PR4 Day 1 - San Juan!

Brice: As my girlfriend Lis and I are long distance now, we have to catch a flight to see one another. But if we both flew instead of one of us flying, then we get to see something new and spend time together. So I decided that we'd visit Puerto Rico! And in traditional Farrell style I did my best to jam as much as possible into it.

Lis: I was asking Brice, as I always do, about when we could do another visit.  Dying to see him again, happy to just drink gin and play pool, the usual.  But in November he goes, "I think we're gonna do a trip, like Puerto Rico.  Whenever your spring break is." My jaw hit the desk.  Take a plane??  Go to an island??  Spend a ton of money??  So needless to say, I've been looking forward to this for months.

Day 0 - Flight

I love the beauty of exotic trips, but I also enjoy the journey.  The flight from DC to San Juan is one I'd been excited for, as it was my first flight with Brice!  We were both exhausted and tried as many contortions as we could to cuddle/sleep on the plane, but the spacing of economy class, especially United, is made for hobbits/Lises and not elves/Brices.  But we managed a few bouts of conversation and dozing.  Once we landed and set off for Caribe Hilton however, I started getting energy again.  The hotel has a private beach, pools, a mini-jungle with exotic birds, and a ***ton*** of space.  But when we finally made it to our room between 2 and 3 am, the fatigue kicked in and we had a restful night.

Day 1 - Walking San Juan

Today we decided to do San Juan by walking. This was mostly a good idea.

We struck a great balance between sleeping enough that we were energized and not wasting the morning.  As we left the building I remarked, "I've been transported to this magical world where it's summer!"  (Back home the weather was around 40-60 degrees, here it was 70-80). 

We first visited Punta Escambrón (Literal translation: Prickerbush Point. It sounds way better in Spanish). We saw the extremely abbreviated ramparts, took in the ocean, and Lis marveled at her first Palm trees.  Then we looked way across the water at the fortifications that made up the todo list for today.  Castillo de San Cristobal a mile up the coast, and El Morro another mile past that.  It was slightly daunting as the screws in my femur still occasionally act up, but we decided to go for it and set off!


We had a deliciously breezy walk over to the long forts in Old San Juan.  Historic sites are some of my favorite places to walk around, because they're well-maintained, spacious, and usually blended with nature.  I had forgotten how large San Cristobal is - despite being the less famous of the paired forts it is much larger - 27 acres!  We immediately set about exploring all of it, from the WWII era additions, to the garritos (the iconic guard-lookout-boxes that all smell like hobo pee), to the ancient storage tunnels that featured all their original lighting! Which is to say, no lighting. There were so many spots on this fortress to sit and look at the sea.  Even some old cannons and cannon balls to climb on (I resisted the urge, for the sake of the children nearby). We saw a few lizards, wandered the grounds, watched the ocean smash against rocks, and eventually set off to find lunch.

After turning down a random sidestreet we found a random cafe? Lounge? Primarily a drinks place, it had sluggish service but neat decor, balconies, and an amazing caprese appetizer.


After lunch we continued past the ghetto ("Never go down there", he said foreshadowingly, like Mufasa warning Simba about the Elephant Graveyard), skirting the cemetery, and up to El Morro! El Morro is more of the same - a huge castle built with a staggering amount of stone, with great views of the sea for the cannons to take in. And too many stairs.


 


That's when my mind started wandering, looking out at the sea and trying to imagine what it would look like if invaders were approaching.  Brice also pointed out a lot of architectural advantages, like a long slope instead of stairs, which would make it hard to run up if it was wet from rain. Or blood!
 



While we were at El Morro we noticed a path winding around the base of the fort, which would put us up close and personal with the waves, so we set off to find it! We ended up backtracking a fair bit, which actually worked out as we ended up leaving via the Puerta de San Juan - the iconic gateway in the city wall. And we saw kitty city. Cat country? Punto gato? Regardless of what you call it, the locals feed hundreds of stray cats along the path around the fortress wall, resulting in cats lounging beneath every tree. It's super cute. My inner child was throwing a tantrum at the fact that it's not safe to jump into a pile of stray kittens, petting and kissing them and rubbing their bellies.  But at least I know they exist, and lounging and pouncing on lizards in their spare time.

We walked around the entire castle, taking in the imposing view an invading army would be faced with, and watching waves taller than we are smash themselves apart on the rocks. We continued around the north side of the point, eventually ending up at the cemetery. We slipped in the back door, made our way between the close-packed graves, remarking at the large swath of history on the stones.  Unfortunately, once we made our way to the front door we discovered that it was locked, and a bit too large to surreptitiously jump. So we made our way back out the backdoor, across a seawall, and around the far side... cutting across the edge of the previously proscribed neighborhood.  Luckily, everything went well and we began making our way back to the hotel.

We stopped for afternoon tea (afternoon rum?) choosing open-air seating next to Plaza De Colón, where I finally got the ceviche I missed at Brunch. While we ate we observed the art demonstration going on across the street. The local art school kids had a speaker system and were setting up to begin some spray-paint art. I've seen the youtube videos, I know how this goes. They start with random smearing and them BOOM! Planets! Nebulas! This guy spent... I dunno, at least an hour, with his team, painting a graffiti tag that just said DAB.  And no space scenery. It was delightfully ridiculous, though I'm sure that's not what they were going for.

We walked back to the hotel, snapping a few pictures of the sunset along the way, and had a more substantial meal in the in-house taco shop. Then we walked out the private pier and along the now empty beach, and chilled in the hot-tub. There was not a lot left to say at the end of an action-packed day (doesn't mean I didn't try! "If you met an alien race...."), so we just recuperated in the hot water, letting the jets scrub the 10 miles we'd hiked out of our legs.