Outback Safari - An Excursion Into The Dominican Republic

When you stay at an All-Inclusive Resort in a tropical destination are you the type of person to just sit around on your beach chair and soak up the wonderful sun? That may sound great to you but for me, it isn’t the case as I learnt while on my first tropical vacation.

When we woke up on the first day in Punta Cana we had a meeting with our trip advisor from Air Canada Vacation she informed us of the various excursions and activities that we could go on outside of our resort. There were a couple of adventures that peeked our interest and the first one we booked was for a general tour of the local area to get a feel for the Dominican Republic; The Outback Safari.

The following morning we were greeted by a white truck (yes you’ll notice that the above image shows an orange truck with strips) and we climbed aboard with 14 other people and started out of our resort with Louis our guide.

On our trip to our first destination (Coconut Farm) Louis went over several points about Dominican life and their history. It’s pretty interesting but I won’t go into that detail, let’s just say that the Dominican Republic’s nick name is `Little Spain`.

Our first destination was a small family farm where they grow coconuts to primarily make coconut milk and coconut oil along with their own brew of coffee. It was interesting to be able to go through this family’s house to see how people in the Dominican can live. Louis informed us that this family receives a monthly payment in order for the Outback Safari to bring in people and tour their home and business. Of course the family also makes money selling vanilla, coconut oil to the tourists as well. The one thing we noticed is that the vanilla this family creates is not pure vanilla as the ingredients on the label said there were artificial flavours among some other ingredients.

After they went through the demonstration of how coconut milk is created as well as how they extract the coconut oil we were on our way to out next destination; Coco and Coffee plantation.

Along the way we stopped off in several spots of interest as Louis pointed out various tidbits about the land and its history. We were approached by a bunch of children with hibiscus flowers hoping to exchange them for money. An older child seemed to be hustling the younger ones into getting money from the tourists.

Robyn also pointed out the `living fences` along the way. These are branches that have been staked into the ground (which is very fertile) and then start to regrow in the soil. The branches then turn into trees and grow around the barbed wire creating a living fence of sort.

Eventually we arrived at our next destination the Coco and Coffee plantation, the downside to this was it seems the Outback Safari also has multiple tours happening at the same time and all the trucks seem to get to the destinations at the same time, so a group of 16 people end up being 5 times that at each spot. A bit crowded for me and this is the reason why I believe I would love to travel with GAP Adventure next.

Most people when they think of pineapple think that they grow in trees, well it’s wrong and I can prove it with the above picture. That’s right; pineapple grows in the ground and if you’ve ever been to the Dole plantation in Hawaii you’ll see huge fields of them.

This coco and coffee plantation also was home to a couple of local animals; crocodiles, turtles, snakes and crabs. This is a bit odd but I am sure this is mainly for the children’s entertainment. You could also get your picture taken with a bunch of constrictor snakes too.

Each destination seemed to have a particular tour guide explain what went on at the various farms etc. This time it was Louis and he explained how chocolate was made and shows us what raw chocolate looked like and let us try some. It was fairly good, a bit slimy but we were told not to eat it, just to chew and suck on the pieces. Louis also went through the making of coffee as well as explaining things like what Mamajuana (the Dominican’s answer to all illnesses and a nice taste alcoholic drink). There was also a boy trying to give out hibiscus. I also noticed a small Dominican boy with his pockets packed with candy (how did he get that candy including rockets?).

After we tried the raw chocolate, sugarcane, papaya, chocolate milk and Mamajuana it was time to head to our next destination. One of the ladies on our truck kept throwing Twizzlers at the kids following behind. It was this lady who managed to stuff the little child’s pockets with sugary junk. Our tour guide scolded her because it was illegal for tourists to give candy to the children. This makes them rely and wait on the trucks when they come by turning them into beggars. The lady shrugged and tossed the entire bag of Twizzlers over the edge and into the dirt where the children snatched it up, started eating the dirty Twizzlers and tossed the bag onto the side of the road. This is the type of person I’d want to smack. She didn’t care what impact she had on the kids, she thought she was doing a good thing.

Our last destination of our tour was a beach. Unfortunately at this time I cannot remember the name of the beach but the waves were a good height for boogy boarding. A small disappointment for me was that all of the Outback Safari trucks (about 8 in total) stopped here as well as a Jeep tour (20 Jeeps) and about a dozen people on ATVs as well. This made the beach a bit busier than Robyn and I would have liked it and we kept being herded back into the crowd by the Outback Safari guides (liability issues I suppose).

We also stopped off at a place called the Rum Shack. You could purchase various types of Dominican rum as well as various type of cigars. A lot of money exchanged hands at this place. We didn’t purchase anything but all the other truck loads did.

On our way back we stopped off and took pictures of the only snow you’ll see in the Dominican Republic. Louis (our guide) thought it was funny that our truck was all Canadians and that we all wanted to take pictures of it.

Two things during the trip that were a bit interesting that was different from most of the information he spoke of were about the telephone poles and of Santeria. All the telephone poles in the Dominican come from Canada. Yes we use our best lumber for telephone poles. The second being that the practices of Voodoo are hidden behind the Roman Catholic Church and is called Santeria but primarily done by Dominican’s closer to Haiti. Whether or not this is true… well it is what he told us. He said that was the explanation of why the houses are of vibrant colours too.

I would recommend doing the Outback Safari to anyone who is in the Dominican Republic as they over a nice all day trip around the country side with some interesting information about the Dominican and what it’s all about. You also get to enjoy a very good lunch buffet before you hit the beach so Robyn and I thought it was worth the 85US price for each person.

JuanValdez delivering his Coffee