Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Puerto Rico

What an interesting place! Puerto Rico is one minute Hawaii, one minute Mexico, and the next you are in Anywhere, USA, with a bit of European flavor in Old San Juan. It's a very densely populated island with lots of poor and not much middleclass except perhaps in San Juan.

While it was nice to have warm weather and warm ocean in December, the 85-88 degree weather was a bit much for me.

We arrived on Sunday and stayed at a resort hotel in the Isla Verde region of San Juan, right on the ocean. We had a Hotwire room, and they put us on a lower floor with a city view, next to the elevator. When we asked if we could possibly move from next to the elevator (the hotel was nearly empty), Val told them it was my birthday, so they gave us an ocean view on the 14th floor! Nice. Here is the view from our hotel balcony:


We ate dinner at the cafe on our beach, and drank fruity rum drinks! And watched the sun set...


The next day, Monday, we went to explore Old San Juan, a lovely town with a European feel. Built on the tip of a peninsula, within the old city walls extending from a fort, it had narrow, one-way cobblestone streets, and the houses were brightly-colored.

It was so hot, we could barely believe it was Xmas season, but decorations were out in full force, including this Capital building:


US chain stores were everywhere (McDonald's, Burger King, KFC, Taco Bell, Best Buy, etc), but they were evidently limited to discreet signs, as this Walgreen's showed:


Some street scenes:



We had lunch in a traditional Puerto Rican restaurant which served Mofongos (different kinds of meat-stuffed plantain cups) and I had a stuffed avocado. The half avocado was bigger than most of the avocados I've ever seen!

Then something drew me into the shop next door... It was run by a French Canadian guy who sold wonderful art pieces from around the world, including prints by his father, 2 of which I bought. He took a liking to us, and we must have chatted for about an hour or so, during which we became fast friends!



We finally dragged ourselves away to go sight-seeing in the town and fort..

This was an old shrine or something, but it was locked up...


A couple of parks:





A gate in the city walls.



The outside of the city walls...


Some interesting statues around the town:













































































We made it up the hill to the fort, which had an old cemetary next to it....


Who wouldn't want to rest in peace here by the ocean?


Inside the fort:






The tracks for the cannons:


View from the top:



As we were walking up the hill in the heat, we were surprised to come across a Ben & Jerry's ice cream store! Complete with hippie decor!



That night, we ate my birthday dinner in the hotel restaurant, Alfredo. The menu had a story about how Alfredo invented Fettucine and that they had the original recipe for Fettucine Alfredo.... so I gave it a try. One bite, and I put down my fork and said, "Wow!" Val took a bite, and said, "Wow!" It was by far the best Alfredo I've ever tasted, with a hint of gorgonzola giving it a bite. The tirimisu was also the best I've ever had, even better than the Italian restaurant in Maastricht!

Next day, Tuesday, we were off to Guanica, on the southwest part of the island where we were staying the rest of the time. In the morning, we headed out to the El Yunque tropical rain forest. It was gorgeous, but since we had a lot of driving to do that day, we didn't really take any of the hikes.

The road to the top was alternating between giant bamboo stands and giant ferns, with lots of Tarzan-like vines...






Val playing Jane...


View from up there (you can see the beach and waves):


Gorgeous waterfalls:



And mountain peaks:


After visiting El Yunque, we took the backroads south across the island. After two hours of winding roads, we felt we had a good sense of how people lived there. One thing was politics... giant posters of politicians were everywhere, all with pictures of the politicians.... I guess you do have to have an ego to run for politics, and it showed here.


A guide later told us politics was very dirty in Puerto Rico.

One thing I found most interesting was that even in the middle of nowhere up on the mountains, or on the remotest beach, we had cell phone service!

The houses all over Puerto Rico were like cages and painted gaudy colors! I guess there is lots of crime there... even front porches were caged, so when you drove by, it looked like the people were in jail!




Even the mailboxes were in cages...


And the telephone poles were painted in bright colors, each neighborhood/town having different color scheme.



After going across the mountain to reach the highway, we made good time to Guanica. I had wanted to get there early, because near there, in Parguera, these creatures give off a fluorescent glow when disturbed. They are only visible on moonless nights, and the moon was waxing, so our best chance was that first night.

