[vNGiDaFX]

I just love the internet, visiting isn't the same in person as it is online but the two are getting closer by the day!

My wife and I have been exploring different countries (in person) in hope to find one to live in the very near future. I happen to be addicted to windsurfing so Cabarete and the DR made the list !

Research
For the past couple of months, we've been reading in English, French and Spanish a lot of different internet information sources; forums, news, wiki's, pictures & videos from the DR and Cabarete. I've been communicating with people that have been there, live there or want to live there .

This really helped us get a feel for what we were about to get into. We both had an extensive travel experience. I have to admit that I did get scared by all of the crime-related stories however it pretty much all lived up to our expectations. I was a little surprised to see that most houses/apartments had safety bars on windows and doors regardless of what type of property it was. Only a few houses in heavily guarded gated community didn't have them, it looks to be a necessity there .

Driving
I wanted maximum freedom for moving around so we rented a car, a nice bright-red shiny-new Chevrolet Spark, woo-hoo, so long for trying to be "under the radar". However, once used to the flow (only took a few seconds off of the POP airport to get it), we didn't really stick out that much. I was quite surprised by the number of new and nice vehicles out there. At first, I thought they must be all tourists until I realized that there weren't that many tourists there to boot this time of year! The pot holes weren't so bad but it's the missing manhole covers although generally smaller that were quite spooky to me. Saw two nice ones in Puerto Plata.

Houses
Thanks to Yenny, our favorite real estate agent, we were able to visit a few houses in the Sosúa/Cabarete area. One house didn't show nearly as well as it did online (water damage, electrical issues, dead sapo in the near-empty pool) but most of them showed about the same or better.

Apparently the dilemma with buying a house near the Sosúa/Cabarete is such: a house close to beach will rent easily, a house higher up in the hills will be cooler with potentially less corrosion but maybe not as safe as more isolated...

I ran into houses where the owners as a community opted for alarms and no security (most likely responsible for their latest break-in when no one was in the house). And on the other hand, saw many armed guards with shotguns, why not simply carry a gun on a belt or a taser or both?

Santo Domingo
After our short stay in Cabarete we drove to Santo Domingo via 21 through Moca and La Vega, it was a great drive. The road wasn't too bad, the GPS on my phone decided to quit working temporarily so we had to drive by "feel" which was entertaining for a while. I was surprised to see how clean the road was, I noticed that on pictures also but was expecting more trash on the roads and towns.

We saw many different vendors on the side of the street, not really knowing what they all were, they had coconuts, some sorts of grilled meat and chickens, big potatoes(?), flowers & large rugs .

Santo Domingo had more trash for sure that anywhere else we had visited. We stayed in the Zona Colonial, walked around there a little and along el Conde. We visited Los Tres (4) Ojos también and got yelled by their Politur female guard because we were wandering around too far. She said that we had a nice camera, that there was hardly anyone in the park and whatnot, she was afraid for us so we had to head back. I have noticed that they are really afraid that something happens to tourists.

We "shopped" at La Sirena, went to eat at a couple of restaurants, La Dolcerie was amazing and so was its customers. We discovered something else there for sure. It was definitely a complete different Santo Domingo in that area.

Getting lost
We got lost (somewhat) trying to find los 3 ojos, got lost trying to find highway entrances, and got caught in the Feminicidos event going on. The one-way streets take some used-to as well as figure out where to hop on the highway. However, people drive along without much hesitation which made it easier to figure out how things worked. Sometimes, I stopped when I didn't need to but they never jumped out in front, they let me by anyway !

What we are looking for
Besides the windsurfing criteria, my wife and I are also looking for a country or area that has a nice culture/history, more social benefis (such has health and education), active social life, restaurants, music, and that is family oriented. However, we don't like smaller places such as Bermuda for instance. We also like the fact that the DR seems to have lots of direct flights to many countries. We met lots of Russians, Germans, French & Americans in Cabarete which is nice.

The DR seem to meet a lot of our criteria except for the insecurity. We don't have much to steal but I think unfortunately it's not the point because some are willing to steal anything no matter how little. That bothers me some. I have a dog (don't mind having several), and I'm willing to setup the house to make it hard to break-in but can only do so much against the most dedicated thugs! My wife says she doesn't care and that I worry too much. While it's partly true, I prefer doing things that make sense !

Anyway, the plan is to think about the houses we saw, and return around XMas possibly.
I work with computers and would ideally work remotely removing the need to find work in the DR at least at first.

Any tips in regards to buying real estate & life around Cabarete? I've noticed that it's not really possible to go to the beach and rig up my windsurfing equipment and that it'd be better to store it in one of the centers, anyone has any experience/knows someone that can help with that?

Thanks all, looking forward to knowing the DR1 community some more.