Country #135: Beaching it in Cap Haitien

Country #135 is a short 1:30 flight from my hometown. It has crystalline beaches, lush mountains and infectiously joyous music. All things being equal, I should have been there much sooner. Sadly, all things are far from equal. Country #135 is Haiti. As long as I can recall, this nation which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic, has been beset by natural disasters and political instability.  Conditions have only deteriorated since 2021, when the president was assassinated and violent gangs took over the capital, Port-au-Prince. This had led to most countries (including the US) issuing it a Level 4 threat advisory, the worst possible ranking. 

So why did I go, aside from the obvious fact that it's both a country I hadn't been and my last one in the Western Hemisphere. There was more to it than that. Recently, I've been flying in and out of Cap Haitien for work. Each and every approach, I'm glued to the window, wowed by its natural beauty. This awe led me to question both passengers and airport staff about the current situation. The very consistent response was that while Port au Prince is a dangerous no man's land, Cap Haitien is much calmer and with reasonable precautions, safe to visit. 

Armed with that information, I made plans to spend a couple of days in this northern part of the country. Those plans coincided- to the day- with Hurricane Melissa's imminent arrival. It's one thing to willingly go to a level 4 country. It's another to do so when a category 5 hurricane is barreling towards said country. Plans were changed, arrangements were delayed and I was now only spending one night in Cap.

I reached out to a couple of tour operators to schedule a tour to the Citadelle, the largest fortress in the Americas. Due to the limited amount of tourism, only private tours are available and the cost is prohibitively high (around $300 for a 4-5 hr tour). So the fortress was out. Instead, I decided to make it a beach day by booking a room at the Cormier Beach Resort, which included transportation from/ to the airport.

The ride to the resort would be my first impression of Haiti. Not gonna lie, it was pretty shocking. I've been to my fair share of developing nations but nowhere have I seen the amount of garbage I did on the muddy road that runs immediately outside the airport. It wasn't just the massive trash heap, though. It was the fact that it was Sunday and there was a busy outdoor market taking place smack dab in the middle of dumping grounds. There were women sitting on blankets atop piles of garbage, displaying fruits, vegetables, clothes, everything you can think of . My initial impression was: if this was the nicest part of Haiti, what must Port au Prince be like?

That thought slowly abated as we continued. Just minutes away, the downtown area was definitely in need of some TLC but its colonial-era architecture was relatively orderly. Everything was closed and the streets were empty but that was to be expected on a weekend. 

The further we got from the airport, the nicer the scenery got. The tree-lined road that wound up into the mountains, providing regular glimpses of the ocean below, was downright picturesque.

I arrived at the resort and was in my room by 10am, leaving me an entire day to play with. There is no known situation where I can simply sit on a beach for that many hours so I made arrangements to hire a driver to take me back downtown. I had read about a beachfront boulevard full of restaurants that seemed worth a visit.

But first, I figured I would stroll down to the beach, where I discovered I was at the right place, at the right time. There was to be a beachfront concert scheduled that very day. New plan, hang out for the 2pm show and then go into the city for dinner. 

I was not far from Labadee, the private resort belonging to Royal Caribbean. Due to security concerns, they no longer dock there so it is closed off. Instead, I walked the other way along the beach to the public area. I expected to be approached by the beach vendors along the way but other than the occasional Bonjour, I was wholly left to my own devices.

So much so that I actually found myself having to chase a young lady down in order to buy a coconut. After catching up with her and getting my coconut, she stuck around. I thought she might be waiting for a tip but nope. Once I had drunk all the water, she took the empty coconut and opened it so that I could eat the meat. When I did try to tip her, she declined. I was in what would be the prime tourist harassment zone in so many places, yet here it was pretty much nonexistent. 

I returned to the resort in time for the 2pm show. The concert was a celebration of the Day of the Dead and while I was gone, purple banners had been placed everywhere. I ordered a Prestige beer and waited.

And then another and waited some more. At 4pm, a dj and accompanying conga player finally took the stage. 

The music was drawing a crowd. There was a $20 cover charge for non-guests so I thought perhaps these were other hotel guests venturing out of their rooms. It wasn't until I started meeting my fellow party goers that I learned that a lot of them were locals. 

We toasted over a gorgeous sunset, all while chilling and vibing to the music. 

As it got later, my plans of heading downtown to bar and restaurant hop were becoming less likely. The headline act had yet even to take the stage and I was nicely buzzed from my very Prestigious day . I eventually cajoled the restaurant into creating a vegetarian dish (mac and cheese) and accepted that this might be all I do on my lone day in Haiti.

Malou Beauvoir eventually took the stage. She was absolutely worth the wait.  As much as I regretted not seeing more of Cap Haitien, I was grateful that the need to reschedule had put me on Comier Beach on this particular night. 

My return flight was the next morning, leaving me only enough time to take a sunrise stroll and grab a quick breakfast at the resort before heading back over the mountains to the airport. 

The desolate downtown I had passed through the prior morning was no more. Trucks, mopeds, bicycles all competed for space on busy streets. There were men, women and crisply uniformed schoolchildren rushing to and fro. It was lively and slightly chaotic but at no point did it feel unsafe.

I felt pangs of regret for not having spent more time, for not venturing more outside of the resort. I felt like I had missed out on the "real Haiti".  In retrospect, I did definitely miss out on one side of Cap Haitien and on a good number of things I wanted to see. However, I had spent the night listening to a Haitian artist while surrounded by a largely local crowd. The idea of this country and its people being destitute has been so ingrained that I had dismissed people with enough disposable income to go to a concert and partake in a costly bottle service as not "real Haiti". That's messed up. Yes, this is a country in distress. There are nightly news stories of increased gang violence in the capital but there is so much more to it than that. I would happily return to Cap and I hope I have the opportunity to do just that but if I am going to carry a regret, it will be that I didn't go sooner.