It's a beach town for tourists who think that just lying on a beach all day and reading a book is boring. That's what I love about Cabarete. It's the young, hip version of a Caribbean vacation. No activities directors, aerobics classes or plastic bracelets to differentiate paying guests from others.
People come here to find their own fun.
Ten years ago, this was a quiet little fishing village just being discovered by windsurfers. Today, Cabarete's population of 15,000 is swelled by about 30,000 visitors a year. Now, the British magazine Boards calls it one of the top 10 windsurfing beaches in the world. It has hosted five Professional Windsurfing Association World Cups and has an amateur windsurfing competition every June that attracts about 2,000 people. It's been popular with young Europeans for years, and U.S. Peace Corps volunteers based in the Dominican Republic know it well.