Moving to Santo Domingo has resulted in some quite major changes for myself, Hannah and the dogs. Among some more challenging moments, there is one beacon of light - or green - in the city that is a relative oasis: Parque Mirador Sur.
Grass: a rare sight in Santo Domingo
The park was created in 1970
The capital of the DR is probably the biggest city we have lived in together. It definitely is the place that has felt most like a city. Busy, dirty, noisy. And that is just the street that we currently live on.
A common sight in our area, even though there are a lot of bins (the blue tubs in the right of the picture)
This intersection becomes very busy in the afternoon and evening
We also have been placed in an apartment, which is a new experience for Mini and Maxi. No garden with animals to entertain them for hours on end. No garden in which to toilet freely. No stimulation, essentially, which means that they are very animated whenever there is noise coming from the hallway. Our door is opposite the lift. There is therefore a lot of animation, usually in the form of barking.
We invested in a 'puppy patch' for the girls to use as a toilet: they prefer sitting on it...
What's behind the door?
Trying to walk the dogs is particularly challenging. The temperatures here are high, with the real feel and humidity increasing the heat stress. During the day, the ground is too hot for them to walk on. This, in addition to the business, noise and quite frankly filthy streets, mean that the dogs don’t really want to walk anywhere. There is one patch of dirt within 500 metres of the apartment at which we hope they do their business. Not ideal when they need to be taken out multiple times a day.
I have no idea about the bin collection schedule, but bins almost always seem full
There's a pavement under there somewhere
We are nothing if not creative and resilient, however. One example is putting the dogs into backpacks and walking them 1.5 kilometres or so to the ‘nearby’ park. Over two very busy roads. I’ll talk about driving another time, but that is an added stress.
Maxi enjoying life in the backpack
Mini taking in the sights from up high
But let’s focus on the positives. That park is called Mirador Sur: “south viewpoint”. If you reach certain sections, and squint a little bit, you can see the sea, so possibly, technically true. But the park is so much more than a viewpoint.
The road you can see on the left is usually closed to vehicles, allowing it to be used for exercise
This pond is next to a restaurant
Not all green spots are green - that top green section on this map is the Olympic Centre, which has almost zero grass
Its size, for one thing. Mirador Sur is quite narrow, but stretches for 5 kilometres across the western side of Santo Domingo. It is described as the ‘great green lung’ of the capital - as there aren’t many green spaces in the city limits, it isn’t hard to hit that description. But it is green, full of trees, and wonderful.
Sources I found suggest there are 77 types of tree, and over 34,000 trees, in the park
This tree is sometimes referred to as a 'flamboyant tree'
It’s the place to take your dog. There is an official ‘dog park’ about halfway through the park, which has become more accessible since we got a car. In between her not being nice to other dogs, we managed to get Mini to run up and down the bridge.
It has a few different structures, but mainly is a space where your dog can be off the lead
Queen of the Bridge
Parts of the park are named after one of the country’s most famous politicians: Dr Joaquin Balaguer. He was the 41st, 45th and 49th president of the Dominican Republic. The revered leader used to go for walks in this park to maintain his health. That legacy has been built upon hugely, as exercise is the main reason most people use the park.
Lots of sports...but not the national sport - baseball is banned in most parts of the park
I ran with a group one Saturday morning - we met at 5:30am, and had started running at 5:50am
On a map, it looks like a road bisects the park horizontally. In reality, it is the southern edge of the park, as the limestone rock drops off sharply after it. The road is used by cars at certain times on weekdays, but the rest of the time it is closed to road traffic. 2 lanes are reserved for cyclists, one for runners and walkers, and one…for rollerbladers.
The length of the park road is 5 kilometres
It is mostly unshaded, meaning you are in the sun if you run later
This is my running oasis. It is the lifeline for many other athletes as well. This place is busy in the mornings. When I say mornings, I mean any time after 5am. Running at a time like 9am is insane in this heat.
Sunrise during a run
Just the 97% humidity for a Saturday morning run...
Taking the idea of Central Park in New York City, Mirador Sur is an area of nature within a concrete jungle. It’s an area of cleanliness within a city of trash. It’s an area of peace within a city whose volume is often turned up to 11. We are hoping to move apartments to be nearer to the park: it would transform our feelings about Santo Domingo.
An aerial view from a local website showing the scale of the park
What would be the strangest place where you’ve seen a sports competition played? How about the ground floor of a shopping mall…
Squash at the Agora Mall
Wrestling in the Olympic Centre
The Dominican Republic is currently hosting the 25th edition of the Central American and Caribbean Games. As of last Wednesday, the Dominican Republic is also my current home. Happy coincidence.
