Los Galeras, Oct 16th-18th

(Posted by: Doug)

Because, as things get chilly, as you turn up your heaters and wrap yourself in layers, as you check the 5 day forecast before you think of heading out of town for the weekend, we know that you're not at all sick of seeing photos of us sipping mango shakes and munching coconuts on spotless Caribbean beaches, we're back to tell you about the best one yet.

This weekend we went to the Samana province, off on the East part of the island, to a small beach town called Los Galeras. After some adventure getting there, including running away from a crazed old lady, we finally made it and chose a (bad) place to stay. Los Galeras is known for having "Playa Rincon" in its vicinity, which carries the tag line, "one of the top 5 beaches in the world." Though we were close, we actually never even made it to this beach. We did, however, see some pretty great stuff but did not bring our camera for much of it. Here's what we did take some shots of, though. Fairly short post on this one.

Argh.

Looks nice, but the dumpiest place we've stayed so far by a long shot. On the other hand, super nice restaurant here run by an awesome Romanian family.

Hands down the best food we've had in this country. Run by a super nice Italian lady with remarkable culinary skills.

From left: Bridget, JP (who's clearly very pleased), Stace, and Caitlin at dinner.

Island off the coast of the main beach (but by no means the nicest) of Los Galeros.

More dinner.

We ran by this painting of the main character from Stacy's favorite book of all time, The Little Prince. Except for a few motorbikes, it was nice and quiet here. Good times.

P.S. Please email Stacy and/or leave comments requesting that Stacy once again grace this blog with her presence. There's a bunch of shots from her birthday that need to get posted, but I have as yet been unable to talk her into it:(

Just another neat photo

Oh, silly.

(posted by: Stacy)

Just a fun, non-beach photo of my future home:

I can't wait to see things like this!

(posted by: Stacy)

So, the contracts have been sent off and we're awaiting plane tickets. In a little over seven weeks, I will be venturing into the great unknown (also known as the Caribbean). While part of me is screaming "white sandy beaches! dolphins! scuba diving! new adventures! summer ALL YEAR LONG!" the other part of me is wondering "will I be safe? will I miss my family and friends terribly? what if this job isn't as amazing as I'm imagining it? will I be a good teacher?"

In any case, here's the scoop in case you're out of the loop (ah, I'm a poet!):

On July 28th (or at least that's the date we're planning on), Doug and I will be leaving for Santo Domingo, the capital city of the Dominican Republic.

We'll be teaching at a dual-immersion English-Spanish school - I'll be teaching high school English (9th, 10th, and 11th) and Doug will be teaching 1st grade (up until yesterday, we thought he would be teaching 2nd grade, but that changed).

In addition to getting our immunizations (contrary to popular belief, the hepatitis shot hurts MUCH more than the tetanus shot), we have been sorting through our things, getting rid of pretty much everything we own so that we can start anew.

That's all for now - more details to come as I (and Doug) have more time to write.  Love you all!