San Juan, Puerto Rico ~ Day 5 ~ DeJa Vu

I'm really late but so much is going on right now. Anyway, my final day on San Juan came in very quick. It was warm. The water was beautiful. The scooters were out. The tours were back on but it was time to check out and board our plane. Can you believe that? As soon as the weather went back to normal..it was time to head home. It was bitter sweet. One of my sisters happened to be a block away from me in another hotel. Swing sister that is.. We met right before lunch. It was great. My sister and her family was having fun in the sun. Its so funny that my sister and I live in Queens and we happen to be in Puerto Rico at the same timSe. My travel partner and I had a lunch date at UNO's. The food was great and we had free dessert. How cool is that!!  We made it to the airport on time head ad landed in Miami safe. There were delays from Miami to New York but all went well. It was great to be home in my shower in my bed. God is great..ad greatly to be praised.

San Juan, Puerto Rico ~ Day 4 ~ La Playa

We finally got out of the room after a late start. There was Light!! The first day of Fun in the Sun. We ventured out for food and started walking towards the beach. We felt the water and decided to skip a meal just to experience the sandy beaches of San Juan, Puerto Rico. We rushed back for our swim wear and before we could get back out of the hotel room..we saw the rain coming. Smh. I was determined. By the time we got back to the beach the rain ceased and we got right in water. It was beautiful!! We rested on beach chairs and watched nature all around us. It was very relaxing and breath taking. My travel partner cut those moments short due to his hunger pangs. We walked along the nearest street to the beach looking for good food at a reasonable price. We passed a few restaurants and high end stores like Salvatore Farragamo, Cartier and Gucci. The strip is on Ashford Street. We came across a little cafe that had sandwiches, smoothies, coffee and fruit juices. The name was Picachos aromas de cafe. It was very nice and very clean. My partner chose a ham baguette with a diet Coke and I selected the Chicken Focaccia with Passion Fruit juice. The Chicken Focaccia was excellent. It had lettuce, tomatoes and pesto sauce. I did opt out of the pesto sauce but they put it on anyway. I was so happy that they went against my wishes because I enjoyed the sandwich. The passion fruit juice was great at first but you couldn't taste your sip go down after a while due to the after taste. Ok, ok t wasnt that serious about your sip. I got that line from an old hit sitcom (Martin). Dessert included a stroll across the street to the famous Cold Stone Creamery. It was was an exciting walk back down the strip because the ice cream was so delicious. I got a few looks and stares and one wave. I dont know if the ice cream made me look good or if I made the ice cream look good. Either way it was all good. It was our last full day so I had to make it back to the beach. We relaxed and heard the sound of the water rush in and pull back out. We were out all day with no watch and no cell phone and had no knowledge of the time. We looked at each other and said, "that's vacation.." The highlights of the day faded out and the lowlights of the night flowed in..we capped it with a movie called "Tangled."

P.S. The pics were on another SD card. Having technical difficulties uploading them.

San Juan, Puerto Rico ~ Day 3 ~ Aromas

What a beautiful wet day it was on day 3. We flip flopped through the streets of Old San Juan. It was beautiful and very historic. I envisioned all of Puerto Rico to look like Old San Juan. The streets were very narrow. It was very commercial but looked like old living quarters turned into shops and boutiques. We hopped in and out of the stores like true tourist. We found shelter in a good old Radio Shack when the rain started to drench us. We perused the place acting like we were customers. We grew hungry and asked one of the salesman what was a great reasonable and authenthic place to have lunch. He said "go out, make a left and then a right and you will see a restaurant called Aromas." We followed directions and almost got side tracked by another suggestion but the rain was way too heavy to start venturing off to the unknown. The restaurant was cozy and contemporary. I will attach a couple photos. The food was great. I had chicarrones de pollo and arroz con guandoles (I may have spelled it wrong). The translation is fried chicken chunks with the bone in and rice with beans. My travel partner had a well seasoned burger with cheese, onions and peppers. Just in case I didn't say it before, the food was great!! The only weird thing is that you had to go outside of the restaurant to use the rest room. Yes, very different!! We walked along the streets and gazed into shop after shop. We saw the Governors residence and walked near the water. Our last stop before we left was an old castle. It was a historic site called Castillo San Cristobal. The rain was heavy and the winds were high but we toured the castle and learned a lot of history. It was fun because of the rain. We tried to make a scary movie while in the dungeon but are extras kept messing up (sort of an inside joke). We took a cab back to our hotel and ventured back out into some crazy rain. I took the hood off of my poncho and just splashed in the rain as people gawked at me like I was crazy. We were a block away from the beach and saw the waves roaring coming way over the sand and closer inland. We decided to make it a movie night. We saw so much water that the choice of movie was Fireproof!!

