New routines

July 3, 2007

Happy Birthday Liberty!!!

After three weeks here in Luperon we’ve begun to establish daily and weekly routines. This has less to do with time constraints and more to do with the fact that there isn’t a whole lot to do here so you figure that, hey, today is Tuesday, isn’t today vegetable truck day?… it takes all of an hour, but then we know that we’ve accomplished the day’s task and can go about the rest of our daily routine unaccosted by our concience.

So, here is our weekly calendar of events:

Daily Routine:
06.30 wake up
06.45 go running and exercise
08.00 shower, breakfast on Whisper, wait for the wind to start blowing so that the boat cools down.
10.00-12.00 proceed with day-specific weekly activities
12.00 lunch (usually at Pico Pollo in Luperon consisting of rice, beans, chicken or beef, salad and water)
13.00-16.00 Hide from sun and let stomach recuperate.
16.00 Dingy to town to get food for dinner (usually bread and tomatoes), sit in the park, have ice cream
18.00 Back to Whisper for dinner, reading, playing games, socializing with other boaters, etc.
21.00 Cruisers bedtime… yes it looks rather sedentary, but you should try to be active with 90 degree heat, 90% humidity and no A/C, no ice and no cold drinks.


Monday: Fun Day! (this is in order to prevent getting a case of the Mondays, with which Kristen was afflicted for 3 years straight when she had to start the work week) Our Mondays will probably involve going on a day-trip somewhere.

Tuesday: Vegetable truck at 8am, then proceed with daily routine (see above)

Wednesday & Thursday: Boat project days.

Friday: Do laundry and clean Whisper

Saturday: Watch baseball in town, drink beer.

Sunday: Cruiser’s swap meet at the marina in the morning. Go to the beach, drink beer and eat fried food in the afternoon.



Hanging out at the beach on Sunday with Jim and Wendy from Merengue. It's "the" place to be on Sunday afternoons with food stands, loud loud merengue and bachata and cold beer. The water in the ocean is the same temperature as the air so we spent most of the day sitting in the shade talking and people-watching.


The Muelle (pier) in Luperon.


Local fishing boats tied up to the pier.


A double rainbow over the harbour after an afternoon thunderstorm.



A day trip to Santiago


The Monument, in Santiago. We spent a day in Santiago yesterday, Kristen's first time back in seven years. It was all pretty much the same, even the bars and restaurants around the monument were the same and the stores down the main shopping street were unchanged. Although it did seem as if more stores had air conditioning. It was fun to go back to see the changes and to see how it has remained the same.


Pizza! We had lunch at Pizza Hut, our first pizza since we left the States. soo greasy and cheesy!


TV TV TV! (and a store with very cold air conditioning!). It was fun to look in the shops in Santiago and realize that we didn't need anything they had to offer!


A side street in downtown Santiago with some old houses.


El Gran Teatro del Cibao (the theater) in Santiago next to the Monument. Unfortunately it was closed so we weren't able to look inside, but it supposedly seats 15,000 people.