Samana, Dominican Republic

Thursday, 9:00 AM -

Our final day at the beach! *sigh*.

Our destination was waiting right in the middle of the bay -

the beautiful island of Cayo Levantado.
This time, we had to take tender boats as transportation to and from shore as there wasn't any port for the ship to dock on.

The Samana Peninsula is located in the northeast end of the Dominican Republic, between Samana Bay and the Scottish Bay. It has miles of virgin white and golden sand beaches. These beaches are shaded by thousands of coconut palms. In fact, it has the greatest amount, in the world of coconut trees per square meter.


Cayo Levantado is a small island with one of the most impressive beaches in the Caribbean. Our shore trip included access to beach chairs, live entertainment, local artisans market, souvenir stores, clean & working showers (yes!), beach volleyball and other games. Hungry? There was also an optional $15.00 barbecue lunch.



Speaking of food, instead of having the all-you-can-eat barbecue buffet, P and I opted to order lunch from some local fishermen who were tending a rickety shack nearby. They had assured us that for $20.00 per person, we would be served a bountiful plate full of grilled, fresh jumbo shrimps (maybe, a few prawns?) and some salad for lunch. So much for the anticipation. It turned out that our $45.00 (included was a pinacolada served in a leaking pineapple) got us a plate piled with about a pound and a half of small/medium shrimps. Yep, the same-sized shrimps that I get in Chinatown for $5.99/lb. The "salad" was some shredded cabbage topped with 2 slivers of tomato - and not a drop of dressing.

Suckers. That's who we were. I was seething mad I couldn't even make myself eat a single one of those damn crustaceans. These guys may be trying to make a livelihood - but for a 300% profit?!  For $40.00, fishermen back home in the Philippines will give you pounds of huge prawns and slipper lobsters - and will even throw in a free crab as well.

(Mental note: Go home for a holiday next year).

Oh well, so much for that. Chalk it up to another lesson learned. We didn't let this rather unfortunate lunch incident mar this lovely, gorgeous day. At least S and I could say that we saw a lobster that day - or rather, a semblance of it:    P's sunburned legs.