Luquillo Beach & El Yunque {Puerto Rico, Part 2}

Before heading off to the rainforest - El Yunque, we had breakfast at Caficultura in Old San Juan - our new favorite place. Jason had banana pancakes with rum and I had a delicious BELT with a cortadito! Yum!

 Once we arrived at El Yunque, we kept driving past all the sites we'd already explore before - La Mina Falls, La Coca Falls, etc. and drove to the trailhead for the the Monte Britton Trail. After a moderate hike straight up hill, (Fitbit calculated over 100 floors this day!) we reached the tower. We could see both sides of the island from this point, which was pretty incredible!

For lunch, we went to Kioskos de Luquillo. It was fun to walk the kiosks - we'd tried the ceviche hut before and it was quite delicious, but we were perfectly content with the fried deliciousness of empanadas (chicken and crab) and cans of ice-cold Medalla light for less than $10.

We came back that evening and had a wonderful dinner at El Jibarito in Old San Juan. Somehow we ended up going on the night that the Christmas lights were turned on, so we got treated to a fun musical performance and Christmas presentation of sorts. Walking back to our hotel that night, we ran across another musical performance in front of the local university. Back at our hotel, we headed to the rooftop and had a drink. We could hear a fun discoteque - Nuyorican - playing music in the alley below us.

Up Next: More of Old San Juan!

Culebra & Culebrita Islands {Puerto Rico, Part 1}

This was actually our second Thanksgiving spent in Puerto Rico. And since it's happened two times, it's basically a tradition, right? 

We caught a flight out from Houston on Wednesday. We got in, grabbed a rental car and drove to Gran Melia - our home for the night. That night, we were able to take a dip in the ridiculous pool and sip some wine under the stars.

At the top of our list for this trip was to take a snorkel trip to Culebra Island. While technically a part of Puerto Rico, the island is actually closer to the British Virgin Islands. We booked our trip through East Island Puerto Rico - the same company we had used to do our Bio-luminescent Bay tour a few years ago. It was about a 45 minute boat ride over via high-speed catamaran to Tamarindo Bay where we snorkeled in the water for around an hour. We also had lunch here. It was a great spread (including rum drinks - so many rum drinks!)

We then moved on to our beach stop at Culebrita. The original plan was to go to Flamenco Beach, but due to the swells, we made our stop here - and are we glad we did!! Playa Tortuga was completely unspoiled. There was no electricity, running water or buildings of any kind on this tiny island off the coast of Culebra. We swam in the crystal clear water and took in the tranquility of it all. It was honestly the best beach we've ever been to. Around 3, we headed back to the marina.

It was a truly great day and all we have to do is say "Culebrita" to bring us right back to that mental place.

Up Next: Our trip into the rainforest - El Yunque!