On the hunt for real Puerto Rico and some roasted pork!

After a few days in Ensanada Honda in the idyllic island of Culebra of Puerto Rico, we decided it was time to get over to the main island to check it out! Rise and Shine at 05:30 and in the dingy to get the 06:30 ferry at the shocking price $9 for two adults return!!! (1hr 15min trip). Our destinations, Fajardo was a bit of a dump, but one hidden treasure, World Car Rental. This was with no doubt the place amongst the locals as it was chockablock. Got a descent car and off we went to find the rainforest El Yunque. A few stops en route at too tempting places to ignore such as Office Depot, West Marine, Wall Mart and Radio Shack (sad isn't it), we finally got to the destination. Decided it was no point in walking the forest as we would see nothing but trees, but a climb up an old watch tower was well worth the views. Stunning! Half expected to see King Kong on top of one of the forest covered mountain peaks, but unfortunately a no show! Stopped by a water fall which had attracted the camera crowd, but being Norwegian and quite spoilt in the waterfall department it didn’t impress. After about 30 min, we decided we had driven through enough trees, and started our search for some roasted pork people were raving about. Convinced Ray that Caguas was the place known for the suckling pig, and we both pictured an idyllic little restaurant in a lush peaceful setting buzzing with satisfied customers..... hm. Not quite the outcome Jose... The idyllic town turned out to be a rather big city, full of fumes, traffic and fast food joints. As a matter of fact, the only places we saw during our 5 hour hunt for the non appearing pork was just that, American Fast Food Giants and snack bars with fry ups. No wonder why we see so many rather chubby P.Rs. and why they stuck them in retirement homes around age 60.  I got rather upset in the end about how a nation so easily embraces junk food rather than cooking their own old recipes.... hopefully we shall discover the real Puerto Rican kitchen at an other outing....  However, we did cover quite some ground, most of the Eastern part of Puerto Rico and discovered that besides the American influence, there is stunningly beautiful country side and an unforgettable lushness and the people are utterly charming! The more crowded areas did remind me somehow of my not most favorite places on the earth; Dominican Republic and Cuba. Ray couldn’t help himself laughing of the idea of Lady B entering India, as that is a real dump according to the specialist... we shall see. The other thing we learnt, this must be the birth place of Speedy Gonzales and his like, the driving is crazy!

Other highlights. We had a wonderful visit by Ray’s beautiful daughter Beccy and equally beautiful friend Jeanny who definitely made the boat prettier with their more or less constant posing on the aft deck. Showed them as much as we could of St John and the BVIs during their 10 days. I think they only thought the captain and first mate half crazy. After dropping them of at the airport in St Thomas by dinghy Ray and I headed for the SVI a week ago. Not much else writing back home about. No dangerous seas or terrifying storms, just chilling with the odd moments of wonder about how the curtsey flag ended up flying through the saloon window, or how on earth the dinghy cable had got undone with the lock still hanging at the end of it, being locked....

The Captain and I have changed our plans about spending X-mas in the BVI. We like it here, there is a quaintness about the place... part from their pre-X-mas traditions of driving around all night blasting Christmas carols Caribbean style. There is no snow, but we certainly cannot forget what time of year it is. The Christmas decorations they have on display here beats any thing we have ever seen, even what we saw during our cruising down the Intercoastal waterway in Florida in 2007. And on that note, a very Merry Christmas and ho ho ho to all of you from Raymondo and Lady B!

Until next year!

Ps. Unfortunately the man who helped us take this year X-mas shoot, must have had one too many!