Ole!

We were invited by our neighbour to watch him perform at his flamenco show in Old San Juan - so we headed out to Cafe Nuyorican last night and squashed ourselves into the cute little old "cafe" (more like a bar).

There was one man with a spanish guitar, another singing and then our neighbour Ronaldo who was on the Flamenco Box Drum. It was really interesting actually - it looked like a speaker, but it was a big box that was on the floor and it made a metallic sound when he beat on it. He d between the drum and dancing - and then there were two girls that wore beautiful dresses - and one for each different dance!

Although the acoustics were really bad and earplugs would've been welcomed for the singing, I loved how much the Puerto Ricans took part and supported the group all the time - they clapped along to the music, always cheered and shouted "Ole!"

Kayaking

Close to home, cheap and fun - we decided to go kayaking today! It was gorgeous weather and not a cloud in sight. We packed our towels, a packet of Nerds and Alpen - and headed for Conrad Hotel in Condado (just a 3 minute drive from home).

The Condado Lagoon (Laguna del Condado) is a perfect place to spend a sunny afternoon, there are kayak and paddle boat rentals and they're not too expensive either (tip: mention you're a local and they might just give you half price off :-)

Alpen fell off once - but she's now learnt how to swim! The poor thing got the fright of her life because she's never been in water that deep before, but we think she's got the hang of it now and will take her to the beach more often to show her that the beach is a part of our every day life.

The lagoon itself is beautiful - fed by the Atlantic Ocean and it doesnt have any waves, which makes it perfect for the man-powered water sports. On one side lies Miramar (our home!) and the other side follows onto Old San Juan.

Convention Center, San Juan

The other day we took Alpen for a walk down to the brand new convention center. Puerto Rico is pretty proud of it, since its the biggest and newest convention center in the Carribbean - and has a casino and Sheraton attached to it. It is pretty impressive - as you can see from the pics it has fountains and a little bar - Puerto Rico certainly havent spared a penny here!

Unfortunately I just missed out on the Hotel and Tourism expo - but the bridal one is coming up soon!

The photos of the hotels and ocean is where I always go for a quick swim when its late or when we're short on time. Its beautiful and very clear water - remarkable for being so close to the hotel zone. You can hire paddles and kayaks too for cheap, which we've yet to do!

Truck registration

After doing some research into registering the truck - and our month of being allowed Washington plates is slowely drawing to an end, we decided to go through an agency called "Licence and Co." to register the truck. There is a couple of DTOP's (DMV, Vicroads etc) in San Juan but seeing the queues there means literally an entire day spent to register the truck.

Instead, we decided to pay a few extra dollars to get Licence and Co. to do the registration for us. We needed to get an inspection (REALLY easy to pass, all they checked were the emissions), pay your $11 for it, and this can be done at almost any petrol station, no appointment needed. We then went to Licence and Co. - we were lucky to have one just down the road from us, next to Blockbuster, and give them the paperwork and they get the truck registered for us. They're a pretty good little agency, they help you with changing over your licences too.

Just had to include this pic, we were at a traffic light stop earlier and thought that its only in Puerto Rico that they'd get away with putting a street light in front of a traffic light!!!?

Road tripping...

Today were going to do something a bit different and visit one of the coffee haciendas in the mountains of Puerto Rico. A coffee hacienda is a basically a coffee plantation, but the ones here offer tours, bird watching, hiking - even accomodation! We thought it would be a great thing to do whilst Geoff's knee isnt the best, and something that we could take Alpen along to, too.

This was the first time we'd ventured away from the coastal roads and went inland - and I could say for certain that the forests here are as beautiful as the beaches. They are just unspoilt, a lot more rugged and therefore also not a tourist in sight - exactly what we wanted! We began along a "highway" - which was apparently a two lane road... maybe for motorcycles! We did about 6 hours worth of twisty, winding roads with beautiful lush jungle, tropical flowers, rainforests and cute little villages. We just had to stop at one of the many open air bars at the top of the mountains which had a beautiful view overlooking a valley... a great, filling meal for $5 - beer for $1 and we were back on our way. By this time we were having so much fun on these tiny roads and beautiful views that we thought, we'll do the coffee places on another day and just continue exploring, taking every opportunity to stop off for pictures, take a paddle in the waterfalls or say hello to a local that were fascinated by Geoff's truck and my blonde hair (haha, can you imagine that someone asked me, "Where are you from?", I replied "Australia" and he said "Really? Your english is perfect!".... what do you say to that?)

Fajardo

Yesterday we decided to explore east of San Juan, since we got a little break in the weather. We drove down to to Fajardo, which is where the ferry terminal is. From here boats and ferries leave to go to Isla Culebra, Vieques and Virgin Islands.

The town of Fajardo itself was a bit of a ghost town, with most shops and restaurants being closed completely and hardly a person in sight. However, the government is investing $2 M into the terminal of Fajardo to spruce it up - I guess they havent started it quite yet. All the houses here were very old and delapitated, but it was fun to walk around and see this different style of housing and how these local people live.

We were exploring when it started raining again, so we thought we'd get a bite to eat at a tiny seafood shack on the water - fresh, fried fish, empanadillas, pickled vegetables and tostones (fried plantain). I think the combination of being starving hungry and just amazing fresh food tasted like the best meal I've had in a while! We tried to wait out the rain, but it just coming down, so we ended our day short - but not without stopping at Popeye's for a fresh fruit smoothie - highly recommendable to anyone visiting the area. It was mixed fruit blended with fresh fruit chopped up and mixed in with whipped cream on top - needless to say no dinner for us tonight :-)

Dog-ercise

With all the rain we've been having this week, we took the first opportunity we got with a break in the weather to take Alpen (and ourselves!) out for some exercise. Someone had told us about a dog park in Condado (the next suburb to us) so we thought we'd check it out.

It was muddy, and at first Alpen didnt understand the concept of the obstacle course, but she learnt quickly and just 10 minutes later she was hopping all over the place !