Puerto Rico off season

Well, I never really wanted to go to Puerto Rico. It is a territory of the US, and I figured it would be too US-like for me. I was partly right and partly wrong. E and Pickle and I just returned from a week vacation on the west coast near Rincon. Here is the result.

There is absolutely no doubt of US influence on the island. All you have to do is to see all the McDonalds, Burger Kings, Pizza Huts, Church's Chicken, Walmart, Walgreens, Home Depots, and other US brand stores fly by as you drive. You also can't help but notice the (good) quality of the roads, signage, street lighting, level of housing, and types of cars that show up as you travel. After that, though, the flavor begins to assert itself. There are a lot of ways in which Puerto Rico distinguishes itself.

Tropical with a capital T


There is no doubt you are in the tropics. This is not just Florida hot and humid. This is wringing wet at times, surrounded by the sea and always feeling its effects. It is almond trees on the beach. (By the way, don't sit under them - despite the great shade - unless you are willing to have a knot on your head when an almond in its husk falls on your head. They are heavy.)

It is daily thunderstorm wet. More on that later.

You can even drive through a cloud (and torrential rain) as you go from the south coast over the mountains to the north coast.

Animals

Some are really strange to us temperate climate types. Of course we have all seen frogs and lizards. But these are really big! This guy sat about 5 inches tall. We thought it was the infamous Coqui frog, but it turns out that that one is a little guy (about the size of a quarter). The Coqui is the frog that sings out with a powerful voice each night. We're not sure what this guy was doing, other than sitting there patiently while we took its picture.

The lizards are also pretty big. This guys was one of many, easily hanging on a vertical concrete column, motionless for minutes at a time.

There seem to be a lot of varieties of crabs, some of which are edible.

And a retired zoologist showed us his ball python, his friend for a long time.

Beaches


There are tons of them. We were near Rincon, supposedly known for its surfing. Take a look here! No waves! A bit further north there is more of an Atlantic character, though, bringing bigger waves.

The off season seems nice here. The place we stayed was deserted during the week. On weekends the local people book it up a bit more. We had the beach pretty much to ourselves. We couldn't veg for very long, though. About midweek we got going to see a bit more. This is the "surfing" beach near the lighthouse north of Rincon.

The character of the beaches seems to be quite natural, though some that are in cities or parks are tended a little more carefully. Unlike other places, you can still see and collect sea glass here.

Politics

Politics seems to be big business here. We were told that about 90% of eligible voters participate in elections. People are very participative. While we were there, the election preparations were going on. Every Saturday, and sometimes in between, there are parades of cars, trucks, and other vehicles. Some of them, like this one, have HUGE loud speakers on them, blaring out messages in Spanish along with music. While almost everyone here can speak English, the overwhelming everyday language is Spanish.

Other vehicle have people in, hanging onto, sticking out of, and on top of them. Apparently there is no regard for safety! The cops evident in all these parades seem to ignore that.

It is not uncommon to see 40 or 50 vehicles all driving along together, honking horns, shouting, and blaring music in support of their candidate. They double up, they pass each other, they peel out, they take up the wrong lanes; it is just plain crazy!

Old friends

One of the days we met up with one of E's old friends from graduate school. Carmencita is a multi-talented woman, a professor of chemistry at the Mayaguez branch of the University of Puerto Rico , a musician, a talented poet, the founder of the Mayaguez Symphony Orchestra, and a hell of a lot of fun. She and E pal'ed around together in Gainesville quite a while ago. To give you an idea, Carmen once won a wet t-shirt contest without baring herself, just by dancing the rumba island-style.

With Carmen we visited a lot of local places. We started with lunch at a little town called Joyuda, on the beach near Mayaguez.

We ate at El Gatito (the little cat), which had fresh seafood and appetizers that were very good. A bottle of Medalla, the local beer, went really well with that.

Then we went to see San German, the very first Spanish settlement in the Western Hemisphere. This was a beautiful small town with a central square surrounded with gorgeous houses and a restored church.

Carmen got us in to see the church, despite it being closed. She is quite a wheeler-dealer, and knew the historian who happened to be inside.

Most of the roof had been restored. However, the inside columns were original, made of a wood so hard that you cannot hammer nails into it. There were a lot of beautiful artifacts inside, like this tile of the Tower of Babel, situated on the steps leading to the pulpit.

This gives you an idea of its size, as well as showing some of the original columns and an original carving.

