Whale of a Tale

Stardate 66549.6

23:45 - We start this tale where we began it: at the Punta Cana Airport. Our mission was to find the seasonal Humpback Whales in Samana Bay. The only problem was Samana Bay was a few hours away by bus through mountains. We decided to bypass the whole bus situation and take an airplane. I mean the type of plane that makes you put down how much you weigh because they need to balance both sides out.

We landed about an hour away from Samana Bay, and the weather did not cooperate with us. Focus Foxies, we had a deluge of biblical portions that threatened to cancel our whale watching plans and plagued us all day. We persevered but barely. We headed out to sea in some of the choppiest water I have ever been in. I mean I have been on many rough seas, Focus Foxies. This was down right terrible. They outfitted us with life jackets and big yellow jackets, and we went bravely into the perfect storm. We needed to go further into the bay to see the whales and let the storm past by us.

We were able to see two different pods of whales. One pod had a mother and calf in it,

and the other had several juveniles. We got the feeling that the Mom and calf whale did not want to be messed with and kept swimming away. So we went in search of the other pod spotted by another boat. These juveniles were playing around in the sea as if they had no cares in the world. Pictures were hard to take because the amount of people on the boat and whales can hold their breath for long periods of time.

Our adventure didn't stop with the whales. As epic as whales are, Focus Foxies, we needed more adventure packed in our day. We stopped on Cayo Levantado, which is an island in Samana Bay, to visit the beaches. Well, until the rain chased us away to our lunch spot.

Our next adventure was a horse ride like no other. My Mom and I are not experts in horse riding, but we have had our fair share of horseback shenanigans. We have taken a donkey down into the Grand Canyon and made it back to tell the stories. This situation made us think twice. I mean we still jumped on and went along for the ride. We just said so many prayers as we made our way through the extremely washed out trails. Each horse had a guide/owner who led us to a waterfall. (Side note: Focus Foxies, we had no idea what our end destination was for this horse ride. At one point we thought we were on a one way trip into the forest.) We eventually made it to Lemon Waterfall, which fun fact was a USAID project for tourism.

We eventually made it to the head of the trail in one piece. Our guides grabbed their day's wages and rode off into the sunset. This was our cue that it was our time to go home as well. We made our way back to the airport but not before we went through some Dominican backroad. 

Yea, that road was washed out as well