Wednesday, November 7, 2001

November 7, 2001 - Wedding, Las Terranas


We have just spent several minutes trying to figure out why all our journal entries since May 13 are gone.  It turn out that we haven't updated this page since then!  How embarrassing...

Our wedding has come and gone and here we are back at work and back in the Dominican Republic.  It is unbelievable how that long year of waiting, planning, and stressing finally paid off with a beautiful wedding day surrounded by all of our wonderful family and friends.  Have a look at the wedding page to see some pictures.


So what's new?  Since we returned back here we have been keeping a pretty low profile and doing lots of relaxing.  This past weekend was a long one so we made a trip up to the northern coastal town of Las Terrenas and met up with our Canadian friends Mark, Terri, and Carolyn Haugen.  Besides being eaten alive by mosquitoes we had a great time!  We found a superb little Vietnamese restaurant in the town which we visited a couple times.  On the Sunday we took a horseback ride to a waterfall called Salto de Limon.  The horses were quite good and the ride was very scenic.  By the time we returned three hours later we were filthy, tired, and extremely hungry so we devoured a delicious Dominican lunch of rice, beans, and chicken.


This coming weekend Ana's friend Julie, who lives in Puerto Plata, is planning to visit us here in Santo Domingo.  We haven't seen her for a while so that will be nice.

Not much else to report.  The Presidentes here are still icy cold!


Kris

Sunday, May 13, 2001

May 13, 2001 - Barbados, Puerto Rico


This is a start of a new year for me (Kris) as I turned 29 years old yesterday!  We had a very relaxing day, and finished it off with dinner at a nice steak restaurant and a marvelous cigar.  We have been very bad recently at keeping our site updated so I thought today is a fine day to write another update.

Since last time, we have had visits from our friends Tom and Linda from Detroit, Mike and Nola from Chicago, and Martin and Marianne from Denmark.  As well, Ana has found herself a new job....at Shell!  In fact we are now working together on the same project and having a great time of it!  She has been involved mostly in the training and documentation side and has been doing a superb job.  We will be finishing the work in Dominican Republic within the next couple weeks then the plan is to move on to doing the rollout of our system to the other 17 countries in the region.  We don't exactly know what will happen yet, though we will likely be keeping a central base then just traveling out to the other countries periodically.  That will be nice for us as we don't have to pack up and change homes every month, we were not looking forward to that.


Of course, the wedding is fast approaching.  Ana is returning to Canada at the end of May for two weeks for her bridal shower and also to send out invitations and sort out the remaining tasks on our "Wedding To-Do List".  We will update the wedding page today with the latest so check that one out.

Ana and I recently took a long weekend trip to Barbados and Puerto Rico.  Part of the reason was to get a repair done to Ana's engagement ring, which I purchased in Barbados last year.  We had a very nice time and checked out some of our old favourite hangouts such as the almighty Mojos drinking hole where I imbibed in the frosty delight of many delicious Banks beers.  On the way back from Barbados we spent a full day in San Juan, Puerto Rico.  Our friend Tico picked us from the airport and played the perfect host.  We had a great tour of old San Juan and spent a few hours there.  We also hit the malls (Plaza de las America) and did some damage to the credit card.  The majority of things were cheaper than in Santo Domingo so we stocked up on a lot of stuff.  We both really liked the city and would love to spend more time there exploring the country side.

I suppose that is all the news for now.  I'm also going to update the Dominican Republic page today with details of the new places we have visited so have a look at that one.

Oh yes, today is Mother's Day, have a wonderful one Mom!!!


Kris

Monday, February 5, 2001

February 5, 2001 - Puerto Plata, Cabarete


So much to tell and so little time to write it seems.  As Kris mentioned we went to Canada for Christmas (which already seems like a lifetime ago).  We had a fantastic time, but as always, too short.  

We spent Christmas with my parents and then New Years with Kris' family in Saskatoon.  We did all the Canadian winter activities like ice-fishing, tobogganing  and snowmobiling.  It was so nice to see everyone again.  We have some photos of the holidays on our Saskatoon page.  

Since returning to Santo Domingo I have quit my job and we've had Mark and Linda (Kris' aunt and uncle for a visit).  My job was as the production manager at an internet company.  I quickly found out that the Dominican way of doing business is a lot different from what I am used to.  It was a very good learning experience and I made many new friends, but it simply was not worth the money or the hours spent.  I have returned to making websites and also translating at home.  It seems to be going well and I'm much happier.   As well, it was nice to be home and spend some time with Mark and Linda during their visit.  We spent many nights on our balcony and a few afternoons by the pool sipping cervezas. It was a great visit.

A few weeks ago Kris and I went to the north coast to Puerto Plata for the  weekend.  It was fun, especially because we got to spend some time with my friend Julie from Toronto.  She has been living there for the past 2 years.  She gave us a great tour of the Puerto Plata area and we also had a great seafood dinner at a local restaurant owned by a Canadian couple.


On our way back to Santo Domingo we stopped at Caberete, which is a small town about 40 km east of Puerto Plata.  We think we have discovered our favorite place on the island.  After much searching for a place with some character and no all-inclusive resorts we finally found it.  There is not a resort in sight and it is said to be one of the best windsurfing locations in the world.  This little town is full of small hotels and restaurants and has one of the nicest beaches we've seen on the island.  We only spend the afternoon there, but our next trip will definitely be to Caberete!!

We are going to be quite busy with guests in the coming months...on February 17 both my friend Christina from Brantford and our friends Tom and Linda arrive.  Tom and Linda are staying at a resort a couple hours from here but we still hope to spend some time with them.  A week later our friends Mike and Nola arrive from Chicago.   Three weeks after that our Danish friends Martin and Marianne arrive for 2 weeks.  That's a full schedule!


The timing for all of our visitors has been perfect as Kris will begin doing some traveling with his job soon.  We aren't sure of where but we are both getting a bit of the traveling itch, so it will be nice to see some new spots.  Don't get us wrong, the past few months of living a somewhat normal lifestyle has been great!   Unpacking our suitcases for more than 3 weeks has been a real pleasure!!

Thanks for your patience in waiting for an update to our site.  Now that I'm working from home, I hope to dedicate some more time to it.  Hope to hear from you all soon.


Ana