news from taco jones: Headed to Bayahibe

We woke at 4am on Sunday, July 29th to head to the airport. Our flight was scheduled for 5:50 am, and we were supposed to land in Santo Domingo, DR at 1:20pm. From my research, I anticipated that we would arrive at our resort by 4pm. I looked forward to hitting the beach or pool right away and relaxing before our first night's dinner, but this was not how things would turn out.

At 5:25am, the Delta employee announced boarding had begun for first class. I was quite excited as we were soon to be on our way! At 5:40 she announced that there was going to be a delay. It wasn't long before the passengers that were already on board were allowed to deplane and wait in the terminal. The plane had a hydraulic fluid leak, and there was no telling how long we were going to be delayed. This created a big problem for me as there was only one flight from Atlanta to Santo Domingo, and the delay meant we weren't going to make it.

The lady at the counter assured me that she would get us out of LR, but after a half hour I gave up and called Delta. They confirmed that we would not make our connecting flight and that there were no other flights. I was able to get us redirected through Punta Cana instead, but this led to questions as to whether our pre-arranged shuttle company would honor our arrangement in a different airport. I was a bit worried, but thrilled that we would be landing in the Dominican by 4:30.

For our trouble, we were given vouchers for lunch while we were in Atlanta. We grabbed McDonalds as we were already short on time to make our connection. Another nice perk (not that McDonald's is really a perk, but FREE food is always nice) was that we were seated in the exit row on both flights. I thought that the 3.5 hours on the plane would never end! I kept looking out at the beautiful, clear water below and wishing we could speed the flight up!

Once we arrived in Punta Cana, we were herded through the immigration area, and we were nearly run over by a little Asian woman who was intent on getting her family of 5 through the line before those of us ahead of her. I was a bit cranky at this point, and entertained myself by assuring that she did not get past me. It's the little things sometimes.

We lucked out with the shuttle service, and were placed in a van with another couple. They were staying in Punta Cana, so we got to drive past most of the resorts in that area before making the trip to the Dreams La Romana resort. We got in the van around 5pm, and arrived at the resort at 7pm. It was a long 2 hours with some of the craziest traffic I've seen. Narrow two lane roads with cars passing without enough room and scooters everywhere. Our driver talked with his hands and picked his nose too much for my liking, and I was pleased to get out of that van.

We were greeted with a glass of champagne as we walked into the lobby. The entrance was beautiful, and the stress of the day quickly began to leave me. The champagne was terrible, so we grabbed a beer to take in the view of the pool before heading to our room.

A welcome Presidente Light as we review the resort map

Our room was beautiful. Very modern and spacious. We dropped our stuff, and headed to the buffet for dinner. It was decent, but I am so thankful that we didn't have to eat there for dinner any other evenings.

The evening's entertainment was the Michael Jackson show. I'm a sucker for seeing MJ shows, so we headed over to check it out. The team did a great job, and he was probably the best dancer I've seen as MJ but his lip synching sucked. haha! We bailed fairly early and headed to watch karaoke in the lobby bar instead.