Comments from the Guests of the Jarabacoa Hostel
"...After spending almost a week on board the “Tres Hombres”, we disembarked in Santo Domingo on "La Isla of Española:. We decided it’s time to change our way of traveling and start exploring places by land...D[ominican] R[epublic] is the origin of Merengue and Bachata music. ... We took ...Caribe tours to our next destination, Jarabacoa. It’s a small town in a beautiful mountain area.
We found the most
beautiful hostel we have ever been to. It’s right outside of town. It’s a
private house with 3 double bedrooms, a leaving room with a fire place, a
kitchen, a computer room and a large yard. A group of people just left it and we
were the only ones there. We had the place to our selves.
The owners are a young couple, around our age. Molly-Ann is an American
and Rodolfo is a Dominican. They live 2 houses down the road. They are a great,
nice, caring people and we found them as a great company. We arrived in the
after noon and went to explore the town.... The next day we took the hostel’s
bicycle for a ride. We drew a map and followed it on a relaxed, beautiful, full
with fruit tries road to a beautiful waterfall. We took a swim in the freezing
water...
The area is full with trails and mountains and attractions... On the second day we decided to hike. We left early and took a road that goes into and out of town and goes up to one of the mountains in the area. It called “Jamaca de dios”. The road to the mountain was beautiful. ... When we arrived to the mountain...The view was spectacular and we could see all the valley.
That evening it was very cold so we light up the fire place, it was sooo nice and warm.
The next day we went for a rafting trip. It’s the longest river in DR – Yaque del Norte. ...we had a great time. It was funny, scary, fun and very energetic. The guides were crazy, jumped into the water all the time, jumping from very high rocks into the river and pulling people into the water, it lasted for a few hours. When we came back we had some lunch. We had a great day and we met lots of new people.
The next day we spent resting in the house, strolling in the near area and going to town. ...That evening we were invited to dinner at Molly and Rodolfo’s house. They invited another couple and we had a really nice evening. They are “Jehovah witnesses”, meaning they believe in the old and the new testimony, they are religious but very easy going. We had some interesting conversations, they were very enthusiastic to hear all about us, Israel and Judaism. Molly made really good food, she even made Humus and bought pita bread.
While we are in DR we decided to look for a boat going to Cuba. We connected with a Norwegian guy owns a yacht, he arrived to DR a week after us and planed to sail to Cuba next....
April 19, 2011
by Liat Rubinstein