We ended the day visiting the University Campus, which has a planting of some 50+ varieties of palm trees spread across the campus.

It also has some really beautiful sculptures like this Tree of Life with Pickle sitting next to it. This is quite an old campus. The government is currently restoring some of the original buildings.

Exploring a bit

Other days we had more adventures. One evening we reached La Parguera on the south coast right after dusk. Here there is a mangrove lagoon that has a bioluminescent character. John's Boat Tours took us out to see the "must see" natural phenomenon.

About 20 of us piled into this boat to splash through the shallows into the lagoon. There a young man jumped into the water and started swimming around in it. Then about half the people on the boat jumped in and swam around, stirring up the water. Then the mosquitoes came and attacked the rest of us!

This is the best picture I took of the phosphorescence. It was VERY pale, almost to the point of SO WHAT? Oh, well, live and learn. For $6 what do you want?

Another day we headed off to see a church in Hormigueros, a small town along the Route 2 expressway. Since we were early in the day we stopped off at a well known bakery for breakfast. Bakeries here are a little strange. They have the obvious, bread and sweet confections. They also have comida criollas (Creole food) and sandwiches. They serve anything from breakfast through dinner, and are open early and late. This one (Ricomini) is really good.

We knew the established route to Hormigueros, but spotted a sign that pointed us along the way much earlier than we expected. It took us onto a tiny (1 1/2 lane) country road that just got smaller and smaller as we drove. Along the way we saw this beautiful horse who clearly expected to be fed something. Unfortunately we were traveling sans carrots.

After a while the road dwindled into one lane and started winding up and down hill, skirting ravines and jungle. I love this kind of thing, and am used to driving on minimal roads. I learned to drive when I was eleven, and drove woods roads a lot. Unfortunately, this is a very scary thing for Pickle, who screeches a lot and accuses me of trying to kill her. So, when confronted with a tree half across the road I turned back, ultimately resulting in a visit to a gomera. We had seen signs everywhere for gomeras, but couldn't tell what they were. You really don't want to know!

This picture should give you a hint! As we drove off the hill we began to notice a thump, thump, thump sound. I stopped twice to look at the tires, but did not notice any problem. Soon enough, though, we knew what had happened.

The timing could not have been worse! Remember the afternoon thunder shower mentioned above? As we were driving through Mayaguez, the afternoon shower began. Soon I had the wipers on full speed. We began to notice flooding on the expressway and streams running down roads. Everyone slowed down to about 10 mph. The thump, thump, thump then resolved itself into a flat tire. I ended up replacing the tire in a freaking monsoon! Seriously, I thought I would get washed away before I could put on the spare. We had picked up metal spikes on the back road. So, the next day I discovered what a gomera was. Gomas are tires, and the gomeras replace or fix them. At least it was cheap ($8 for a patch).

What else?

Sunsets are good here, at least if you can see to the west! If it doesn't rain you should hang out around sunset and see if anything happens.

The farmer's market in San Sebastian is pretty entertaining. It's a bit windy and twisty, roadwise, to get there. The market site is really unusual. They have constructed a long, concrete-roofed, winding market place. It meanders over a couple of acres next to a big parking lot.

There is a lot of stuff that you would not usually see. Some very strange roots are in evidence. There are lots of varieties of yams.

There are about a billion and one kinds of bananas. You can get anything from one to a bunch.

You can get these stubby, thick, vaguely disturbing ones, too. I wouldn't go for that kind, though.

They also have a wide variety of animals for sale, everything from these goldfish...

to baby rabbits, puppies, prize hens and roosters, and these tropical birds.

Food

We were a bit disappointed. There is a LOT of fried stuff here. There is also mofongo, with its sort of ghetto epithet sound. Mofongo is mashed plaintain with other stuff - e.g., bacon fat and garlic. It is often served relleno - stuffed. You can get it stuffed with lobster, shrimp, fish, or chicken. You can even get a gob stuffed with meat and fried - alcapurrias. Edible, but nobodies favorite.

Last day - San Juan

Everybody says you have to see Old San Juan. On our last day we drove the southern route, through Ponce and over the mountains to San Juan. The mountains can be a challenge. Your squirrel cage rental car will be in second gear for a looooong time, creeping up and up and up. Add in a downburst from a cloud that's about 10 feet over your head and you have an unusual trip. Along the way we got gas, leaving the toll road just after paying $1.75 toll. Following the signs back to the toll road we found ourselves - guess where - back on the pay again side of the toll. What the hell?

