Dominican Republic

As an 'end of the never-ending fire season' reward, Leif and I took a tropical booze and burn vacation for a couple of weeks in Puerto Plata, DR. We stayed in a swanky 4.5 star resort on the beach. Turns out we got a pretty good deal on the whole thing after getting $500 back each for the 5 flight delays, and left 25 hours after our scheduled departure. Our days consisted of walking from the restaurants to the beach to the bars. We ventured a few kilometers down the beach to some sweet secluded areas away from the resort. It was pretty close to paradise. Leif devoted an entire day to the "conch search" and at sunset as we sat digging for shells in the sand, a local diver came strolling up the beach carrying the most beautiful conch in existance: pinky purple inside, with a golden coat on the outside. He wanted some old tennis shoes to trade for it, but having nothing, we gave him a few bucks, and thus the conch joined our travels. Unfortunatly there was a bit of a tropical storm brewing around the island, and we faced rain for an hour or 2 every day in downpours, probably for the best, as we didn't burn. We did however get to see Michael Jackson at the resort in a 2 hour special performance.