La Isabela Bay

One of the locations that we are scheduled to visit is La Isabela Bay.

According to Ms. Wood's book DK Eyewitness Travel Top 10 Dominican Republic, La Isabela Bay is one of the top 10 places that should be visited in the DR.

• La Isabela is the site of the firstk permanent colonial settlement in the Americas.
• The town is named in honor of the Spanish Queen (Isabella I)

The book says that the Bay has 10 locations that are worth checking out.

• Parque National Historico La Isabela - A national park that has been excavated since the 1950s. The site is the original settlement. It has a promontory, expanse of red sand dotted with acacia trees.
• The Settlement - Small walls of hewn limestone show the foundations of structures such as a possible warehouse, chapel, hospital, watchtower.
• Columbus's House - Covered with a thached awning. He lived in a modest dwelling made of packed earth and stone.
• Cemetery - First Christian Cemetery in the New World. Both Spaniards and Tainos were buried.
• Museum - Well maintained display of Taino artifacs. (pottery and arrowheads)
• Playa Isabela - Beach
• Templo de las Americas - colonial-style church - whitewashed stone and brick.
• Laguna Estero Hondo - Mangrove forest
  
• Punta Rucia Beach - Beach
• Cayo Paraiso - sunbleached circular sandbank surrounded by coral reef and aquamarine sea.

http://traveldk.com/dominican-republic/dk/highlight/la-isabela-bay

• 1200 men from 17 ships arrived in what was to be called la Isabela Bay.
• The first things they built were the house for the Viceroy cum Admiral of All The Seas, a church, a warehouse and smaller houses for the nobles.
• Celebrated mass for the first time in the New World on January 6, 1494.
• No gold was found on the island.
• Upon Columbus's return to the colony he had to deal with choas and revolt.
• He named his brother Bartolomo as mayor, had furnaces built to bake bricks and tiles, and a wall was placed around the settlement.
• Tropical fevers, goldrush fever and constant quarreling between the natives and each other lead to a lot of the colonist ending up in the cemetary and the colony never growing large with citizens.
• Columbus left the island on March 10, 1496 to return to Spain with 225 Spaniards and 30 Indian Prisoners.
• In 1497 the first 30 Spanish women arrived in the New World.
• La Isabela was abandoned less than 10 years after it was settled. The inhabitants moved west to a place named Puerto Real

http://www.puertoplataregion.com/mod.php?mod=informasi&op=viewinfo&intypeid=3&infoid=8

http://www.caribbeanparadise.com/dominican_republic/xphotos/destinations/luperon/isabela.JPG



http://cdn.physorg.com/newman/gfx/news/hires/teethofcolum.jpg