Dominican Republic Dec 26-Jan 2 (2023-24)

We had another chance to go on a family trip!  Dave and I started planning this one with the help of a travel agent.  The same travel agent helped us find hotels on our way to and from another trip (in Spain and France) and she was really helpful.  We're on the far east side in Punta Cana!

She found us an all-inclusive, which was our request this time, in a tropical location.  Every other trip we've taken has been a rental place and we grocery shopped, but this location relieved everyone (ok, mostly me) of the task of meal planning/grocery shopping/cooking/cleaning. 

We had a chartered flight on Frontier directly from Chicago to Punta Cana, which was a nice flight.  Not our favorite airline (no free snacks/drinks) but it was only 4 hrs and good timing.  We stayed in a hotel in Chicago Christmas evening and booked parking there for our trip.  Breakfast was dunkin donuts at the airport before our flight. We had arranged transportation from the airport to our resort, called Dreams Royale Punta Cana. 

We arrived in time for dinner on Tues, Dec 26th, and picked an italian restaurant.  Pizzas, pastas, risotto, and bread filled us up after skipping lunch (for the most part). 

We love our rooms and the beach was a welcome sight!  It got dark pretty quick...I was exhausted and fell asleep the first night at like 9pm.  Dave stayed up w/ the kids. Girls swam, boys buried themselves in sand.  Typical!

Wed, Dec 27, 2023

Today was very chill.  Dave and I slept in til 10:30 am and missed breakfast.  The girls got up to see the sunrise at 6:30am and then went back to bed.  The boys got up at 7am and spent the whole day together, for the most part.  They probably ate more than anyone the whole day, enjoying going to restaurants and snack bars, coffee shops, and ice cream places for "free". 

Dave had to finish payroll, so he spent a little more time in the hotel room than the rest of us.  We went to the coffee shop (two times), the beach, and spotted the family here and there throughout the day. We had dinner together at the Sea Side Grill.  

Thursday, Dec 28, 2023 ****** Calvin's 16th Birthday ******

I think we ordered room service food close to midnight and sang Calvin happy birthday when he got the chance to turn 16 two hours earlier than he normally would have in Iowa.

Dave and I found Eli in the pool in the morning.  We talked to concierge about what we can do to make his birthday special.  We also booked some things for tomorrow and the next day.  They put a "Feliz Cumpleanos" sign on the kids' door during housekeeping services and gave us a special request slip to give to our waiter at dinner so they would bring out a birthday cake and all the staff would sing to him.  Turns out there was a BBQ on the beach that night so we signed up for that.  The weather here is just beautiful - their "winter" and it is in the 80s during the day and 70s at night.  It has been perfect.

The day with no plans let us hang out by the beach, swim in the ocean, eat burgers for lunch by the ocean, say hi to our kids when we saw them (usually with an ice cream cone or slushie!), and somehow we collected everyone to have dinner together.  The evening was SO fun with a real band playing music we recognized (that is hard to find around here), and the staff made Calvin's night special.

happy 16th Calvin!

just strolling to the beach

walking towards the Beach BBQ

still walking to the Beach BBQ 7pm

stringed lights!

Violet is always ready for the camera

we took some fun pics at night w/ the moonlight over the water

so proud of my birthday boy!

yes he did push Eli in - he was begging for it

the boys chilled in the game room

David, Violet and I got involved with the silent disco - headphones that played different channels of music.  the whole room of people had the same headphones and same beats in their ears, so only those with headphones could really jam out!

Friday, Dec 29th, 2023

Today we spent most of it at an Adventure Park nearby.  We had booked ziplining and horseback riding!

We rented a locker and had to put our phone away so we didn't get any pictures of anything, but it was really fun.  Eli especially enjoyed his horse named Margarita and Calvin's horse was named Wendy.  He thought that was pretty hilarious.