Reaching San Juan we found parking just at the entrance of the walls to the fort. The fort is pretty impressive, with really thick and high walls. It is a traditional star-shaped fort, able to defend  from two directions (star points) against an attack at the same time.

Inside now are lots of buildings, beautiful sculptures, and tourist traps. It was sweltering hot and reaching toward 100% humidity. The thunderstorms we drove through to get there were approaching while we were walking through the old town dripping.

Losing ten pounds of water while walking tended to ruin our curiosity. So we walked down the hill inside the fort toward the harbor and our parking garage. We paid our $1.87 for two hours of parking and left. (I don't believe I ever saw a parking garage return $0.13 as change before.) Sure enough, as soon as we were out of the garage, the downpour started again.

After a brief 4 hours wait at the airport and paying $45 to ship our bags back on the airplane with us we were off to the states again.

Conclusion

While this is an unusual place with lots of attractions, we probably will not go back for a while. There are lots of other islands to see. The only one compelling for us for extra visits is Jamaica, since there is family there. So, go, explore, taste, and enjoy. Make your own conclusions. Be sure to explore, though! There is always something new and different around the corner.

Chincoteague weekend

This is an unusually nice weekend. In August there is always a nice breeze through the place. No AC necessary! The temperature is moderate, the ocean is warm, the breeze is soporific. This weekend we have Pickle, our oldest daughter, with us.

The beach has not been as crowded as in the past, perhaps due to the gas crunch. At any rate, this year there seems to be an increased focus on surfing. It could be that the surfers are local and just appear more numerous when the crowd is thinner.

The waves seemed more than usually perfect for surfing. Normally there is a short break at the sand bar, then a second break near the shore. This time the break was continuous from the outer reach of the sand bar all the way to shore. There were some long rides today for a change.

That left more time for some maneuvering. I don't know what they were called, but it was pretty cool. There seems to be a bit of everything in the water, long boards, short boards, kayaks, and boogy boards. They were all getting good rides.

I kept to my normal occupations, however; daydreaming, kite-watching, lunching, people-watching and such-like.

And tomorrow there was

It always feels good to me to come to Chincoteague. I can rest here. I can beach here. I can always see something to capture on film here. Today it was this ghost crab, stirred up by a little boy with a plastic shovel. Boy, was he surprised! So was the crab, which attracted a crowd quickly.

So were we, when it came time to purchase our Duck Stamp for the year. Normally you purchase a $15 Duck Stamp and it gets you into Assateague National Wildlife Refuge (and the beach) for the rest of the year. This year they introduced a $15 beach pass on top of that. Only the federal government could see doubling their price as trivial. Maybe it is, but it was a bit of a shock.

We found out that someone from work is down here for the week, too. We'll visit a little later in the week.

Day b4 Yesterday or so - Onward into Florida

This was a bit of a long day. Out of Louisiana, first we traveled through the bayous and lakes (from Lake Bigeux onward to Grosse Tete the road was elevated on concrete stilts). This is beautiful country, with patchworks of bayou, swamp, and lakes peeking through the foliage. Here we saw names from my ancient past in an environmental lab. Calcasieu and Placquemine Parish, the sites of huge waste dumping facilities. We tested them, along with other samples from all over the US, then assembled the results into a database for the biggest waste hauling company in the US.

Then on past Lake Pontchartrain and into Mississippi. Pretty country, but not much to note there. Then past Mobile and the battleship Alabama, sitting in the harbor as a historical monument.

Well, maybe there is something to note. Somewhere in Mississippi or Alabama (the latter, I think) a police car pulled out of the median onto the interstate behind us. It did exactly what I had just read about. It pulled up behind us in the next lane, paused long enough to type in our license plate, then pulled up beside us. I turned my head to see what was going on, and the trooper waved. I waved back and then he pulled forward and took off. Apparently this was an example of a phenomenon I had just read about. The cops track cars doing the speed limit, suspecting that they are ferrying drugs. If the driver does not respond by looking at the cop, the cop then pulls the car over for a search. I'm not sure what the probable cause would be. But if drugs are found, the cops glom onto the whole thing and pay for their stuff with it. Kind of justified piracy as they see it. Glad I looked over and saved myself the trouble of a search!

