Puerto Plata

Puerto Plata (silver harbour is the official name of San Felipe de Puerto Plata) is a city and administrative seat of the province of Puerto Plata in the north of the Dominican Republic.

The city has about 130,000 inhabitants and is one of the most important port cities of the Dominican Republic. The name goes back to Christopher Columbus.  The area around Puerto Plata is covered by dense vegetation and is very hilly. In the east, the local cane is grown.

In addition to the port of Puerto Plata it is also known for its tourist resorts located east of the town of Playa Dorada and Costa Dorada. Overall, the city of Puerto Plata has approximately 10,000 hotel beds.  Puerto Plata has the only cable car in the Caribbean, Teleferico, which ascends to the Pico Isabel de Torres, Puerto Plata, a 793-meter high mountain.

The lower station is in the southwest of the city center, near the road to Santiago de Caballeros. Above is a botanical garden with a small replica of the Christ statue Cristo Redentor in Rio de Janeiro.
The port was formed in the 16th Century which was used until the time of Trujillo’s dictatorship as a prison and now houses an amber museum.  In the center of the Parque Central lie a church and a wooden pagoda.  East of the city center is the road to the airport and the Brugal rum factory which produces one of the three major rum brands in the country.

Except for the cable car and the Amber Museum, there are not many other attractions. The town is largely unkempt and dirty, even if now they are working on an improvement.  Downtown, there are only small stores, which are designed for the needs of local people.

Puerto Plata Airport is located east of the city in the direction of Sosua/Cabarete and is about 15km from Puerto Plata in the town of La Union.  The bus station is south of the center and on a national level they operate the bus fleet of the company Caribe Tours Puerto Plata with all the major cities of the Dominican Republic combined.  In and around Puerto Plata there operates an extensive network of low-cost minibuses (Guaguas). Their “station” is located near the inter-regional bus terminal.

In the northwest of Puerto Plata lies the settlement of La Isabela.  Christopher Columbus left the building at the turn of 1493/1494 as the first permanently inhabited settlement in the New World.   A few miles east are the well-known surfing towns of Sosua and Cabarete.