Trip report, December 2004 (you can see pictures of my trip
here)
I arrived in Santo Domingo capital on the night of Wednesday, December 8th. My ride mixed up the dates, and I wound up taking a taxi all the way to my hotel in Gazcué. I don't know who was older, the driver or the car, a rather decrepit Chevrolet.
Since I hadn't been to Santo Domingo in a while, I was surprised at the efficiency of the Expresos built from east to west. Although rushour traffic was rather heavy, once inside the city the drive was smooth.
Samaná
On Friday morning I drove out to
Samaná with a couple of friends. The road to Piedra Blanca in the Autopista Duarte was smooth and quiet since it was a double-laned highway. Once I turned east toward Maimón and Cotuí, I expected a bad road, but I was pleasantly surprised to find an ample road. Sure, the constant flux of motorcycles was somewhat annoying, but it was smooth sailing until a very rough patch of road between Cotuí and Pimentel, where the road meets the main San Francisco-Nagua highway.
Right after Castillo, in El Pozo, that highway was closed due to construction, and traffic was detoured through the small towns of El Pozo, La Pichinga (!) and Matancitas. The pavement was horrendous, it was raining and many impatient drivers tried passing me even though we were all stuck behind a few trucks.
When we reached the Samaná Peninsula, however, the sky cleared and the sun shone on this beautiful part of the country. Soon we crossed Sánchez, and reached Samaná proper. We were starving, and found a restauran/pool hall right by the Malecón. Not only was it outrageously expensive (two chicken Chowfans and one spaghetti bolognese for 1,800 RD pesos), but quite bad, with horrible service.
Las Galeras
We kept going east until Las Galeras, on one of the many tips of the peninsula. We got a relatively good deal at Club Bonito, right by the beach: a double and a single for a total of US$110. Since the resort was rather empty, the man at the reception desk decided to lower the prices.
The rooms were great and breakfast was superb. After some swimming, we headed to Playa Rincón. I had originally seen this beach 14 years ago, and it was in a pristeen state. Its abubdance of palm trees and presence of a nearby river made it almost a paradise. I was appalled to find it littered with garbage, and with a few locals fishing and just having some fun. Nonetheless, and despite the difficult road (some three miles of unpaved track), it is still worth it..
After that, a quick swing by Samaná city and a hike through the pedestrian bridge to Samaná Cay. I think that this is a very difficult place to reach, since the hotel on top of the hill that leads to the entrance is being remodeled after a prolonged period of decay.
Having left Samaná, we hit the rolling road toward Las Terrenas, passing by at least six different spots in a 10-mile stretch of road that claimed to be the trailhead for the El Limón waterfalls. Since by this time we were in quite a hurry, we breezily spent 15 minutes in a beach outside Las Terrenas. After passing by the hustle and bustle of Las Terrenas proper, we hit the Sánchez road, another rollercoaster of a ride, although it was in a pretty good state, as Dominican roads go. The northern and southern views from this road are spectacular.
Do you know the way to San Francisco?
Close to Nagua, we got hopelessly lost trying to find the main road that goes to San Francisco and eventually La Vega and Santiago. We asked around, and were directed back to the small town of Matancitas, and there, after losing our way once again trying to find some sort of silo that marked the road, we were directed. The road was the same dreadful one we had taken earlier. Somehow, the main road from Nagua is not properly marked.
Outside of San Francisco de Macorís we had lunch and did some shopping at La Sirena, a modern European-style supermarket/department store. After crossing chaotic San Francisco, we took the road to the Duarte Highway. It was a smooth drive to just north of Bonao, where we turned west to take the Casabito road to Constanza.
The Casabito road to Constanza
The road has been much-maligned in the Dominican media recently after a string of mishaps which have killed several drivers. Since this is a winding road that goes up (and then down) the
Cordillera Central Range, a couple of gaps and the never-ending presence of trucks make it quite dangerous. However, it is glorious to drive through it in the late afternoon, when the sun is just about to set and the golden glow brings some cool air.
After crossing the Tireo Valley (which is slightly higher in elevation than Constanza), we reached the broad Constanza Valley right before sunset. The entrance to Rancho Guaraguao was not properly marked, and we had to make it through side roads.
Rancho Guaraguao
As an environmentalist, I am torn about Rancho Guaraguao. The scenes from its overpriced cabins ($220 a night for a two-roomer) are absolutely gorgeous. But they did take up an entire mountain to build it, in a valley that every passing year seems to be more sprawling.
We bought some groceries at the local mini-mart, and tried our hands at cooking. There was a glitch, however. The cabins are not heated, and despite apparent luxury, there are gaping holes all over them. It was quite a chilly night, and I woke up several times at night, shivering. At sunrise, the air outside the cabin was actually warmer than the one inside. To the right, the low fog over the Tireo valley was a sight to see.