Finally we got into Florida, where E and I met each other years ago in graduate school. We were on our way to visit old grad school friends, G and M. We dropped off I-10 at Pensacola, finding our way along Route 98 (very slowly). It goes along a big sandbar island for miles and miles. We passed through Gulf Breeze, Mary Esther, Destin, and finally into Miramar Beach. It was kind of troublesome on the stretch through Destin. Apparently half the US population was there! Two lanes in either direction (Route 98 is the only major highway on this island/sand spit), and all lanes full of cars moving at snailish paces.

G and M live in a resort (Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort), alongside a golf course. Their home and surroundings are just beautiful (I'll try to catch up and include some pictures soon). The house is spacious and elegant and beautiful.

Our families had gotten together several times in the past, at the beach and elsewhere. From these times, G had stitched together home movies and stills into a really nice CD presentation which really brought back memories. For one, I was actually reasonably thin at the time (no longer). Our girls were young and cute, not grown up and beautiful like they are now. Derek and Patrick were entirely switched in height. To me G and M look the same now as they did then (except M's haircut now is fabulous!)

Our kids and theirs were born almost coincidentally, and it was fun tracking what had happened to each of them. The kids got along really well when we all got together.

We spent a day and a half in Sandestin, tootling around in their golf cart, visiting the beach and the resort activities. As hot as it was (in the high 90s), it is the height of one of their seasons here. The beach is a couple miles of resort roads and golf cart tracks from the house. Once you get there you are in the middle of major resort. The chair and umbrella combo can be had for $69 per day (set up by the hotel). Bring your own!

 There were lots of people and activities, but no boardwalk. That's a good thing. Bring your pass so you can show it to pee.

Our chariot awaits. These things are fun. We should have one for Chincoteague.

M cooked dinner the night we got there, then I cooked chicken and dumplings the next night. It was great to see them! It seemed like we picked up just where we left off ten years ago, the last time we got together. We have all "retired" in some measure, but three of us still have jobs of some type, just slower and somewhat more enjoyable! Life is nice when we can catch up like this. We were sorry to leave, but we have a schedule we need to keep to get home on time. Though the Post Office purports to working in rain, sleet, and snow, they do not hold the mail for longer than 30 days. Last time we did anything like this they dumped it off in boxes on our doorstep.

Hellshire Beach near Kingston, Jamaica

People are afraid of Jamaica, that is clear. I have always wondered why. While there is undoubtedly crime here, being here there is no sense that it is more frequent or worse than elsewhere. There is more than enough to make up for it in natural beauty, friendliness of the people, music, creativity, and comfort.

We spent today at Hellshire Beach, out past the causeway on the other side of Portmore. I always take a camera because I never know what will present itself. Today was a day for food, beautiful children, and the always present vendors.

We started the day, as usual, with fresh fried fish, lobster, and festival (a fried, slightly sweet bread in stick form). The fish here are always fresh. The boats come right up to the shore where the fish are scaled and sold directly to the restaurants. The ambiance is a little chaotic, with people coming and going all the time. We sat and watched the people, ate our fish and lobster with escovitch-style hot pepper/onion sauce with vinegar.

Then we went outside to watch what was happening. The beach was very full. There were lots of families in the water, and lots of kids around. Some of them saw me taking pictures and wanted theirs taken. Somehow they wanted to be part of the scene that I was recording. Nobody wanted me to send them a picture or do anything more than show them theirs.



Lots of kids were riding the horses led around by their owners. Every single one of them was happy and smiling. The children in Jamaica are beautiful!



While this was going on a majorly huge speaker system was pounding out music with an impressive bass, earthquake style. Eight 2 foot bass speakers are intentionally pointed at the ground. The ground really shook! The DJ played topical music, anything from reggae to pop to love songs. It was LOUD!

The vendors were out all day long: nuts, "peppa swimps" (pepper shrimps), peanut brittle, ganja, oysters, cotton candy, and more. These guys are always here, day in and day out. Many of them I recognize from being here so many times for fish, sun, and music. My favorites are the bamboo bank guy and the oyster guy. They wander the beach, trying out their lines on everyone, especially tourists. You just sit still and they com to you. The oyster man pulls up, starts shucking while you slurp. He doesn't quit until you say so.

So I have a theory:

• if visitors to Jamaica came to Hellshire and listened to the music and watched the children and families
• if they came and watched the vendors do their business and had a meal
• if they enjoyed the sun

then, maybe they could begin to understand what a lovely place this is. They could enjoy the creativity and joy in the people. They could have the sun and the sand and understand a new point of view. I don't have a problem here. Others should be able to relax and enjoy it, too.