The Dominican Republic presidential results will be announced later today. The early results put Danilo Medina ahead of Hipolito Mejia by 51% to 47%. As a reminder, most businesses will be closed today which also means that it will probably be difficult to get a public car if you are planning on going anywhere.

While there is a prohibition on selling alcohol today you can expect things to be getting pretty loud and a lot of drinking going on when the final presidential results come in so it might be a good idea to stay off the road. Even with Medina as the early winner there are still people (a lot of kids) walking up and down the streets screaming LLego Papa.

Election Result Day Safety

(more…)

Many people coming to the Dominican Republic choose to stay at one Hotel on one beach. Which is nice but you don’t get a very good feel of the island. If you have time (at least a couple weeks) it’s nice to explore the island some. You have two choices in doing this, one is to rent a car. This is pretty expensive and your nerves will be shot after a couple hours of trying to navigate through one of the cities. The second way is to use the public transportation.

This takes a little getting used to and a bit of knowledge beforehand really helps. There are several forms of transportation here Tour buses, Guaguas (public cars or vans), Motor conchos (guys on motor cycles) and Taxi’s.  (more…)