Santo Domingo, also known as The Gateway to Caribbean is the capital and biggest city of Dominican Republic has the privilege of being the first city of Modern World. It is located in Caribbean Sea and first city of Spanish rule. It also has the privilege of being the oldest city of European rule in America.
Santo Domingo was named “La Nueva Isabella” after the Queen of Spain by Columbus after 1496 and was called “Ciudad Trujillo” under the rule of Rafael Trujillo from 1930-1961.
The City of Santo Domingo is an excellent example of preservation of cultural and historical heritage, with some buildings as old as 500-600 years old, built in 1492, before the advent of Columbus.
It also has the privilege of having:
- America’s First Cathedral
- America’s First Castle
- America’s First Monastery
Dominican Republic gained independence from Haitian rule on Feb 27th, 1844. We planned our trip during summer season, which I believe was not a very good idea, since it gets really hot during summer season. Nevertheless, we flew all excited from New York, and after a flight of approx. 5 hours, we reached Santo Domingo. From there many cab services were available; we picked one and reached our hotel Mercure, which was located in Colonial Zone in the heart of Santo Domingo. Although I wasn’t really impressed by the surrounding and appearance of hotel, I latter found out we couldn’t find any place better than that as per its location.
Next day we went to explore the area, and we got to know just 5 minutes away from our hotel was Catedral de Santa María la Menor, believed to be the oldest cathedral in America and its construction dates back to 16th century. The construction took 28 years to finish (1512-1540). The walls and roof were magnificent and full of ancient drawing work, silver and gold plating, carved woods and glass paintings.
Just close to it was the entrance of Columbus Park also called Colonial Park, which is basically a huge bricked ground, with the statue of Christopher Columbus in the middle of park, made by French sculptor Gilbert in 1897. The area serves as a nice neighborhood for locals and tourist with many gift and souvenir shops. Many tour guides came to us to offer services at very reasonable rates. There is an excellent coffee shop by the park and to sit on their benches or chairs and seeing children feeding pigeons was a wonderful experience.
The Alcázar de Colón is also located in Colonial Zone, where we stayed and has honor of being the First Castle in America, and is a part of Colonial Zone World Heritage site of Dominican Republic. The palace served as residence of Columbus son and government mansion too. Due to lack of maintenance, the building was abandoned but renovated in late 1950s.
The Fortaleza Ozama is built near river Ozama, and is believed to be the first military fortress still standing in America. After exploring all these areas obviously we were very tired. However we did hired a guide for the next day. Before retiring on bed, I was sure, my next day was going to be even more exciting.
Tags: 1492, 28 Years, Ancient Drawing, Cab Services, Caribbean Sea, Catedral De, Christopher Columbus, Ciudad Trujillo, Colonial Park, Colonial Zone, Columbus Park, Domingo Santo, Glass Paintings, Gold Plating, Hotel Mercure, Monastery, Queen Of Spain, Rafael Trujillo, Santo Domingo, Silver And Gold, Spanish Rule