San Juan, Puerto Rico ~ Day 2 ~ Sand & Toes = Simplicity

Sand & Toes sounds very plain & simple. Well that's the kind of day that I had today. We had a Tropical Storm/Hurricane warning. It passed over us. Thank God for Jesus!! We did have very high winds that caused us to stay in doors and lose electricity. Yes, I am on vacation and had to deal with the loss of lights. My travel partner and I walked to the beach. The tides were very high but nature is beautiful. He did his excercise run along the beach. I made an impression in the sand with my toes and watched it wash away with the rushing water. I spelled out my nickname in the sand and the water came and erased it before I could complete the last letter. My travel partner watched and asked, "why would you do it again if you know its going to wash away?"  I looked and said, "because I'm playing a game." We walked inland passing numerous stores that were clearly shut down because of the storm. We finally stopped at a small authenthic restaurant for brunch. The place was a lil worn and not all of the drinkware matched. I guess that is common but I noticed. We sat in the back where we could see the ocean and its unruly waves. The food at Don Jose was fine and it was a nice little crowd. As the rain poured harder the leaks in the roof of the restaurant leaked stronger. I looked on as everyone else dismissed it like it wasn't even happening. We got the check, made the transaction and left the shack just in time for down pour. We picked up a old beat up abandoned umbrella and kept on going.  We got back to the room and still there were no lights and no electricity. I found out there was electricity on one side of the hotel and I immediately opened my mouth. My travel partner caught the contagious mouth problem and we got upgraded to a large suite. I love the upgrade. I learned that storms, hurricanes and down pours can bring simplicity in the end..

San Juan, Puerto Rico ~ Day 1 ~ August 21, 2011

Vacation Puerto Rico Day 1
Ahhhh Hello Readers,
I am currently on my United Airlines flight to San Juan, Puerto Rico. First let me back track a bit. You all know how expensive airport parking can be..right?? You also know how inconvenient it can be to ask family and friends for a ride to the airport. Especially, when your flight leaves super early in the morning. You run the risk of your ride being late and you having a pre-vacation attitude because of it. They run the risk of slight jealousy and having a pre-non-vacation attitude because they realize they will not be going with you. Ok so with that being said; I decided it would be smart, easy and reasonable to reserve a Zipcar. The process would be that my boyfriend (he will be referred to as my travel partner for the remainder of this blog ..because its just funny to me :~) and I would hop into my car, drive to the Zipcar, one would drive the other car back to my home, park my car, drop me and the luggage to the airport with the Zipcar, and then he would drop the Zipcar back to the spot. For all those who are unfamiliar with Zipcar, you have to drop the car off at the same spot you picked it up. I thought that I could just leave the car any where I felt and they would track it down but of course life couldn't be that smooth (smh). The plan was for my travel partner to take public tranportation back to the airport after walking to the bus. So we stuck to the plan. While I was roaming around Laguardia airport in the wrong terminal because I don't follow directions; my travel partner was right on schedule patiently waiting for the bus. Im pushing one of those airport carts (which is something I don't ever want to do again..its just soooo not me) texting my travel partner to let him know what terminal he should be going to once he reaches the airport. He's responding and still patiently waiting. I'm walking and walking hoping that the person didnt give me the wrong information because I'm not big on the whole walking thing with cute sandals, an airport luggage cart, luggage and a not so happy face. I mean it was still dark out, only a few people were walking, I'm reading signs stating "Its prohibitted to go beyond this fence, etc." I finally reach the terminal, I scanned my passport, printed out our boarding passes scoped out the place and my travel partner was still patiently waiting. I messaged him all my accomplishments and he replied that he was still waiting for the bus that was obviously off schedule. He waited for the next scheduled bus and it never came. I'm sitting on the luggage at this point looking like Lonely Linda. Ok moving right along, there were mechanical issues with both scheduled buses. He finally arrived late. We made it on the plane and were not sitting next to each other..ugggh, until my travel partner guilted someone out of their seat. We slept and slept, had a slight lay over and almost got locked out of our connecting flight to San Juan, Puerto Rico all because I wanted Starbucks Iced Lemon Pound cake and a hot chocolate. Obviously, we made Iy because here I am writing you on the plane next to my travel partner who is sleeping like a fat baby. Oh yeah ummmm I was notified that there would be a bad storm in San Juan once we get there..hmmm thats funny. I hope Irene is not mean and out of control. Irene is the name of the storm. I'm looking out the window. I just love how amazing God is..the sky..the clouds..