The games run from July 26 to August 8
It is hot here, so not everyone is keen to participate
The Games, which I also saw in El Salvador in 2023, have a wide variety of events and locations. The golf is in Punta Cana on the east coast. The surfing is at Cabarete on the north coast. Some events, like BMX and football, are being held in another city called Santiago. The vast majority of events, however, fall within the jurisdiction of the capital, Santo Domingo. Where I now live.
Santo Domingo is the the close dots on the southern coast
The view from the top of my apartment block - the sea is in the distance
That’s not to say that they are easy to get to. When I visited Santo Domingo in late 2022, I was based in the Colonial Zone. A tourist area. So at that time I didn’t really grasp the fact that the city is actually quite long, particularly from west to east. I’m living in the western area, about 7 kilometres from the Colonial Zone. That may not sound like a lot, but you may not have seen traffic here…
I'm living in an area called Bella Vista, which is the circle on the far left
An interesting intersection near my apartmen
Also as a new arrival, I’ve had things to do organised by my new job. Signing contracts, setting up bank accounts, going to IKEA. Yes, there’s an IKEA here. IKEA with island prices, admittedly.
When I worked for IKEA in 2005, they told us that there is a strategy to their building plan so that people are tired by the time they get to the restaurant. We stopped there, so it worked on us!
Celebrating our first weekend in the city
Sunday was therefore my opportunity to take in some of the Games, and I limited myself to areas relatively close to home. Deciding to sleep in rather than wake up early to watch the cycling along the Malecon, a sort of corniche or waterfront promenade, I eventually roused myself to go to the Juan Pablo Duarte Olympic complex. JP Duarte was not alive when the Olympics were on, interestingly.
There are a wide variety of sports in the games
Independence hero - there'll be more about him in these blogs in the future, I'm sure
Arriving here for 10am gave me free access to the men’s diving competition final. It was called the 10m platform event, which made it strange that the local pairing spent most of their time jumping off lower platforms. I can’t criticise, though; it looked terrifying enough from my vantage point, let alone theirs.
The complex was created for these games in 1974
10 metres...quite a splash if you get it wrong...
They weren’t scores that would get any of them near Olympic medals, or even the games themselves, but they were incredible to watch. It made me wonder about how often they get to compete.
Imagine if you slip!
There were teams from Venezuela, Cuba, DR, Mexico and Colombia in this final
If any of these teams will make it to Los Angeles in 2028, it will be the Mexican pairing. They were phenomenal, and really took their time to make sure they were ready before diving, as attested to by the video below.
Their score was significantly higher than the other teams
Can't remember if this was Mexico - either way, nothing for the truly elite to worry about
The Centro Olimpico is where many events are taking place, from chess to wrestling. I watched the latter shortly after the end of the diving competition. I don’t really know the rules of this sport, and was confused during the first match when a referee told a man to lie on the floor. It did begin to make sense later.
Ajerdez: new word for me!
There are two 'fighting' arenas, this is one of them
This was an event in which a Dominican athlete had more success, outmanoeuvring his Puerto Rican opponent after a fast start. There was quite a fervent atmosphere, particularly when a point was docked from him by the referee.
A lot the the time was spent like this...
...or like this...
The most spectacular wrestling bout involved a Venezuelan, who was able to roll, collect and slam his opponent out of the circle. My understanding was that this gave him an automatic win. You might be confused by the idea of Venezuela being in the Central American and Caribbean Games. I was too, until I remembered that the country has a coastline on the Caribbean Sea. It is why Colombia, Guyana and Suriname are also competing.
The Venezuelan grappler is in blue
He seemed significantly stronger than his opponent!
The Games themselves seem quite flexible. When I had planned what I was going to see on this particular Sunday, I had noticed that there was boxing taking place at the Centro Olimpico at midday. Sat outside the very much closed entrance to the boxing arena at 11:45am, I checked the website again…to find that it was starting at 2pm. Not wanting to wait that long, I walked a couple of kilometres away from the complex to a shopping centre called Agora Mall.
A beautiful flame tree at the Olympic Complex
An art piece in the Olympic Complex
I love the idea of having events in places like this. Guaranteed eyes and publicity, and no massive waste of building a stadium that wouldn’t be used much after the event has finished. Unlikely they could have done diving here, admittedly, though the mall does have four floors…
There were two courts in the mall
A friend had visited on Thursday and said the courts looked nothing like this, so it's impressive that they were ready
There was a lot more I could have seen, but I more than satisfied my desire to explore and see something interesting on my first weekend living in Santo Domingo. And if they keep the squash courts in that mall after the Central American and Caribbean Games ends next Saturday, maybe I’ll need to find a racquet…
