polarizer!
A polarizer(or CPL) would have reduced the harshness of the reflections(off skin) of sunlight.
Also .. what Andrew said!
Another thing to check on your D7000, is to work out if you have quick compensation enabled on the camera.
One of the handiest features on any camera .... It allows you to use any of the programmed semi auto modes as a pseudo manual mode.
So if you're using
Aperture mode, you can set
exposure compensation with a quick flick of the
shutter dial without fumbling about using the
exposure compensation button/dial setting method.
By default easy compensation is turned off in the menu system. To check it, or enable it, navigate to menu item B3 in the Settings Menu(spanner icon) and set it to On(not On - Auto reset).
If you choose this mode, then what you would then do is if you're in
Aperture Priority mode, you control the
aperture with the front dial as per normal, but you set
exposure compensation just by turning the
shutter dial.
(which does nothing, if easy compensation is disabled).
In
Shutter Priority mode, you control the
shutter as per normal(rear dial) and set compensation via the
Aperture control dial(front) which usually does nothing by default.
No need to set
exposure compensation with the infuriating two button press/turn method.
I reckon had you given this scene(as shot) -1Ev compensation, it may have exposed quite OK(except for the background sky) ... a polariser would have helped to lower
exposure on the sky too tho.