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Casual bar and restaurant overlooking Las Salinas. Popular with sailors for its seafood, burgers, and pasta.

The park comprises the most southerly tip of the country, the Pedernales Peninsula, as well as Isla Beata, an uninhabited scrub-covered island. Covering more than 500 sq miles (1,293 sq km), this is the biggest of the national parks, comprising dry limestone studded with cacti and other desert vegetation. This terrain is home to a huge array of land and sea birds, iguanas, lizards, and bats. The best way to get a sense of its natural importance is to contact the national park office at the village of Oviedo, for the boat tours of Laguna Oviedo.

Pedernales is quite literally the end of the track, the final Dominican outpost before crossing over into Haiti. This remote settlement of one-story concrete buildings huddled together, is hardly a conventional tourist destination. But the place is not without interest, especially on Mondays and Fridays when the no-man’s-land between the two countries is the scene of a large open-air market. The village’s beach is also worth a visit, and from here it’s usually easy to walk over the border.

A favorite beach with residents of Santo Domingo and San Cristóbal, this strip of golden sand isn’t quiet, but it’s a good place for a drink and a meal.

Another popular hangout for locals, and rather noisy, the beach does have a quieter end towards the headland and lighthouse, where the sand’s slightly darker and the sea rougher.

One of the first beaches on the long and scenic road south of Barahona, this is a lovely and little-known stretch of wild coastline, backed by rugged cliffs and woods.

Up in the hills from Cabral is a scientific enigma – a stretch of road that appears to run upwards, but in fact descends. Take off your handbrake and see.

Large Dominican restaurant at Hotel Caribe on the Malecón. Enjoy the air-conditioning indoors or the cool terrace. Good value menú del día with seafood.