Somehow, we went from Colombia/Brazil to Puerto Rico, but it was a fun trip, so we are happy with the way it played out. We left on a Wednesday and got in bright and early on Thursday morning. With the kitchen and bathroom remodel going on, work, extra classes, and probably just a little laziness on our part—we had nothing planned. So, after sleeping in we took off and made our way to Old San Juan.
Old San Juan reminded us of Havana a bit with the brightly colored buildings and general buzz in the air. Tip for anyone—do not drive in Old San Juan. Take a taxi, uber, or just walk it. Parking is a zoo with people parking on top of each other and its virtually a one way out type of place. We parked next to a police station and walked about a mile back. It was a fun time and I, of course, got the most important item of the trip, which is my mask. We have a little collection started now, and I hope for it to grow even bigger.
That night we stopped at the beach and splashed around for a bit. There were several hotels in the area that were abandoned and/or still being renovated from Hurricane Maria. It was an eerie feeling as it felt like half the city was missing or closed. It felt as if Thanos snapped his finger in Puerto Rico and we were living post-defeat. Once back at the hotel we came up with a gameplan for tours and sorted out the rest of the trip.
Friday morning, we started early and were off to do a jet ski tour of Old San Juan. The tour directions were wrong, but we eventually made our way to where we needed to go. We met our tour guide who clearly was not a big fan of mainlanders. He said as much on the actual tour. This was great because it was just two mainlanders (Grant and I) on the tour. He briefly showed us how to operate the jet ski and then he was off. Our mission was to catch up to him as best we could. The water was choppy and unless we were going 50 mph we thought we were going to fly off. We made our way around Old San Juan, snapped some cool photos, ate the local dish (Mofongo) and then headed to El Yunque National Park.
The park was in the “rainforest,” which is a must do for Grant and me on any trip that has this type of topography. Again, a lot was closed due to the hurricane. We did climb a bit and there was a pretty waterfall right at the beginning. We hiked a tower that had awesome views of the area and then headed back down for our final event of the evening the bioluminescent tour.
This tour was a mess. The idea was that we would kayak the bay to the Laguna Grande lagoon. There we would kayak a lagoon that lit up every time we paddled. It lights up because of these single-celled microorganisms called dinoflagellates. These microorganisms glow briefly, usually in a blue-green color, whenever they are disturbed. The problem with the tour was that there were about 30 kayaks and it was pitch black. People went with wrong tours, people didn’t expect it to be so physical, and then the tour guides did not speak English well. It was an experience that we will remember as there are only 5 lagoons in the world like this and 3 are in Puerto Rico.
The final day found us tackling the world’s longest zip line “El Mostruo” at ToroVerde. We got there and met up with some of Grant’s co-workers that just so happened to have been honeymooning in the area. The first part of the adventure was tackling 8 fairly long zip lines for about 2 hours. Then came the Monster.
This zip line was a bit different because we had to lay in a harness and do our best Superman impression, which is not something we have done before. In total, the zip line was 1.5 miles long and reached speeds of 95 mph. The whole experience was a blur, but it was an incredible feeling while it was happening. We took a few pictures to commemorate our experience and then headed back to San Juan.
For whatever reason, I may have booked our hotel next to a Fogo De Chao, which may be one of my favorite restaurants. It just so happened that it was also the only restaurant that was open, and walkable, and I had a coupon…and I definitely planned this.
We definitely needed to get out of the house and let off some steam and we did just that in Puerto Rico. On to the next adventure! 😊