A very expensive adventure
When I checked out, I complained about the lack of heating, and about the poor insulation. The response was a classic: "It's part of the adventure." For 6,300 pesos a night, I shouldn't pay for that kind of adventure, I replied. They smiled, and said that I should have called an attendant so that he could have lit the fireplace. This was not mentioned when the cabin was shown. I felt somewhat ripped off, but oh, the views...
We had breakfast at the main intersection of Constanza, in front of the Isla gas station. This used to be the old entrance to the town, back when it was a sleepy mountain hamlet. How things have changed. The fare was fried cheese with yucca. All three of us ate for 220 pesos.
One of the indicators of Constanza's growth was its out of the way ghetto. If one enters the city and keeps heading south, toward the old road to San Juan, the dilapidated apartment buildings, which still show the naked building blocks without any paint, can still be seen. This is quite a contrast from the touristy image of Constanza, small and virginal. There is poverty here, too.
Aguas Blancas
The road up to Aguas Blancas and Valle Nuevo has been wiped clean of the many shacks that used to dot its side. The track is unpaved, but quite wide in most aspects, specially before it climbs back down to the Río Grande bridge at El Convento. From here we could see the several greenhouses that provide berries, cold-weather fruits and flowers.
Three-tenths of a mile from that bridge, and exactly 8 miles from Constanza is the road to Aguas Blancas falls. One needs to be a skilled driver or have a four wheel drive to take the one mile unpaved road to the base of the waterfalls. From there, a rather horrid metal bridge has been built to cross the pool of water beneath the impressive falls.
The rest of the trip to Valle Nuevo is a relentless uphill road, unpaved and sometimes full of puddles. As everywhere else, kids came up to us asking for money. Soon, after a guardhouse staffed by a park ranger (who seemed ripe for a small “propina”), another view of Constanza is at your feet, approximately 700 meters (2,100 feet) below.
Villa Pajón
Soon we reached the entrance to Villa Pajón, a small cabin complex. We asked the housekeeper for rates, and she told us that they were 2000 pesos a night, and had to be reserved in the capital by calling "la doña" (809-567-8919, 809-562-6580). The cabins have fireplaces and warm water, but alas, everything else has to be brought in from Constanza, which is 14 miles and almost 2,500 feet below.
We kept driving, and the previous entrance to Valle Nuevo, which housed some barracks and a couple of luxury homes is gone. As a matter of fact, one has to be really attentive to notice the trace of buildings.
Some three miles down the road is Rancho Enmedio, the apparent park headquarters. This is where the road to Alto de la Bandera starts, the highest mountain in the country outside the Pico Duarte formation and apparently possessor of an imposing view of the Bonao region. Alas, the ranger said the road was closed.
The eerie ghost town in Valle Nuevo
I believe a Lonely Planet guide states that a US$20 contribution to the Park Ranger Rum Purchasing Fund will open the gate for you, but I wasn’t about to try. A mile and a half past the ranger station, and right after some kind of housing, we found the abandoned Sabana Quéliz. The complex of houses had an eerie look to them, specially a door.
By this time the sun was shining brightly and the temperature was a comfortable 65 degrees. The road, unpaved throughout, has a few rough parts, specially in a couple of streams. After leaving the rather small and unimaginative memorial to Carlos Caamaño Deñó (a former general, president and guerrilla leader who was killed in the area), we reached the Pyramids.
This famous monument is reallly one pyramid sliced into four areas, and shamefully covered in graffiti. Some people believe that it marks the geographical center of the island (not true, the center of Hispaniola is right outside San Juan de la Maguana, in Corral de los Indios), others say that it’s the border between the La Vega Province and Ocoa Province. This is not true either, since the border comes a few miles south, near La Nuez.
So we’re guessing that it’s the geographical center of the Dominican Republic. This is the last hurrah of the high plains of Valle Nuevo, the valley called La Nevera, at 2,154 meters (7,044 feet) above sea level.
It was all downhill from there
From here, the road winds down until the park’s southern entrance, in La Nuez, a narrow strip of land between the basins of the Nizao (which streams into the Caribbean near Baní) and the Yaque del Sur, which flows into the sea near Barahona.
Once outside the park, the road is a gigantic series of farming communities until the Ocoa river is hit at La Horma. The road is rough, and despite the views, quite dangerous because of the constant pedestrian traffic in its many curves. It took us almost an hour to cover the 19 miles between La Nuez and the paved stretch of road outside San José de Ocoa, in Sabana Larga.
Anyway, I posted this story along with a few pictures
in my website. I also created a
slideshow here. Enjoy!
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Samaná, Constanza and Valle Nuevo
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