On the Road

I just got back from the capital. I was there for a Peace Corps Conference to mark the 1 year of service in country. The journey is about 330 km, or 200 miles.

The DR is roughly the size of Maryland

Google Maps says that the journey should about 5.5 hours. A pair of capitaleños were in town recently and they made the journey in less than that but they did it in the middle of the night and had a hot shit 4x4 vehicle to navigate the rough roads.

August 2016

In the US, I can imagine a town-to-town journey of that distance taking as little as 3 hours, depending on traffic. On public transit in the Dominican Republic it usually takes Cat and I around 7 to 9 hours. The first 1.5 are spent just getting to the nearest paved road.

Conditions of the road vary depending on the rain. We're in the middle of the rainy season now and things have been deteriorating steadily, so that 1.5 is now about 2 for a journey of 35 km. The grader truck that comes by 2 or 3 times a year won't be by until the pause in rain that comes in the fall.

I try not to think about it.

The dirt road intersects with the paved road at a military checkpoint where la guardia civil desultorily checks the papers of anyone who doesn't ¨look Dominican¨. Sometimes that includes me but normally it is limited to those of obvious Haitian descent. El chequeo is at one of the peaks in the mountain range and afterwards our route to town is a descent down a curvy mountain road.  

I do this in the back of a pick up truck - the cabina is reserved for ladies, children, and the elderly - so I literally need to hang on to my hat. Passengers share space with the cargo: crops for sale going to market, empty gas tanks or empty water bottles that need refilling, etc. Sometimes, it's standing room only.

At least 10 more will fit in comfortably.

Two or three trucks leave the every morning. They are the only reliable transport out of town. It's possible to get a later lift but far from certain. If you want to be sure to make it to your destination you leave early.

The truck drops us in town outside the small local office of a large bus company: Caribe Tours. Accommodations are comparable to a Greyhound bus but in term of cultural importance CT is American Airlines.

I am a veteran long distance bus rider: I haven't owned a car since I was 19 and I am almost twice old that now. For much of my early adulthood I was too broke for airfare. In my early 20s, when every trip outside of Michigan was worth hours of discomfort, I considered any trip under 24 hours to be short. I took the bus as far east as Rhode Island, as far south as Atlanta, and far West as the boot-heel of New Mexico. A journey of 6 hours doesn't phase me.

The bus makes stops in most of the towns along the route, including a 10 minute break in Santiago, the DRs second largest city. I usually sleep part or most of the way.

We arrive in the early afternoon. From the main parada (bus stop) in the capital it is another half hour to the retreat center. Instead of a guagua (local bus) or carro público (imagine a sedan with 7 people in it that drives a fixed route), we opt for a direct cab. As it is an official PC event we get reimbursed for the passage: otherwise the trip would cost nearly 1000 pesos each - exactly 1/14 of my monthly salary.

The conference was held in the same retreat center where we were first received upon arrival in country. It was nice to see it again. The opportunity to catch up with old friends and share our experiences of the past year made the journey worth the while.

This view didn't hurt either.