Chocolate, rum and a handmade cigar.

            Today's destination is Amber Cove in the Domican Republic, we had booked to go diving down some waterfalls, however my knee has been playing up for the last  couple of days and although the first part of the trip was by coach, the last 40 minutes involve quite a severe up hill climb, so I reluctantly gave in to Perdita's sensible side, and we changed our trip to a more sedate Flavours of Puerta Plata (meaning silver port) tour. The tour started at 12.30pm and 1st stage involved a coach trip to a local farm,out in the sticks, where we were treated to a taster of 3 rums, all from the same company(Brugal), one a young dark rum, another aged in American whiskey casks and a white rum, the aged one had been aged for 10 years and was obviously the  best and being a rum drinker I bought a bottle to enjoy once I got back home with friends. Whilst at the farm,we were provided with our lunch which was a buffet if rice and a beef and chicken stew with potatoes, sweet potatoes, cassavas and plantains in it. This is apperantly served at special events like weddings and the such because it takes to long to cook on open fires. Perdita had to sift through to try and avoid the meat  being a  vegeburger.After lunch our guide Don Juan showed us some of  the locally produced fruit , from mangos, dragonfruit, pineapple and bread fruit and of course cacao and tobacco.

         From there we we taken to the town of Puerto Plazza itself, where we take to have a look at the Cathedral,which is quite new to the Dominican Republic, both because of the several rebuilds throught the years due to earthquakes, and because up to 2010 it was only a church, until they were sent a Cardinal to oversee thier religious affairs by the Vatican. Then onto a the pink Street dedicated to Bella Blanca who was an Italian lady who opened the 1st hotel in the town and is considered the the mother of tourism by the locals, unfortunatley she passed away from cancer so the painted the street on which her hotel was situated bright pink to commemorates her.

            We had 30 minutes free time to spend shopping in a shop we were taken to, who gave us s free shot of Mamma Juamma, which was a herb liquor and tasted like night nurse, but it did mean we got chance to purchase the usual required articles. From there we went to the street of  umberellas,(not it's real name) but there a loads of umbrellas suspended from strings over the street, here was also our 1st visit to a chocolate shop where we were given a sample of hot Baily's Chocolate, which Perdita liked enough to buy a 500g bag of the powder mix.

           
           Next up was the cigar factory, where everyone who wanted one got a free cigar and a lesson on the correct way to smoke, a cigar, then we were given s demonstration on the different part of, and how cigars are rolled, with the opportunity to try rolling your own for those who wanted to try. I have never been a cigar lover, but it wat far better than I had imagined.

       The last stop for the day was Del Oro Chocolate factory, which was tobe honest a bit of a let down, we were ushered into a smallish room to watch a short video on the production of chocolate in the Dominican Republic. The history isn't very long as they have only been making chocolate for three years, although it does produce quite a large percentage of the world cacao for the size of the country

       On the way back to the ship webwere treated to a drive down the boulavard and to the fortress at the far end of it.

Pongo and Perdita signing off!!!