Puerto Rico - Day 2

Day two started kinda slow. Jason and Blake went to breakfast while I slept in. When Jason got back, it was my turn to go to Burger King for breakfast. When I got back, I went to the pool area for a little while. At lunch time, all three of us walk around a bit. We went down to the beach, but didn't go on the beach. Then went ate lunch at Latin Star. It was alright, not that special. After lunch, Jason went to the hotel to work and I went to Old San Juan.

I was a little nervous about the taxi ride, but I didn't want to stay at the hotel and I did not want to drive. I got out at the Christopher Columbus statue and had no idea where to go to next. So, I walked down some streets with shopping and then decided that walking toward the water would be more interesting. I ended up at La Princesa Fountain, which is on the south side of the island (Old San Juan is an island). From there I walked along the city wall past La Fortaleza to Castillo San Felipe El Morro, which is on the west end of the island. Then I walked along the city wall on the north side of the island to Castillo San Cristobal, which is very near where I started.

Castillo San Cristobal is magnificent. I wondered around there for a while, took some pictures of the amazing views and was in general in awe of the place. To give you an idea of the size of the island, those cruise ship are on the south side of the island. You can also see how close Castillo San Felipe El Morro is. That's it on the farthest point. That the most western point. By the way, the little neighborhood in the middle is La Perla, one of the worst slum areas around. Shortly after taking this picture, Jason called and said that he and Blake were on their way to meet me at El Morro.

El Morro is just as magnificent as San Cristobal if not more so. The inside courtyard is painted yellow, which is something I have never seen in an fort before. We completely toured this fort from the sixth level to the first. The views from this fort were more of the ocean than of the sea. El Morro sits on top of a hill with a big grassy area in front of it. As you can tell in t he photo, it's very windy here, so there were a lot of kite flying. According the website, there is a kite flying festival at El Morro every year I wish I could be there for that.

As we were leaving the fort, there was a huge storm. That's not the night sky in that picture, that's the storm cloud. You can see in the video how hard it was coming down. Those people with the umbrella walk by us a few minutes later and they were soaked. I don't know why they bothered with the umbrella. (Sorry about it being sideways. I keep forgetting that I can't turn the camera that way for video.) The storm lasted about 15 minutes, then it was over. That's pretty much how the rain is here. Just a few minutes (or seconds) and then it's over and done.
After the storm we had dinner at Restaurant El Jibarito. This a restaurant that Jason knew about from previous trips. It was very good. After dinner we went to the piers and got a closer look at the cruise ships. Those ships are enormous! After that, we went back to the hotel.