Relocating to DR: Family Life

If relocating for work, would this not play a part in where you live in the country?

Cabarete is a good possibility. Activecabarete.com wiil show you a little about the area sailing small time,watersports like kiting surfing and surfing and nice big bay with 30 rest,bar,combos right on the beach safe and much more family orientated then sosua

Depending on whether this new job is with Barrick or the other gold company or with Falconbridge, the nickle company you are going to be rather limited as to your place of residence.

I would suggest La Vega or Santiago with Bonao a third choice, and Cotui a fourth. The traffic out of Santo Domingo is horrendous these days and would make life very uncomfortable.

Santiago provides you with the needed entertainment, recreational and health providers, certainly some of the best in the entire Caribbean region and more accessible than Santo Domingo--I cannot imagine trying to cross Sto Dgo in a hurry to get to any of the major clinics...sorry you folks that live there...

No matter which of the places you chose (except for Cotui and Bonao) you have access to the sea just an hour or so away,. mountains are half to three quarters of an hour away.

Safe living is considered to be the norm in La Vega or Santiago.

Also a consideration is the fact that there are intelligent young people that can become a circle of friends, especially in Santiago, a more cosmopolitan city than La Vega (but La Vega will do...yes it will)...so you probably need to take a week or more and get a feel for the place.

Feel free to ask more questions...no problem.

HB

Alot of the Barrick Gold mine people have settled thier families here on the north coast (Sosua and Cabarete) with lots of secure gated communities and condos. The wives and kids are here full time and Hubbie usually joins them for thier long weekends off.

Bob K

Hillbilly has it right. If I were you I'd stay away from the towns which tend to be sex tourism destinations.

There are some Barrick workers living in Metro Country Club - a gated community in Juan Dolio - south coast. Advantages are nice houses, safe gated community, 45 mins to capital, 5 mins drive to beach and good restaurants. Disadvantages are that your wife would need a car to get out. The wives of the Barrick workers are on their own mon-fri and do not go out at all as they are too scared!!

matilda

As some have presumed, will you be on site M-F at the mine and then have the weekends free? I have a neighbor who is in charge of building the roads to one of the mines and he lives in Cabarete.

I think the best choices would be Santiago if you want the city life or Cabarete if you want to be near the ocean, but then I don't know enough about where exactly you will be during the week.

By the way, there is virtually no camping in the DR. A better option is to visit the various locations such as Jarabacoa. Monte Cristi, Luperon, the Samana peninsula, etc to see the variety the DR has to offer.

One of my neighbors has a daughter in elementary school and through her they have met a number of Barrick employees who live in Sosua and Cabarete. From what I understand, those employees live a very normal life, except that the husband is home only on weekends. My neighbor tells me the children of the Barrick employees are in surfing school and other activities the daughter is participating in, and the adults have a circle of friends who entertain each other. Most weekends my neighbors go to a party hosted by a Barrick employee or where Barrick employees are.

Yes stay away from Cabarete and Sousa......your children wont understand that "that man had a different girl friend yesterday mommy"....it's awful here. I wish i knew of a out reach program to help the women empower themselves.

There are plenty of families living in Sosua and Cabarete and there is plenty to do for the children and their is a good International school.
As an expat living here myself now over a year at the NC, I love it here. We go to Sosua and Cabarete both for the beaches and restaurants and for the ambiance these little beach towns give.
The other kind of ambiance then some of here are talking about and probably the reason why they are so desperate to talk the two down as hard as possible.
Each to its own and as far as I am concerned, the two can live perfectly next to each other.

Acira