Cabarete

Cabarete was founded in 1835 by Zephaniah Kingsley, a merchant and planter from Florida, as part of his estate on the north coast, the Mayorazgo de Koka. He came with his mixed-race family and 53 people he had freed from his Florida plantations, at a time when the whole island was under Haitian rule, and his wife Anna Kingsley kept a house by the harbour. Descendants of the Kingsleys and of the freed people still live in the area.

The town lies on Camino Cinco, the coast road east of Sosúa. Its reef-sheltered bay and steady trade winds made its fortune, and it grew into one of the Caribbean's main centres for both sports, hosting the Professional Windsurfing World Cup several times along with kitesurfing world cup events.

Growth has had costs. Development in the town and deforestation in the hills have increased runoff into the bay, damaging the coral reef, which had already suffered from overfishing in the 1980s. Tourism has eased one pressure, as many fishermen now work in hotels for better pay.

Watersports set the tone of Cabarete. The bay has hosted the Master of the Ocean, an event that brings together surfing, windsurfing, kitesurfing, stand-up paddleboarding and wing foiling, and kite manufacturers use the town as a testing ground. Wind blows on about 300 days a year, and evenings move to the bars and restaurants on the sand.

The town is unusually international for its size, with foreign residents and long-stay visitors from North America and Europe living alongside Dominican families. English is widely understood, and foreign currencies circulate in the tourist businesses. Beneath this the rhythms are Dominican: merengue and bachata from the colmados, and dominoes in the shade.

The Kingsley story gives Cabarete an unusual heritage, as a settlement founded by formerly enslaved people from Florida. Several descendants of the Kingsleys and of the people they freed still live in the area. Playa Encuentro has its own surfing community, and every year the town hosts competitions in the wind and wave sports. Manners are informal, but greetings matter, and dress beyond the beach is modest.

At the 2022 census the municipal district of Cabarete, part of the municipality of Sosúa, had about 16,100 people, of whom slightly more than half lived in the surrounding countryside and about 7,100 in the town itself.

Tourism is almost the whole economy: watersports schools and equipment shops, guesthouses, holiday rentals, restaurants and bars along the bay and at Kite Beach and Playa Encuentro. Many local people work in these businesses, and others in transport and services. Around 33 windsports schools work the bay, Bozo Beach and Kite Beach, and surf schools at Playa Encuentro, where waves run on about 300 days a year, give lessons and rent boards.

The day follows the wind and the waves, and motoconchos carry people up and down the coast road between the beaches. Evenings are spent on the beachfront, and on a calm day paddleboarders take over the water. Much of the town's life is concentrated on the narrow strip between the main road and the sea.

Cabarete eats two ways. Away from the beach, comedores serve Dominican food: pica pollo, crisp fried chicken; guisado, chicken or beef stewed in a tomato-based sauce; mangú, mashed green plantain, at breakfast; and sancocho, a stew of meat, tubers and vegetables in broth.

Along the bay, beachfront restaurants and bars cater to the international crowd, with tables on the sand. Fresh fish and seafood from the Atlantic, fried and served with tostones, sit beside international dishes on many menus, a sign of the town's many foreign residents, while the comedores keep local prices and local tastes. The kitesurfing beaches have their own beach bars and cafés serving riders between sessions.

Drinks follow the Dominican pattern: Presidente beer, Dominican rum, mamajuana — rum, red wine and honey steeped with tree bark and herbs — and fresh fruit batidos and juices, popular with those coming off the water after a session in the wind.