I promise I’ll finish writing up our adventures in Italy from a year ago – there’s still Tuscany, Umbria, and Rome to explore – not to mention our misadventures in Morocco in May….but now it’s time for a more timely post….an exploration of Puerto Rico at Thanksgiving.

For a number of years, we’ve had a tradition of spending Thanksgiving with daughter A’s in-laws, K and S, as well as A, and her husband N, at various locations throughout the U.S. The gathering spots were historically driven by younger daughter S’s abodes, but unfortunately this time she and T weren’t able to join, given the distance from her new residence in San Francisco, lack of vacation time, and choice of locale.

In fact, choice of locale was dictated by A and N’s experience a couple of years ago staying at a boutique hotel in San Juan and a hostel in Lucina (this may be the wrong name). For our family group, that translated into an AirBnb (designed, strangely enough, by an Italian architect) a couple of blocks from the beach in the quiet neighborhood of Ocean Park, just on the outskirts of San Juan.

It’s a mere hop, skip and a jump from Orlando to San Juan, but the change in climate in this late November was more like a marathon’s distance. No sooner were we off the plane than the warm tropical humidity started to have its relaxing effect. I guess it’s a little like the feel of one of those weighted blankets.

Our first night, Wednesday, we chilled at a local, inexpensive restaurant featuring pizza and quasi-Italian food. The highlight for me was a version of a pisco sour – the glossiness of the egg white set off by a jalapeño syrup. Thanksgiving Day itself was a day simply to relax. The beach was wide and sandy, shaped in a large crescent, which terminated in a sea wall where the high tide pummeled its waves. The only slight disappointment was the absolute dearth of shells, presumably because of what looked like a very large reef or sand bar off the shore. A had waited a little too long to make Thanksgiving dinner reservations so we ended up at a modern, fusion type restaurant just before the kitchen closed at 5 p.m…..I know that aguacate relleno con camarones (avocado stuffed with shrimp) isn’t a conventional turkey dinner, but I did enjoy it. We followed that up with a fun roof top bar experience, looking at the sunset over San Juan.

Friday was a total wild card day. Since we had the luxury of a rental car that would fit all six of us, off we trundled to the pork highway, which sounds a bit more appetizing in Spanish – La Ruta del Lechon. Once you’re off the highway, you’re on a seriously winding road that creeps up through the mountains and that’s lined with restaurants (lechoneras) roasting whole pigs on a spit. While one pig roasts, a man stands at a table wielding a very large machete hacking all edible parts of the roasted pig into bite sized pieces, which are then served with rice and peas, salads, green bananas, plantains, etc. The pork itself is very salty, tender, and extremely good – although I doubt good for you.

Fully sated, we traveled on across the island toward Ponce, a colonial town, much smaller than San Juan, and which retains a lot of original charm. Before we reached the actual town we stopped at the Castillo Serralles, the 1930s home of a sugar cane and rum baron. The family was originally from Spain, the patriarch returned to Spain and never came back, leaving the business in the hands of his son, whose “Don Q” rum is everywhere in Puerto Rico. It was an interesting structure, although hardly equivalent to the opulence of the Newport mansions that we had last visited with A and N. The fact it was decorated for Christmas and they were also preparing an event space for a wedding was an extra bonus. 

The mansion is perched on the top of a hill overlooking the town of Ponce. Ponce has a large central square, lined with colorful buildings many of which are now hotel/casino combos. K and S stopped to order the world’s longest to be made coffees, but the wait was made more enjoyable by watching the town set up for a tree-lighting fiesta. And, it turned out what I thought was some type of device to quickly roast chickens was actually a gambling game that consisted of a table top carousel around which small model  horses spun. They looked like chickens on a weird spit. Presumably winning the game required a successful bet on which one stopped first. At least I guess that was part of it – there was also a board with lots of numbers on it that seemed to play a role. 

After a very long day of exploration and a yeoman’s day of driving for K, we had dinner back in Ocean Park at a vaguely Mediterranean restaurant. I know roasted pumpkin steak with pomegranate, which sounds strange but was really fabulous. 

Saturday was another day to explore, but this time we were nature bound. One of the beauties of San Jose is that in under an hour you can be in El Yunque National Forest, a genuine rain forest, with waterfalls and muddy trails to boot. Some of us climbed up the Mt. Britton Tower that provided views of the vast, deeply green forested mountains, with the turquoise Caribbean in the distance. Next hike was the trail up to the Juan Diego Falls. The first part of the hike to the lower pool was fairly easy, but the second part, to the main part of the fall, was quite slippery and steep and required a lot of holding onto tree roots to make one’s way. I heard later that day that a woman had fallen and had to be carried out by ambulance. The waterfall shower at the top, however, was worth it. We had one final hike that day, part of the way up the Caimitillo Trail toward the peak of El Yunque. Lots of interesting flowers and views.

We followed that up with lunch at Lucino (still uncertain of spelling), a collection of multiple food stalls/ restaurants right on the ocean offering about every Puerto Rican delicacy you could imagine.

Evening provided yet another type of experience. K and S had made a reservation at Santaella, clearly one of the trendiest spots in San Juan. Courses ranged from pastelon to shrimp in a garlic sauce served with mofongo (basically mashed plantains) to whole snapper. We followed that up with a walk through La Placita – a Puerto Rican version of Nashville’s honky tonks on Broadway – and ended up at one of the Vanderbilt hotels for a bit more sophisticated drinks and dancing. 

Despite all of our explorations of the island, we still hadn’t seen Old San Juan, much less the famous forts. So our last day started with a visit to Castillo  Cristobal (built between 1634 and 1765), the smaller of the two forts (the other one is Castillo San Felipe del Moro) but the one with the better historical presentations. It’s a National Park historic site, so J and I got to use our lifetime senior National Park passes, which certainly do provide some benefits to being in your 60s. While reminiscent of the fort familiar to us in St. Augustine, these are infinitely bigger and more impressive. Apparently Puerto Rico was the prime site for Spain to defend its monopoly on the Americas. El Morro protected the harbor entrance, San Cristobal the land side, and the fortified walls the city (that is, until it got too big and part of the wall had to be torn down). 

Fort visiting can only last so long, though, and frankly I enjoyed wandering around the streets of Old San Juan and looking at the colorful buildings just as much. Topping the day off with another dip in the Caribbean was the perfect way to conclude another Thanksgiving.