Real Human Moments

Let me pick up where I left off 3 weeks ago, I’ve been a busy bee. (ima update this post with pictures on they’re done uploading)

We did several excursions to various places in Puerto Rico. We visited Fort San Felipe del Morro, a coastal fort built in the 1600’s to defend San Juan. The photo opportunities were abundant and we all took some glamour shots. The fort is right outside old San Juan, so after we got our fill of Tourist History, we decided to fill up on tourist shopping.

Old San Juan is a beautiful city, the buildings all have the same vibrant coloring, and all show signs of weathering from the salty air. We visited several shops, including the Don Collins cigar shop. See if you can find our picture. Of course we finished our day of tourism by visiting Senor Frogs and drinking and drinking and drinking.

On the way back to the car, we were approached by a well dressed although slightly bruised American man with a southern accent. He told us his story about how his party took a wrong turn, ended up in the wrong part of San Juan and was jumped. Of course he wasn’t just telling the story for shits and giggles, his goal was to get 10 dollars to purchase a cab ride back to his hotel as he used the rest of his money doing the same for his father. This type of situation happens all the time in cities, but here I was inclined to believe the guy. He wasn’t dressed as a typical beggar, and he promised to mail me the money. I gave him 10$ and my business card, still haven’t heard from him… jerkass.

After a night of continued drinking, beer pong, freckles and such we decided to go to visit the Puerto Rican rain forrest, El Yunque. There were the usual beautiful sights, water falls, and mountain towers, however I learned a valuable lesson while feeling hung over in the 100 degree weather. Coconut water is amazing and rids you of hangovers quite fast.

What else, somewhere a long the line we went to a casino that had a beautiful open architecture, but I didn’t win anything. Stupid casino. We visited the Bacardi factory and went of the tour, it reminded me greatly of the Heineken Brewery tour in Amsterdam. We met a funny bar tender in San Juan, Leslie Ann complained that she wanted a man who would make her a “card”, like a birthday card. The bartender though she said “car” and started making fun of her for a while, I didn’t try to clear it up though because I’m cool like that. Also the bartender wouldn’t sell me a Red Stripe sign for less than 250 dollars, i offered 20.

Finally we went Snorkling on the Salty Dog pontoon boat. It was really fun, I got burned like a mother fucker. There are quite a few beautiful photo I suggest you check out.

On our way home, our flight was cancelled so we stayed in the airport hotel. I won 80 dollars, Leslie bitched and got our flight moved up, I got something in my eye, we made it home. The end.

Recently I took a trip with some friends to the island of Puerto Rico. This was my first adventure after graduating college. It was quite a relaxing, and fun time. The other adventurers were my neighbor from fairfield Leslie, her friend Heather and her cousin Matt.We began the trip early morning, arriving at the Westchester airport for a 6 am flight. Being that early I noticed this sign which is kind of funny when taken out of context. Get it, there are two doors A and B, but they mis-spelled “Two” as “To”…. or maye not.

This vacation was truely relaxing, although it is a big island my mind turned to Island mode immediatley. I didn’t have anything to worry about, not work, not a girl, not a paper I should have been working on, nothing. We stayed at a non-tourist condo complex called “Playa Azul II”, which was right on the beach and had an amazing view. We were on the 13th floor, each condo has a small deck/porch area which proved to be a wonder place to pull up a chair and read, or smoke a fine cigar. The mornings were quite rough though, the sun made sure to inform you around 8 or 9 that it did not want you sleeping any more.

The beach had a darker (than CT) fine grain sand, and the water was Azul (blue) just like the name claims. It was so soothing to lay out on the relativly empty beach and drink a Medalla (PR beer). We met some interesting people there; I met some Americans from Oregon, a retired advertising excecutive who helped us order our food and called us “Anglos”, even some college students from UPR.

Puerto Rico is America, its no different than say Bridgeport or Hartford, except the amazing beaches. Being as we were less endowed in the wallet, we frequented classic restaurants such as Pizza Hut, and the equivalent of Taco Bell, Taco Maker. By far the best food was at a row of small stores where the locals mostly ate. They were called the Kokio’s and each one served a variety of fried meat, rice, beans, chicken, fish and ice cold beers. A full meal including a Heinken for 6 bucks, mmmm good.

Besides eating, drinking and tanning we did visit various attractions on the Island such as the old fort “El Morro”.
Check out all my photos here.
… Stay tuned for a complete recap.