Punta Cana

We’re back from Punta Cana, having celebrated our 5-year wedding anniversary a month early. We dropped off Lily with her grandparents Thursday night, and left Friday morning to catch our flight from JFK.  We spent five days and four nights at the Paradisus Punta Cana, an all-inclusive resort in the Dominican Republic.  This was our first trip to D.R., but our second vacation at an all-inclusive resort (the first being our 2007 trip to Jamaica.)

We didn’t bring Lily as we have learned that taking an infant on a relaxing trip cancels each other out.  Too complicated to bring all their accouterments (e.g. diapers, wipes, portable crib.)  Too young for the tropics (e.g. direct sun, sand, heat.)  Too difficult to manage (e.g. warming milk, feedings during dinners, no sleep.)  It wasn’t an easy decision, but we figured it would be best that she stayed here.  In hindsight, I still think it worked out for the best.  Someone I know stated that we shouldn’t leave the baby behind — we should accept the responsibility since we decided to be parents.  My rebuttal was that this is coming from someone who hasn’t had to raise one or more kids of their own!

It was a fun trip. We spent a lot of time on the beautiful beach, the lagoon-style pool, resting and relaxing.  One night, Joshua stayed at the Kid Zone (awesome supervised play center for children) while we had a wonderfully romantic and adult dinner at Fuego, their latin restaurant.  It had to be my favorite night — it was like we were dating again, young and carefree.

The trip home was unfortunately long and tiresome.  While our trip to D.R. was a direct flight, our return trip involved traveling all day, including a 3-hour layover in Miami, and getting home by 2am.  In the end, it was still worth it.  On a geeky note, I declared it “Tolkien Weekend.”  I read The Silmarillion on the flights, on the beach, and night to unwind.  I used the portable DVD player we purchased back in November 2007 to watch all three Lord of the Ring movies, over the course of five days.  Oh, it was glorious.