We checked into our hotel, which had a balcony with a beach view and was just lovely. The meal at the restaurant was not so lovely, bad food and poor service, but we managed to get away, and caught a 9pm boat in Parguera. They brought 2 boats along, and put them side by side to shade the water from the moon, so we could see the creatures as one of the guys jumped into the water to disturb them. Then they broke off a root of the mangrove tree, and the creatures were clinging to the roots and we could see them up close. The boat guy even put some on our hands! They gave off a weak glow, but it was cool. I'd still like to go there on a moonless night.

The next day, Wednesday, we took it easy in our resort. We decided to go snorkeling after I finished working for a couple hours. They had a boat to take us to a nearby island called Gilligan's Island, although I could see no resemblance to the TV Island... It was basically mangrove islands with a channel which made a loop through the island. We were supposed to swim up one side and come back the other to find the best snorkeling, but the wind was strong, and the current so strong, I couldn't make it very far without getting swept back. Didn't see many fish, but it was beautiful and for a while, no one else was there.








That night, we set out with some recommendations to find a decent restaurant, and drove all the way to Ponce, but didn't find anything except steak houses and seafood restaurants. Finally, in desperation, we ended up at the Hilton in Ponce, where we had a great meal and they even had a proper vegetarian meal.

Next day, Thursday, we decided to go up into the mountains again, to visit the caves (but they were closed), and a sacred Indian site. Then we went to Rincon for dinner and sunset.

The caves are famous in Puerto Rico, but the guide at the Indian site told us that they have been closed for a couple months because someone had died there in a freak accident. The tram taking the tourists down to the entrance had stopped to let another pass, and a woman leaned over the side just as a boulder fell down from above and hit her in the head!

More windy roads and animals everywhere!



























































But it was clear that the poorest of the poor lived high up in these mountains. Often, we'd see a run-down shack with the most incredible, panoramic view! Lots of burned out cars, junk piles, animals running around were common, and made it necessary to go very slowly, as you'd come around a corner to see dogs lying in the street to get cool. They would look at you, then slowly get up and move over to the side of the road, then go back after you passed.






The people up there must be living off the land, with plantain gardens, and fruit and flowers everywhere.






We even saw a fire and a landslide.



Finally, we found the Taino Indian ceremonial site. It was in a beautiful valley high up in the mountains.


The site was used by tribes all over the island to come together for religious/ceremonial celebrations, and there were many fields rimmed with rocks used for some kind of game. There were also pictographs.







After coming down from the mountains, we reached Rincon, a world-class surfing spot popular with the international surfing community. While elsewhere, there didn't seem to be a lot of restaurants besides cheap fast food and expensive hotel restaurants, the surfing community here created demand for good, reasonable restaurants, so we found a good spot overlooking Maria's Beach, where surfers were still out at sunset.




Seemed to be a lot of ex-pats here too, and this sign made surfers welcome...


Friday, we were on a mission to find the Dirty Beach, recommended by our guide book and by several people we ran across. First we stopped by San German, the second-oldest town in Puerto Rico. There we ate lunch, and by then, I had resigned myself to eating meat or seafood, so we enjoyed one of the best burgers I've ever eaten!

The town centered around a square, with this old church at one end...



Finally, we reached the end of the paved road, and for the first time, wished we had a Jeep! There were no signs to this beach, and we almost turned back, but navigated the potholes in the dirt road until we saw other cars parked where the road turned into a mess. We went on by foot, and just around the corner, our breath was taken away... the Dirty Beach... which was a perfect circle white sand beach, with shallow, turquoise water.



Found a spot in the shade of the shrubs, and this was the view...




I lay down for a nap, but unfortunately, I woke up 5 minutes later covered with midges (tiny biting gnats)! I had to run into the water to escape!

To get the full effect, I took a video:




Near the beach was a strip of sand with these weird crabs... each had one huge claw, and some on the left, some on the right.


And I just have to end this with the "Good and Plenty" house...


On Saturday, we drove back to San Juan for the trip home, the only event was almost running out of gas... we found a Mexican restaurant near the airport, and said goodbye...