La Romana

Bathed by the Caribbean Sea, this charming city is located on the southeast coast of the island. La Romana is the capital of the province of the same name, and third largest and most important city of the Dominican Republic.

It has an international airport, La Romana International Airport (IATA: LRM, ICAO: MDLR), which is just five minutes from the city. It is serviced by American Airlines from Miami in the U.S., American Eagle from San Juan, Puerto Rico, as well as many additional charter flights from the U.S., Canada, Latin-America and various others across Europe.

Approaching La Romana, you can see its vast fields of sugar cane crops. A large mill was built in 1917 to facilitate the production of more sugar from large plantations, and now the sugar industry generates most of the town’s revenue. La Romana is an economically rich region, not only due to the sugar industry, but also the fact that tourism has a great number of people working directly or indirectly for the Casa de Campo Resort, which is considered the most luxurious and complete resort of the Caribbean, where celebrities from around the world come to vacation. An example? George Hamilton, Bill Clinton, Shakira, and even Elizabeth Taylor were guests at this hotel. It has an on-site Heliport, a private marina, golf courses, an equestrian center, polo playing fields, a sailing school, a tennis center with 13 hard courts, world-class shooting, dog training, and many other facilities, targeted towards tourism excellence. In this resort you can also visit a range of art galleries displaying the works of regional and national artists, as well as magnificent, artistic, iron sculptures.

Things to Do

La Romana is a golf  destination par excellence, with five excellent courses, Teeth of the Dog, Dye Fore, The Links, Romana Country Club and La Estancia. The first three are located within the Casa de Campo Resort, the highlight being Teeth of the Dog, which was designed by Pete Dye. It is considered the best in the Caribbean, and 43rd in the top 100 courses worldwide. According to Golf Magazine, it represents the country in the world of golf.

A great tourist attraction in La Romana is a tour of its various iron sculptures in the Paseo de la Fama del Baseball Latino located in El Parque Central Juan Pablo Duarte. They were created by José Ignacio Morales El Artistico, who recreates athletic poses that mimic the best Latino players who have made history in the big leagues. For those who do not know, baseball is the national sport in the Dominican Republic, and many Dominicans are members of American baseball teams.

The large tobacco factory, Tabacalera de García, is considered the largest premium cigar factory in the world, with more than 4.500 employees and up to 45 million hand-rolled cigars produced each year. Ancient handicraft methods are used to produce world-renowned prestigious brands such as Montecristo, Romeo and Julieta, and H. Hupman, among others. This factory organizes tours to visit and observe the live fabrication of traditional Dominican cigars, and of course, to try them.

Did you know that... La Romana was named after a large, ancient Roman-type scale from the sixteenth century, which was used for weighing goods passing through the port. It was considered very important at that time.