Thursday, July 12, 2007

We had a fantastic time in Puerto Rico. The weather was great up in the hills above Mayaquez, somewhat cooler than down along the coast, with refreshing tropical downpours and some stunning lightning and thunder. We visited several beaches and Forest and Ciandi took a tour of the inner island with Felipe, Forest's grandfather. We especially enjoyed the fiesta with music food and a chance to see some of the folks we had met last year. A real highlight of the party was the baccalao prepared by Elba. This is a traditional dish of salt cod, olives, capers and rice cooked in coconut milk, not the kind that comes out of a can, but the real thing. I'll be looking for coconuts and salt cod back home. I'll also keep an eye out for yucca root, which I now know how to prepare into a tasty patty like hash browns.
We stopped at Dad's neighbor and very good friend's house on our way to San Juan on Sunday. Ferdy roasted some of his coffee beans for us and gave us a tour of his processing plant, very interesting. We then spent the following day in Old San Juan visiting El Morro, a fort begun back in 1521. The small place we stayed in San Juan was right on a very nice swimming beach.
Steve and I got on a plane for Costa Rica a couple hours before Forest and Ciandi boarded theirs. We went from San Juan PR to Puerto Viejo CR in one day and arrived in time to go to dinner. Our plane touched down at 11:15am and we were through immigration and customs and had our bags by 11:30. This has got to be some kind of record.
We are relaxing, reading, swimming and still eating too much. Steve has already run into several different guys he has played with in the past and we will go hear one of them tonight.
Hasta proximo!

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