Border areas to Haiti

I have been to Monte Cristi.  It's beautiful in its own way.  It's not yet a tourist hot spot.  There is a small town  and seriously not much to do there.  Lots of large farms.

I have been to Pedernales and found it to be a quiet, pleasant seaside town. It is the gateway to Bahia de las Aguillas, a most wonderful eco resort area with breathtaking beaches and very few people. I did walk across the border to have my passport stamped while I was in Pedernales.

Monte Cristi  is worth a visit just to see El Morro National Park and Isla Cabra and a seafood lunch nearby the salt fields. The town has some history too and the centre of the town has some interesting architecture most notably the clock tower designed by Eiffel (of Eiffel Tower) and built by watchmaker John Paul Garnier. The province also has perhaps the best coral reef offshore. It makes an ideal daytrip from Punta Rucia which borders the province but in Puerto Plata province. Cayo Arena is probably in Monte Cristi province.

I never have had much interest in visiting Dajabon which I imagine to be a scruffy border town, but it is the gateway leading to  R45 the 'International Highway' which runs along the border between Haiti and DR in Elias Pina province. It is apparently a rough road but interesting for what you see left and right. A bucket list thing to do in better times.

Further south we get to Independencia and you should visit Lago Enriquillo and see the crocodiles living in this lake which is below sea level. La Descubierta is not much to see other than the natural springs and the Taino caves on the outskirts. You will probably not want to do the full circle of the lake (to Jimani) and choose to head back in to Baoruco province on the north side of the lake through the scenic overhanging trees and looking up to the north to the high peaks and into Neiba where they grow dark grapes and make that awful sweet wine. Baoruco is interesting for it's high mountain national park but in the valley it is very dry.

You head back in Barahona province, and Cabral is a pretty town and is the gateway up into the mountains and the small town of Polo, where you find the 'magnetic pole' or rather illusion - if a car is stopped at the right place, and put in neutral, the car seems to be rolling up the hill. This is type of optical illusion known as a gravity hill which is caused by the shape of the slope and the surrounding landscape.

From Barahona - a not so nice town which had it's heyday as a sugar producing centre  with still opertaional narrow guage railways to handle the cane - you head south along some wonderful dramatic coastline, beautiful mountains which are good for walking and horseback rides, pebble beaches and rios and some lovely small hotels to break up your journey until you reach Enriquillo famous for its wind turbines and into Pedernales province. Some great local seafood can be had and there are a few resident Italians adding flavour in their restaurants.

First stop must be Oviedo and it's lake were you can see flamingos and other birds plus iguanas. Take a  boat trip with a park guide who will tell you all. Take plenty of sun block. Beyond there you enter the National Jaragua Park which is a dry forest with lots of cactii and if you know where, there are  some springs in the limestone rock popular with locals. I never got to Pedernales, choosing to branch left just before and go to Bahia de Las Aguilas which was a calm sandy untouched super blue haven when we were there and is now to be developed. Up in the mountains behind, there is a veiwing point where on a clear day you can see all around and into Haiti. It is a hiking paradise and reknowed for 'twitchers' due to it's varied bird life.

That's my bit on the west. So much seen and so much more to see.

https://www.godominicanrepublic.com/montecristi/https://www.godominicanrepublic.com/barahona/https://www.godominicanrepublic.com/pedernales/https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/30/trav … niola.html

DRVisitor - yes you must find time to visit some if not all the west!

I have been in every province in DR bar Dajabon, Santiago Rodriguez and Elias Pina but without doubt I would say the western provinces that I have visited are full of gems not to be missed if you really want to understand this country . Add Azua, Peravia and San Jose de Ocoa provinces if you decide to head west from SD to visit.