Puerto Rico

HOME | TRAVEL LOG

YOU NEED TO HAVE JAVA SCRIPT INSTALLED ON YOUR COMPUTER TO BROWSE THIS PAGE

PUERTO RICO
From March 15th to 23rd 2008

WHERE IS PUERTO RICO?

SEE PICTURES OF DOORS OF OLD SAN JUAN

We spent 8 days in Puerto Rico and I was surprised to see how Americanized this island was. With Mc Donald’s on every corner and Wall Marts everywhere, it was hard to taste some authentic food and experience the real Puerto Rican life.

That being said, the island’s interior is beautiful with lush green mountains and spectacular views. We spend a night at the mountain Lodge retreat center and it was really peaceful.

There are great hiking opportunities all over the island. We hiked in the Guanica Dry forest, one of the only original dry forests remaining on Earth. It was indeed very dry! Trees looked like they were dead, but if you broke a small branch; you could see that the tree was really living with green moist inside branches.

San Juan was really interesting and deserves at least a few days to visit. We stayed in the Condado area (beach district) which was only 5 km from old San Juan. I found that the accommodation was really expensive for what you got. Poor ratio cost vs. quality. On our first night, we stayed at the Atlantic Beach Hotel and it was simply disgusting. For 140$US a night, we got a dirty small room with no hot water. Absolutely not recommended!

The old San Juan was very pretty with old Spanish architecture. If you are passing by San Juan one day, it is worth it to take a 15 min cab ride from the airport to see this old part of the city.

The Bacardi rum distillery was fun & interesting! Located 15 min from San Juan, you need a car or hire a cab to get there.
You don’t get to visit the actual installations (like when we visited Malibu in Barbados), but the tour is informative and you get 2 free drinks per person + you get to buy rum that Bacardi doesn’t sell anywhere else in the world!

The Arecibo observatory is the largest radio telescope in the world and they have been analyzing radio signals from outer space since 1963! It was hard to get to, but I am happy I saw it.

Our trip was good, but we ate lots of fast food and I feel that it was very expensive for what we got.
I think they are much nicer, smaller islands in the Caribbean to discover…

Other visited islands