Getting Around Santo Domingo

From Bavaro (near Punta Cana) you can take a bus going directly to Santo Domingo (without intermediate stop) in 2 hours for 170 pesos. The come back takes 3 hours because the bus follows a different path.
The bus is comfortable with air conditioning (too cold !!! take a jacket with you) and the ubiquitous music (only merengue !!!)
Taxi are more expensive.
The bus makes a brief stop just to make the passengers stretch their legs or have a snack or go to the toilet (toilet ????....I can't describe the toilet...).
In this pic you can see the refresh point and .....the sausage hanging up !!!!!

OK

This is one of the many hundreds of bridges around the country, the Dom. Rep. has lots of rivers and waterways so they are very common place, unlike in the western part of the country near the Haiti border, this is where many bateyes are located, they were built to house seasonal Haitians sugar cane workers, but later many of them settled there, thus having family, there're many Haitians-Dominicans there, the gov has a hard time of educating people not to cut the trees to make charcoal with it, desforestation it's a continuing problem there, also many poor dominicans do this in the mountains and woods, hence the lack of waterways and green in that part of the country.

In Santo Domingo the traffic is chaotic. With chaotic I mean there are no rules. If you go by car take care to other cars. It's very hard to understand if there is the highway code. It's better to take a bus or a guagua. If you take a taxi, agree upon the price before leaving.

Plane is the best way and fastest way. But if u have alot of money, and your not in a rush, u can take a cruise.
Car is the best way. Cabs are expensive, even in U.S. dollars.Also buses offer a good means of transportation.

I still dont get the picture, cause if we would have flown only the people who had to go to Puerto Plata would have been in a bus for 4 hours. When we came in the airport of Santa Domingo we had to fill in the document for getting in the Dominican Republic and getting out. Everybody on boart of the plane still had to do this, so can you imagine about 500 people in a row waiting to get this form and fill it in???

As you can see Frans and i had a nice pleasant flight..no ups and downs so far....just had a nice meal! Cant remember what...but i do know i had a plastic knife and fork, cause of what had happend in New York on the 11th of September.

This is something i do like...the way the plane is flying...its nice to see where you are and where you are going. Always near New York you get some turbulance...and if the sea is coloured light blue you have a nice flight!

We would have flown about 11 hours and an other 2 traveling and waiting to get to Punta Cana. We first would have gone to Puerto Plata and after that to Punta Cana....this screen in the plane is telling you the hours and minutes till you get there...if something is frustrating its this screen...you are sour of all the sitting and then you think you are halfway...nope...still 7 hours to go...!!