San Juan, Puerto Rico

Here are some pictures of our second stop… San Juan, Puerto Rico.   We initially were suppose to visit El Yunque the only tropical rain forest found in the United States.   After waiting 2.5 hours for our tour to start… freezing near an ice skating rink…we gave up and walked into town.   I think they were messing with us a bit.  We were freezing and outside it was in the high 80’s.   I was a little disappointed… (this will make Jolene happy) but that didn’t last long as we started visiting the city and seeing some of the amazing sites.

 

Here is the port just before we docked.  You can already see how beautifully the buildings are colored.  This view was completely lost as soon as we arrived at the dock.

Here is our view of Puerto Rico after we docked from our balcony… not especially nice other than you could watch others and compare size. (Ship size…)  I had to go up on top of the deck to take some pictures of where we landed.

Here we are shopping in one of the hundreds of tourist shops… (you can’t see us).  I was not going to say anything about fellow voyagers….  but…   I think this boy feels the same way about shopping as I do… or maybe he just hates having his picture taken.

Not going on the excursion gave us plenty of time to shop.  This is something usually I hate but this time it was different.   I was participating in a “who could buy the weirdest thing” contest.   Those two words “weird” and “contest” can make anything more bearable.  (This also allowed me to get the kids gift shopping out of the way)

In this square with a statue of Columbus we started our shopping.  This market was mostly comprised of local artisans and Isabelle ended up buying a hand painted nativity scene  on a feather.  (I have not idea why a feather… kind of weird… but not weird enough  for the contest)   There was some really interesting pottery and paintings.   One lady made stuff out of sand by gluing it together… kind of looked like cat litter… or more like what you take out of “used” cat liter.   This was a great candidate for “weird” but the price was too high. we had  a spending limit of $10.

Our shopping abruptly ended when we saw a fort (Fort San Cristóbal).   This fort was originally finished in 1783 and covered 27 acres.   We didn’t take a tour.  We found our selves wandering around the fort and exploring haphazardly.   There are many long corridors and it feels like you are in a labyrinth.  Each time we came out of one of these tunnel like corridors we were surprised by where we were and how much there was left to see.

Here is another view from the fort and off in the distance I noticed another fort! (Castillo San Felipe del Morro)  I decided we could continue shopping as long as we were walking towards the other fort.  I will share some pictures of that walk.  I loved the charm of San Juan… many squares with really interesting statues and colorful buildings.

We found some gifts for the children and continued on our way to the fort. Unfortunately I still didn’t have my “weird” purchase.  On the way to the fort we past a church at the exact moment that sun light from the entrance passed through a back window.   It light up the window brilliantly and was quite something to see.

While staring at the window, I noticed we were beginning to run out of light and was worried we would not make it to the other fort before closing time.  Unfortunately we didn’t make it there before the fort closed.  (hmm…   I should have made Isabelle run.)

We still walked around the outside of the fort and enjoyed  a cool breeze  that made things more bearable.  Isabelle enjoyed the fact that I only took mature pictures of her.  (Although in picture above I told her to back up into the small room.   She did and then notice she was standing in urine.  I guess men and maybe some women use this place as a private bathroom… you should have seen her dragging her shoes across the grass… hmm pee pee shoes)

I have yet to post a picture of a cat on this blog… so here it is.   I am now a mainstream blogger.  We returned to the ship just before dark and when I looked at my phone I saw that we had walked close to 10 miles…  Isabelle has blisters  (Poor thing… maybe it is a good thing I didn’t make her run)

I was not able to get something really  weird. I ended settling for a “Fighting Cock”… which I kind of like.  I had maybe a winning idea but Isabelle wouldn’t let me do it.(Buy a $10 tattoo of something weird).  My co-workers found awesome things like a magnet of a person’s behind with dolphins coming out of it and a pig roasting a man made (that was the winner).  I am sad it didn’t win.. but I blame it on Isabelle and the forts.

 Next post will be of St. Martin and there might be nudity!