We teamed up with another cruising couple, who just also happened to be from Texas! Right?!, What are the odds? We hired a driver, named Eddie, the brother of the dock master. Eddie was extremely nice, spoke pretty good english and cleaned his SUV up for us. He drove us to three of the hot spots for tourists in Santo Domingo. At each location, he saw to it that we paid and got into the place, then waited for us outside. No time limits, no hurry. This is our day in a nut shell. Too much, to detail it all.

First stop. Las Tres Ojos national park. It is a group of three lakes underground in caves. It was really beautiful and pleasantly cool underground. Pictured above.

Second stop. Faro de Colon. A museum of the Americas and mausoleum of Christopher Columbus. The architect of the building was magnificent, the marble structure around the actual mausoleum of Cristotobal Colon is impressive, the many exhibits from all over the Americas are very interesting. There was also an exhibit dedicated to when Pope John Paul II visited in 1992.

Third Stop. Old City. Long, long before what Santo Domingo is what it is today. It was a walled in fort and city. They have worked to preserve much of the old city making it available to the public. Eddie suggested at this point we hire a professional guide to take us around old city, which we did. The guide showed us around the fort, explained a lot of the history, pointed out several old buildings explained what they were, and what they currently are. One of which was Christopher Columbus' house when he was here. There is a very large plaza in which they hold free concerts at times.

After all this walking and a bit of shopping along the way we were all feeling tired and very hungry. We reunited with Eddie and back to Boca Chica. We asked Eddie to take us to his favorite restaurant for lunch. It was Italian, he likes spaghetti!! But, when you add Presidente beer to it, that makes it Dominican!