Welcome to the Chronicles of
San Juan, Puerto Rico
11/01/2006
Welcome to San Juan, Puerto Rico, where if your knife isn't 8" or longer, its known as a toothpick! Okay, I shouldn't say things like that about the island that my father came from, but like Larry the Cableguy says, "but its funny." Another beautiful day for our last stop in the Caribbean, and our only swimless port of call. At the moment it is partly cloudy, and they are calling for scattered showers with a high of 88F. Here is the morning view: We'll be taking a walk through the old section of San Juan, on the Legends of San Juan tour guided by our friend Debbie. It will be a relatively small and intimate tour, or at least that is how it sounds last I heard. We'll be with some of our fellow Cruise Critic memebers (that is how the tour got started - its not a regularly scheduled tour). For those of you who are veterans of our last cruise adventure blog, this tour will seem rather familiar, because it is the same one we took last time out. But Linda and Gayle have never been here, so this will be a great experience for them, and you can never have too many tropical island city pictures in your collection - or at least, that is the story I am going with. This is a short stop (we depart at 1pm), so the tour fits perfectly with our schedule. If you haven't seen the posts about our trip aboard the Winifred, go check it out. I posted it late last night, so some of you may have missed it. Its the first of November today. That means that some of you may have gotten the first Timethief Newsletter, The Timepiece. If you are not on the mailing list, and would like to be, you can sign up here:
I got a great email from Sharon, the Captain of the Winifred last night, with pictures she took of our excursion. It was great! Maybe I'll post some of them later. I'll see after we get back onboard! Keep Smiling!!!
1415 Welcome back to the next installment of the cruise chronicles. Let me tell you, even in November, in the land of my forefather's, its hot. Now, I know its a bit cooler where most of you are right now (although Michael tells me its pretty nice up there today), and 88F doesn't sound too bad, but when you are a mile from the sun, its HOT!
This morning, we got off the boat, and ran into Graham and Geraldine (who celebrated their 25th anniversary on the eve of the cruise - they are the ones from Great Britian), who were also going on the tour. We got to the Sheraton, and there waiting for us was Debbie. Debbie is great. She just turned 40 about a month ago, and apparently she lost 10 pounds from the last time we saw her (a fact she was quite proud of - I'm still not sure where she lost it from!). She introduced herself, and we started the tour.
I am not sure if the tour evelved, or if she changed it just because Carol and I were back, but the route she took was different than the last time. We hit the same points of interest, but we took some different streets to get there. This is good for me because the architecture in the old city is quite beautiful, with major spanish and french influences. I love taking pictures of the verandah, windows, and doors of the buildings.
There are also some beautiful statues to be had in the city. As I recall, this one id Christopher Columbus, but what I really liked is the pigeon on his head.
Now, I am shooting as we are walking, but Debbie is very good at making sure to stop and let people rest a bit (the city is pretty hilly)m as well as make sure that we stay on the shaded side of the street (like I said, its hot). She will also stop everyone in the middle of the block to tell us about a point of interest, type of architecture or building design facet.
Now, San Juan was a walled city, a fortress. It was the key to the new world, because once you left Europe, the first major port you came to in the New World was San Juan. It was also the jumping off point from here to the Old World powers. Consequently, the city was walled in, and a pair of fortresses were build into it to defend the city and harbor. One of the forts - El Morro - and some of the walls are still here, and you can walk into them (we're talking walls 15 feet thick at the top!).
Where these shots were taken is just a little corner park, something you see quite a bit in the islands. There is a statue there in honor of a battle that never really took place. One time (don't ask me when - take the tour and ask Debbie!) the city was surrounded. It was about to fall, since they were out of food, people were getting sick, and things looked desperate. Being Spanish, one evening the people went to the Bishop to ask what they should do. Being a Bishop, he led the collection of women and children to the cathedral to pray for deliverance (the men were all readied for the inevitable battle). Now, all the enemy commander saw was a large collection of people, carrying torches, walking atop the city wall. Fearing that reinforcements had arrived, he abandoned his positions, and left to sea. The next day, the city found it was no longer under siege. So they built this statue:
Here is Gayle at the edge of the park, as well as some other shots of the old city.
San Juan is full of archetectural arches. I love playing with them in the pictures!
I should have gotten closer to this wall (as in, I should have been leaning on it) and made a Medvedev-type image. I'll be kicking myself later, I am sure. But I didn't want to slow the group down!
Debbie made the tour about an hour longer than the usual tour, which allowed us time to get a look at El Morrow and the goverment center building (at least I think it was the goverment center building -- it has a huge square and an art museum in it. Apparently, it also is featured on the cover of one of the well known tour books - when I get home, I am going to find it at Barnes and Noble!). It made for a great tour! But also, all good things have to come to an end - but not without a picture of Carol and I with Debbie!
Carol, Linda, and I headed back to the ship, and Gayle went looking for tee shirts. It was almost time to be back aboard to depart (this was a short stop!), so we had some lunch, and watched the departure from the balcony. Then, as I sat down to write this, I happened to glance back out thru the balcony, and saw El Morro. That fortress has a special spot in my heart because of the number of times I have visited as a child, and even once when I was in the Navy. I have seen the Blue Angels fly there, and had lunch on the lawn. Here is a last shot of San Juan, as we pulled out into the Atlantic. So, obviously we are at sea, and life is good. I cannot believe how fast these port calls have gone. Of course, to be honest with you, and I am not whining when I say this, but it will be good to sleep in tomorrow! The schedule has been somewhat demanding with early starts, taking advantage of what the ship has to offer and writing the updates for you guys. I wouldn't trade it for anything, but tomorrow, I sleep in! It will be interesting to hear how much crap I catch for that last paragraph! Now I am off to post this dispatch, and to see how the pictures came out from last night - you know, Pirate Pete and his Angels! Then I will have to decide if I am going to make Torrie happy and post them! Of course, how much can you argue with the request of a pregnant woman??? Til next time, Keep Smiling!!! Arrrgh!
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