I accidentally started a social movement!

Obviously, everything in places such as Punta Cana is geared towards tourism and rightly so, somewhat. After the novelty of moving here wears off a little, you start to think what else is there? You’ve walked the beach a hundred times, sat through hours of karaoke and ate and multiple restaurants week after week. Where’s the stimulation in a place like Punta Cana beyond the beach and restaurants? Before I started Punta Cana Project, I had likened life here to that of the film ‘Groundhog Day’. Not only do the days blur into one, but the weeks do too! Everything is running like clockwork. Of course, the general tourist who is here for no more than a week is oblivious to this and loves every second. To myself and everyone else living here, hearing ‘Sweet Caroline’ every day of the week is enough to make anyone go crazy!

Now, this is where my happy accident started, but before I explain how I arrived at this point, I need to give you some backstory. A year previous I had started a project called ‘Walk for Education’. In October 2024, I walked 200km from Santo Domingo to Punta Cana over 6 days to raise money for a school in Friusa. Then, in May 2025, I walked 216km from Santo Domingo to Puerto Plata in 7 days, raising money for a school on the North Coast. In February 2025, I started a beach walk to try and spread the word about my charity walks, naming it ‘Walk and Talk’. The first walk attracted around 20 people and it was a success! I started a WhatsApp group of the same name and the ball was rolling. I continued this every other week and I know it got people talking and meeting new members of the community. The walk in May came and went and I found myself continuing with the Walk and Talks, but I gradually began to add other social activities I thought would be fun. By this point, I couldn’t do all of this under the name Walk and Talk so I had to call my movement something, but what?! That was until I remembered in December 2024, I had bought the domain PuntaCanaProject.com for no reason other than I thought it was a good name and I might use it for something one day. Without realising, I had stumbled into a social movement with a name I had forgotten I bought 6 months previous. The WhatsApp group continued to grow significantly, as did the Facebook group I had started. It started with four activities in a month and then I’d add more and more. People were coming and making friends immediately, by having fun learning Spanish, painting and walking. It has snowballed into something much bigger than I ever anticipated. 

As I write this blog, there are 455 people in the WhatsApp group and over 1,100 in the Facebook group with Instagram up to over 700. The amount of friendships I have witnessed being born at one of my events is endless. I feel so much pride in knowing that I’ve helped people connect and made their lives happier. To me that is priceless. On average now, there are between 14-16 events every month and it has taken over my life and I love it. By trade, I am a Graphic Designer, I have been since I left school at 16, and now, Punta Cana Project has given me another outlet to be creative but this time with events.

Going forward, I see this becoming the social infrastructure of Punta Cana. Anyone that moves here for any amount of time, will never feel alone like I did in those first few months, and they’ll always have the option to do something fun and meet others. This is what I’ve become so passionate about, I don’t have to try because it’s in me. I live and breathe Punta Cana Project. I love helping people and I hope to help you reading this.

There’s a lot I am looking forward to, including a Punta Cana Project app which will house everything I do. There are more business partnerships in the pipeline as I look to bring commerce and the local population closer together so everyone benefits. My slogan is ‘Bringing people together’ so everything I do reflects this.

If you haven’t been to a Punta Cana Project social event, then I invite you to join in and start meeting people just like you. We all moved here for a better life in the sun, but we also need community because that’s what makes our lives even better.

Who knows, you might just meet your next best friend whilst playing Cornhole!