Adventure Part Two: Caves and Chapels

To leave Santo Domingo, we had to take another bus company, one that wasn't quite as organized or classy as they one we'd taken the day before, but that just made it more of an adventure.  As soon as we got to the bus station, the bus drivers and ticket takers who were milling around the parking lot started motioning frantically towards the bus and shouting at us: "RomanaRomanaRomana!  Are you going to Romana?  Get on the bus!  GetonGetonGeton!"  Scared that it was about to leave, we clambered up the bus steps...and realized we were the first people aboard.  So we sat down on the ripped brown plastic seats near the front and waited as moms with toddlers, elderly couples, and 20-something adults filtered in.  As we sat there, one street vendor after another got on the bus and strolled up and down the aisle, shouting out the names and prices of things they were selling: gum, calling cards, water, oranges, and bags of a whiteish cheese that looked a little like fresh mozzarella.  Even when we started moving, vendors would hop on at one corner, walk the length of the bus loudly showing us their cans of pop or chocolate bars, and hop off at the next block. 

Instead of having set stops, this bus (and most of the ones we took over the weekend) let people on and off whenever they wanted.  As we passed through Santo Domingo, the conductor stood at the open door with his head sticking out, yelling our destination to everyone passing on the sidewalks in case they decided to take an impromptu trip.

Wait...wait...Okay, run!

Our destination, the Cueva de las Maravillas (the Cave of Wonders!), was located on the side of a mostly empty highway, surrounded for miles only by fields and a few grazing cattle and horses.  When we got close, the bus pulled over to the gravel shoulder of the highway and the conductor got off with us.  He motioned to us to stay at the side of the highway while he looked to see when it would be clear.  As soon as there was a break in traffic, he waved us forward and we sprinted across the four-lane road.

Success!

For Katie

The path leading to the parking lot of the cave was long and clearly not meant for foot traffic - there was no sidewalk, so we walked at the side of the road and, at one point, had to pick our way across a grate that would have held tires fine but would have tripped us if we hadn't been careful.  To either side of us were more fields, and even though they were populated by birds, horses, and red wasps, it was very quiet.  It seemed like we were out in the middle of nowhere.  When we got closer, though, we saw met up with another handful of people buying tickets and waiting for a tour.

Perfect cave entrance.

The cave was opened to the public in the early 2000s, and the people who designed the project did a great job with it - the whole area is beautiful and runs remarkably smoothly. We bought our tickets in an airy and bright building made out of pale limestone and then headed past neatly trimmed hedges to meet up with the rest of our tour group.  Surrounding the footpaths we took to get to the cave was a really beautiful garden of local trees, flowers, and bushes, and I was so busy gushing about how pretty it was that the entrance to the cave took me by surprise.  It was amazing, though.  It looked exactly like a cave should look: huge dark lumpy rocks covered by a net of dangling vines.

The inside was even cooler.  There was a system of motion-activated lights, so as we walked along the path that had been built for visitors and listened to our guide tell us about the history of the area, different sections of rocks would suddenly light up, and a new patch of alien-looking stalagmites and 800-year-old cave drawings would appear.  Although, technically, taking pictures wasn't allowed on the tour, in one chamber our (very friendly) guide told us he was going to go sit outside for a minute and wouldn't notice any cameras going off, wink wink.  So my friends whipped out their cameras, and I have these pictures to try to show you what it was like inside.  Lots of unbelievable shapes - the rocks and columns that have been formed by the water dripping and leaving tiny bits of calcium for millions of years look like something out of a science fiction movie.  This chamber was especially eerie, because right in the middle was a small, perfectly still pond of water that was so dark it reflected everything above it just as clearly as a mirror would have.

Cute, but strange

Although I don't have a picture of the Taíno Indians' cave drawings, I put up this picture from the internet so you could see what they were like.  They were so strange-looking, not at all like pictures I've seen from caves in Europe.  Honestly, they looked a little like the drawings the kids at my preschool make - lots of stick figures that look vaguely like people or animals.  Some of them even had smiley faces.

Smiling like he didn't just try to beat up his friend

Around the path out of the cave, there was another grove of gorgeous trees and then...an iguana enclosure.  It was like an exhibit in the zoo, with a path going by an enclosed habitat of logs and grass and bushes that housed 48 iguanas.  I have never seen that many iguanas up close before.  When we first got there, most of them were lazing in the sun and their caretaker was setting out some plates of vegetables.  As we stood there, watched them, and asked questions ("How old is that one?"  "What do they eat?"), they iguanas started to get more lively.  One iguana ran a few yards, which was bizarre.  I had no idea iguanas could move that quickly or that they look so awkward doing it, with their legs flying to the side and forward at the same time.  A minute later, a fight almost broke out - two iguanas began to stare each other down and making hissing noises.  Their caretaker ran between them, shooed one of them to the other side of the enclosure, and started shaking his finger at the other and telling it "Stay...stay..." in the same tone you would use with a dog.  The iguana seemed pleased with himself, though - he started smiling.  That's him in this picture.

Lorena is squished

Eventually, we had to leave, so we sprinted back across the highway to the side we'd gotten off on and waited.  As no buses make regular stops by the cave, the only way to catch one is to stand where we were standing and try to flag down ones that passed.  We did so, and the first bus we saw pulled over and stopped to let us on.  Assuming this meant that there was room on the bus, we started to board...only to find out there hadn't been a single empty seat so we had to stand in the aisle.  I was the last one on board, and the conductor was literally shoving me to the side with one hand as he was just barely able to pull the door shut with the other.  Soon, though, people started getting off, and I was able to sit on a cushion between the driver's seat, the passenger's seat, and a second pull-down passenger's seat.  Much more spacious.

We arrived at la Romana, a really cute little town, and had dinner at a pizza place that looked a lot like the Burger King in Minnetonka.  Different color scheme, but a big plastic play place, chunky plastic cubbies for kids to leave their shoes, a main dining room for adults, and a smaller dining room close to the play place for families.  The pizza had fluffy crust and tasty sauce, and we finished the meal with a delicious Nutella dessert pizza.

Personally, I wasn't a fan of the concrete

Next, we caught a cramped, dingy, non-airconditioned bus to our next destination: Higüey.  Higüey is fairly small town in the DR, but it is the site of the country's most massive pilgrimage...to the Basilica of our Lady of the Highest Grace...which happened to have taken place the day before we got there.  We got there in the evening, and it seemed like most of the people had cleared out.  The massive parking lot by the church was empty except for a few lone stands that had sold rosaries, fast food, and prayer cards to hoards of people the day before.

To the Virgen

The next morning, however, some of the girls in my group and I went to Mass at the basilica.  Since a visiting monk I'd talked to the night before had given us the wrong Mass time, we arrived about an hour early and had time to see the painting of la Señora de la Altagracia that the basilica is famous for.  The painting is located above and behind the altar, but between the painting and the place where the priest sits, there is a raised walkway, so people can walk up a set of steps from a side door, walk to the painting, and descend down the other side, all while being almost hidden from the view of the people in the pews, which meant that people continued seeing and touching the glass case protecting the painting well into the Mass.  When we joined the line, we discovered that there were still plenty of pilgrims left in town: The line to see the painting stretched out of and wrapped a fourth of the way around the church.

The painting

Mmm...breakfast

After a very fancy Mass, complete with a bishop, two priests, six altar servers, additional prayers between every reading, a full choir, and more incense than I've ever seen used in one service, we checked out of our hotel room and started out for the bus station.  After stopping to get a late breakfast of rice, beans, chicken, and vegetables at a Dominican-style lunch counter, we were at last on our way to the beach!