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Last week four Stromtroopers and their spouses went on a great riding tour of the central mountains and the north coast of the Dominican Republic with Robert Cooper and his wife, Alida (AL-eeda), of Motocaribe. We totaled about 600 miles of riding mainly two lane country roads with some congested city riding and small town & village riding. The mountain roads are great riding with 1st & 2nd gear curves, but often with obstructed sight lines, so no peg scraping. You never know when a truck is broken down in your lane around that curve, or a goat in the road, or anything unexpected at all. The coastal roads have great views, as do many of the mountain roads. If I rode fast here, it cuts down the sight seeing, and I can ride fast at home. One couple each rode a strom, two couples rode as rider/pillion, and my wife rode in the van with Alida. (My wife who never before showed any interest in being on two motorized wheels now thinks she should learn to ride pillion and we go back in two years! I'm thinking that she should take a scooter riding course to learn the dynamics, then we practice riding double before we head south. Maybe she'll even want her own scooter....)
We flew into DR's #2 city, Santiago, where Robert and Alida met us and drove us to their base camp in the mountain city of Jarabacoa (Hara-bah-co-ah). They put us up in the best hotel in town for two nights. We rode two days of mountain riding in that region, then packed up and rode to the Samana (SAH-mah-nah) Peninsula and a luxo resort my wife thought was like a landlocked cruise liner. Many European travelers come there and never go outside the gates. We, of course, got on our bikes around 8:30 each day and rode. Rode to beautiful perfect Caribbean beaches with no one around. Rode to a horse ride to a waterfall were we swam in the pool at the bottom. Rode to more beaches and along twisty coastal mountain roads. Three days in Samana with one non-riding rest day at a great beach with almost no one around, really good beach cafe for lunch, then rode back to Jarabacoa--two more days there with two more days of mountain riding.
Robert's photos on his motocaribe.com web site are accurate--we were there. Here's a short slide show we put together of shots we took before our card was full:
Dominican Republic by Moto | Roxio PhotoShow
Summary---great fun, very good outfit, we'll likely go with them again.
We flew into DR's #2 city, Santiago, where Robert and Alida met us and drove us to their base camp in the mountain city of Jarabacoa (Hara-bah-co-ah). They put us up in the best hotel in town for two nights. We rode two days of mountain riding in that region, then packed up and rode to the Samana (SAH-mah-nah) Peninsula and a luxo resort my wife thought was like a landlocked cruise liner. Many European travelers come there and never go outside the gates. We, of course, got on our bikes around 8:30 each day and rode. Rode to beautiful perfect Caribbean beaches with no one around. Rode to a horse ride to a waterfall were we swam in the pool at the bottom. Rode to more beaches and along twisty coastal mountain roads. Three days in Samana with one non-riding rest day at a great beach with almost no one around, really good beach cafe for lunch, then rode back to Jarabacoa--two more days there with two more days of mountain riding.
Robert's photos on his motocaribe.com web site are accurate--we were there. Here's a short slide show we put together of shots we took before our card was full:
Dominican Republic by Moto | Roxio PhotoShow
Summary---great fun, very good outfit, we'll likely go with them again.