My Trip to the Dominican Republic!

We recently spent a few days in the Dominican Republic for our friends' wedding. We stayed at the Now Larimar resort in Punta Cana. It was so incredibly beautiful there! Our time in paradise was short, but we managed to cram quite a bit in and have an amazing time.

The resort was really lovely. Upon arriving, we were handed glasses of some tropical boozy beverage - the first of many drinks of our stay! Everyone we encountered was helpful and friendly (almost a little too friendly for my comfort, but maybe I'm just jaded). From the building our room was in, we could walk directly out into the pool area, and from there it was just a very short walk down to the beach! The food was plentiful - there were a buffet that was open almost all day, a beach-side grill, and several a la carte restaurants that served French, Japanese, Mexican, and steak.

At night, they held various entertainment things in the courtyard. One night there were fire jugglers and acrobatics, and another there was karaoke. During the day, there were several pools to lay by with more than enough lounge chairs and hammocks; not to mention the gorgeous beach with it's bathtub-like warm water and very few waves. There are several off-resort excursions you can do. We took a sunset cruise with the wedding group that included snorkeling, and took us to a location pretty far from the resort where we could wade around in the shoulder deep water for a while.

I've only been to the Caribbean once before, and that was on a cruise, so I didn't totally know what to expect of this trip. It made packing a bit difficult, and I ended up bringing probably more clothes and things than I needed. Here are a few of the things I would consider essential!

*Multiple swimsuits - so you can always have a fresh one while waiting for the other one or two to dry.
*Tank tops - great for throwing over swimsuit tops.
*A light shrug or cardigan - throw these over the tank tops you've already thrown on over your swimsuit, and you're ready to go to dinner!
*Several dresses - you don't need anything fancy, just something breezy that you can throw on to go to dinner, or to walk around in.
*Sunglasses - duh. But buy a cute cheap pair from Target, because they'll probably get scratched up from the sand (like mine did).
*Cash - bring singles and fives to give as tips to people that help you. Though it always made me feel like an asshole to be like, "Thanks a lot, here's one whole dollar for your trouble." But apparently it's the thing to do.
*An actual physical book - it was a little hard to read my Kindle in the bright sun, and also I worried about leaving it on my lounge chair unattended. I basically used it as a de facto purse, putting my room key and cash for tips in the pages. You barely need anything else, besides maybe sunglasses and chapstick!