Sabana del la Mar

**Sabana del la Mar** (*English: "Savannah of the sea"*) is a town in the Hato Mayor Province of the Dominican Republic, one of three municipalities in the province. The population was 10,582 at the 2010 census.

## Sabana del la Mar

### Region

Higüamo
Hato Mayor Province

### Distance to:

HM del Rey: 43 km (*27 mi.*)
Santo Domingo: 157 km (*98 mi.*)

## About

Sabana de la Mar is one of the three municipalities in the Hato Mayor province of the Dominican Republic.

It is located 53 kilometers (33 miles), as the crow flies, from the city of Santo Domingo.

## History

Sabana de la Mar was founded in 1760 by the Spanish brigadier Diego Delira, who was in command of the bay to guarantee the assets of the French established on Xámana Island, Samaná Peninsula. Its first settlers were families from the Canary Islands.

It was elevated to the category of Municipality in 1876 belonging to the Maritime Province of Samaná; then the municipality would be transferred to the Province of El Seibo. On **December 3, 1984,** it was transferred to the Province of Hato Mayor when said province was created.

It is the largest municipality in the province, and was declared an ecotourism province in 2002 by Law 77-02.

## Geography

Sabana del la Mar is located at 19.0534° N, 69.3891° W. According to the ONE, the town has a total land area of 508.52 square kilometers (196.34 square miles). It is bordered by the Samana Bay on the north, the El Seibo Province municipalities of Miches on the east and El Seibo on the southeast, the town of El Valle on the south, the Monte Plata Province communities of Bayaguana and Sabana Grande de Boyá on the southwest, and the Samaná Province town of Sánchez on the northwest.

## Economy

The main economic activities of the municipality are agriculture (rice, organic cocoa and citrus) and fishing. Tourist activity has increased in recent years with ecotourism with visitors to the Los Haitíses National Park, close to the head city of the municipality, where the greatest natural wealth of the Antilles is found.

Sabana de la Mar and Samaná share with the Banco de la Plata the show of the humpback whales, which come to this area every year to reproduce; and 50% of the almost 30 thousand foreign tourists who visit this sanctuary of marine mammals every year embark on its dock.

## Religion

As in the rest of the country, the most widely professed religion is Catholic.

In the town there is the church of the Virgen del Pilar and the museum dedicated to Señorita Elupina Cordero (1892-1939), a devotee of miraculous hands, much loved by the locals in the country and abroad.

## Places of interest

### Los Haitises national park

Los Haitises, one of the largest national parks in the Dominican Republic (with a total area of ​​almost 1,200 square kilometers), is located in the Northeast region of the country, specifically in Sabana de la Mar. Its lands are located between the provinces of Monte Plata and Hato Mayor. Haitises comes from the indigenous word "Jaitises", which means "High Land" or "Land of Mountains", in the aboriginal language.

The excursions through Los Haitises offer the possibility of knowing the largest mangrove reserve in the Caribbean , caves with pictographs and petroglyphs of Taíno origin; as well as a humid forest with lush vegetation that keeps endemic and migratory birds, as well as endangered species, which are part of this place.

### Salto La Jalda National Park

La Jalda waterfall is the highest in the Caribbean, with more than 120 meters high, In times of rain its whitish waters that stand out in its fall, revealing the immensity and preciousness that dazzles between the green of the forest and the rocks by where the water reaches the chorrera.

Guarded by the copious forest of the Salto La Jalda National Park and hidden among the steep mountains that form the belt of the Eastern Cordillera, La Jalda is the highest and most attractive there is in Sabana de la Mar.

### Chapel-Museum of Señorita Elupina Cordero

Miss Elupina Cordero was born in Sabana de la Mar (1892-1939), Elupina has been an apostle of the Sabanalamarinos. An orphan, blind and crippled at an early age, in her spiritual aspect we find ourselves before a soul that broke the ordinary molds of a normal person.

She was endowed with great natural sensitivity. This woman, due to her limitations, assumed from an early age a commendable mission: to evangelize, heal, feed and alleviate the pain of others. His apostolate was carried out with an orderly and effective program, fostering the spiritual life of all the people from whom he was born, a veneration that survives in our times.

Her remains rest in the Chapel-Museum dedicated to her name.

## Heritage

Their patron saint festivities are celebrated every year in **October** in honor of the Virgen del Pilar.

## References

Sabana del la Mar [1]

Sabana del la Mar [2]