. In the meantime, I´ll allay you with my adventures the following day. As always, I rolled out of bed with the sunshine and headed to the beach. Bayahibe is actually more of a bay than a beach, used primarily for anchoring fishing boats and launching katamarans full of tourists to the nearby islands of Saona and Catalina. Turns out, mornings are all hustle and bustle on this beach, so my original plan of a nice long rung in the sand was thwarted. I don´t much like running when there are lots of people about. I just whipped out my book instead (never leave home without one!), and caught some rays as I enjoyed the goings on around me. I spent most of the day just taking it easy, but by mid afternoon I was jonesing for a new adventure. A quick google search of things to do in the area and I was off on the first motoconcho I could find for la cueva Padre Nuestro. A little background info here: La cueva Padre Nuestro is located in El Parque Nacional del Este. Before going there you have to get a wristband and entrance pass (200 pesos) from the park tourist center (a little building located where all the big tourist buses park near the beach). Then grab a motoconcho to take you to the park for 100 pesos. You could have him drop you off at the park entrance if you want (its about a half mile hike from the park entrance to the cave), or you can have him drop you off right at the cave entrance. The entrance of the cave is actually a bit intimidating, staring up at you lie a giant black mouth waiting to swallow you up. But it´s also a bit daring, promising adventures and hidden treasures. Maybe buried pirate gold or the Lost Ark of the Covenant, just like something out of an Indiana Jones movie. After carefully picking your way down steep stone steps into the dark pit., you will hear strange squeaking sounds and catch glimpses of movement flapping rapidly in a blur past your eyes. Throw your arms up wildly and shield your head! You´re about to be attacked by a swarm (flock? pack?) of murderous vampire bats! Wait. False alarm. It´s actually just swallows. You know, the bird. Turns out they like caves about as much as bats do and make their nests in the rocky crevices in the cave roof. Anyways, by now your eye sight should be adjusting, and what was once a dim black hole is slowly evolving into something beautiful. You probably aren´t going to find any pirate booty here, but what you will find is something just as precious: deep blue waters smooth as glass, reflecting the cave back up at you like a mirror. As the fuzzy black edges around the corners of your vision further clear away, you´ll realize that this little underground pond is actually much bigger than you first imagined...extending far back into deep, shadowy corners and eerie bends. Once you´ve absorbed the silence for long enough , it´s time to head back to the light. I opted to walk back through the National Park and take in the naturaleza. I made it out to the high way and bummed a bola (ride) off a kid on a moto heading back for Bayahibe. (only about a mile or so away) In the evening I headed off to one of the beachfront bars to enjoy a drink and some free wifi. I didn´t realize I was going to get a light show as well.... Honestly. Just breathtaking. But I was one tired puppy and headed to bed shortly after the sun did.
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AuthorHola! My name is Molly and I was recently hired through the travel abroad company CIEE as an ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher for the PUCMM, a university located in Santiago, Dominican Republic. Hopefully this blog will give future travelers an insight into teaching abroad, while also helping me log my adventures and stay in touch with friends back home. Archives
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