Dominican Republic Recap- Part 1

I've finally gotten myself together to start this recap of one of our best vacations--although any vacation that involves my husband, the beach and sunshine is pretty much a recipe for a great time!

We woke up early Sunday morning and caught our flight to Philly and then down to DR. 

We got in around 1:30 and made our way to the resort--we stayed at the Barcelo Bavaro Beach, on the adults only side.

Guys, when I tell you this resort is huge, I'm not even kidding. It is MASSIVE. We had access to the other part of the resort, which was awesome because they had so many great restaurants, and a huge pool, shopping, entertainment, etc. But we were able to stay on our side for a quieter, less chaotic and more romantic time.

Unfortunately our first night we had two double beds (pushed together lol) because the resort was super busy with it being the Holy Week. So that was a bummer.  And we didn't have dinner reservations at any of the fancy restaurants that first night so we hit the buffet for dinner. Not the best, but it was our first night, I was wearing shorts and flip flops and no heavy coat was needed.
Things could have been worse!

It was an early night for us because we were so tired from our day of travel, so we crashed.

But, we woke up to this sunrise:

We had breakfast and made our way down to the beach for the day...and pretty much spent most of our days with this view:

The sand in the D.R. is SO soft, and during the highest heat of the day, you can walk on it  barefoot without burning your feet. Heaven!

We had lunch every day around the same time and had this view:

You can't have a bad day when that's your lunch view.

We also got our room moved the first morning we were there to one with a King sized bed and this beautiful view to wake up to every morning:

 That night we went to dinner at the Italian Restaurant and then we walked back to our side of the resort for the entertainment. 

pre-dinner picture (had to get creative using the table inside and a glass to get the pic)

The next day (Tuesday) was spent on the beach again (and pretty much every day), but we booked an excursion for Thursday. We spent the day reading, playing in the water, trying out tasty drinks and just relaxing together. I think I finished Book 1 of 4 on the trip, and started book 2.

That night we went to dinner at the seafood restaurant. The weather was super nice every night but this night was less humid than other nights, and the food was really tasty. 

We had dinner outside, overlooking the setting sun, with a bottle of wine

My view wasn't too shabby ;)

After dinner we discovered a coffee and cigar bar that we then went to every night (it was bigger inside than a Starbucks) because it had the BEST after-dinner coffees, desserts, liquors!

Irish Coffee, and Cafe Mocha, plus little desserts

 That night we went to the evening show on the resort (there were 2 a night, and I've never seen resort entertainment as good as it was here). This stage was huge and the amphitheater could have easily fit over 1000 people. We saw the Michael Jackson tribute show and it was SO good--I felt like I had actually seen MJ himself.

Every night after being on the other side of the resort, we would walk back to our side along the beach, under the moonlight. It was almost magical--I wish I could have taken a picture that did it justice.

Wednesday, we spent another gorgeous day on the beach and MG went kayaking

(I snapped a photo on his way back to shore)

I finished my second book of the trip and started my 3rd.

Every day there were boats on the water going by, music would be playing...it was just an awesome and relaxing atmosphere.

That night we went to dinner at the steak house, had our after-dinner coffees and watched the entertainment for the night before heading back to our side of the resort with another night-time walk on the beach :)

I'll be back with Part 2 of the recap which has our amazingly beautiful excursion pictures and the end of our trip.

Just looking through these makes me desperate for the DR beaches, the weather, and the incredible time we had.