The ziplining was a 6-line course we went through, from post to post to post, we flew through the jungle and over blue lagoons and fake dinosaurs.  The last one we splashed in the water and got soaked.

on the way to the adventure park

after we were done ziplining and horseback riding, we had lunch served to us which included with the day,  It was grilled seasoned chicken, plantains, rice & beans.  It was so delicious!  We toured an old dominican village and saw one of the horses we might have ridden here in the stables.  

bananas growing upside down

We showered up after the long (wet) day and went to Oceana for dinner.  I think we all got the greek salads and surf/turf so we could eat familiar beef and try some seafood.  I think all the shrimp skewers ended up on Dave and my plates.  I couldn't eat most of the strange offerings I am not used to, like octopus.

while waiting for dinner - Violet got a *virgin* pina colada.

this was taken by the bartender with .7 -- that explains Dave's strange long arm

Saturday, December 30, 2023

Dave found a great company to book a scuba/snorkel/boating trip today.  We left at 8am after waking up at 630 to order breakfast/get ready.  The ride to the Caribbean side (south) of the island took about an hour.  The boat was private and we were the only ones on it - a super special treat which we all loved and appreciated very much after a not-so-fun experience with a packed boat in Puerto Rico two years ago.

Again, perfect weather.  Hot, not too hot, enough shade, enough sun, enough water.  They provided fruit, snacks, drinks, chips, guac, and salsa.  Violet and I did not choose to scuba, so the rest of the family went for two dives.  Calvin especially was excited for scuba!  We stopped at a beach for lunch, which was so much local delicious food! Pork, chicken, fish, potatoes, noodles, rice and fruit!  We took a failed selfie.

reminded us of Iowa corn on the dominican countryside, but it is all sugarcane.

squeeze that fresh lime into the guac!

Ahhhh - bean bags for resting!

getting scuba geared up

go Vanessa!

about to head under water

our lunch stop...and the failed selfie...Dave didn't make it in

lunch views

our lunch location - on a small island south of the DR

the water is perfect

Violet requested songs for the DJ - he was mixing it up with his DJ board! it was amazing!

selfies with snorkels in the ocean ... that doesn't happen every day

boating wrapped up by 4ish, we had an hour long sleepy ride back to our place. bye boat!

The evening's entertainment was a show about The Greatest Showman. The broadway-style crew put on a great show with the movie's music that included acrobatics, dancing, and great singing.  

Sunday, December 31, 2023

El fin dia del ano! *the last day of the year* 

Today and tomorrow are our last day.  Violet, Vanessa and I took a shuttle to a nearby mall and Violet shopped for a dress.  We got picked up at 11:00 and got a ride back by 1:30.  This mall, called "BlueMall" was a very expensive high end with stores like Dulca & Gabanna and Zara.  We found an end department store called Aliss that seemed like a Target.  So we shopped for dresses there. :) After she found something we tried finding iced coffee, and three places looked promising but did not have anything. We ended up at a Santo Domingo cafe and got something similar.  

The rest of the day had no plans. I don't think we saw our kids until we met up for dinner at 7 at the restaurant we reserved for new year's eve dinner.  We were served a seafood "cake" for an appetizer, asparagus soup, then surf and turf (lobster and filet mignon) and then a "golden apple" for dessert.  It was all very interesting and the kids mostly ate the beef.  

After the dinner they went to the World Market buffet and got some food they could enjoy, haha!  Pasta, more beef, etc.

We watched a movie to kill some time before the countdown (Mr. Deeds) because we were all pretty tired. We made our way down to the party for the 2 minute countdown!

There was some room service confusion and somehow we ordered a burger, chicken nuggets, tres leches cake, and a salad two times.  

I think we all got to bed by 1:30am.

Monday, January 1, 2024

I got by myself at 6:30 to see the sunrise.  It was a very pretty walk to the beach. The music wasn't pumping in the resort yet, and very few people were outside.  The clouds dominated the skyline so I wasn't hoping for much, but there was a thin sliver where the sun peeked through then when it got higher it was beautiful shining through and above the clouds.  

walking to the water

this is a Southern Cross constellation in the south I've always wanted to see.  My star app said it was above the horizon at 7am but too far south and blocked by buildings. I don't think it would have been visible even if my position was different since it was already morning.

the view to the south - that's the exact place that constellation is (not visible!)...someday

view to the northeast

there it peeked and then slid behind the clouds

there it showed off!

my shadow was 100ft long!

sand shadows

the palms had long shadows

I went back to sleep and made coffee in our room and worked on the blog around 10-11am.  The rest of the fam went to get breakfast. Dave was happy to have found an omelet station!  

It is our last day and I hope we get everything dried out before packing up.