Day 2 - 3/30/24

 Got up at 8 after an absolutely amazing night of sleep. Dad says there was a party nextdoor but I only heard the dog barking a few times throughout the night and it didn't really bother me. 

For breakfast we went to Panaderia La Borinqueña La Original which had pastries and sandwiches. It's right around the corner and is open until 11:30 at nights so we'll probably end up there pretty often this week. We utterly failed at the first test of our Spanish, took too long in the line and I just ended up ordering something random.

Dad says "Rule #1 of traveling: Do Not Panic".

I definitely panicked-

Anyways, I don't remember the name of the pastry I got but it was covered in powder sugar and had strawberry jam in it! Very flaky too.

It was so flaky in fact, it got everywhere-

But the coffee was good (even though the 'strong coffee' is just espresso, so we each got 12 ounces of espresso, great way to start the day)

Anika Rating: 8/10

Then we got going for the day we went hiking on the Charco Azul train in Bosque Estatal de Carite which is south of us in the mountains.

Dad says that in the rainforest we won't need bug spray because when it rains most of the water runs right out and if we wear bug spray it might contaminate the water. Luckily enough he was right on that count.

Absolutely amazing hike overall, not super hard and exposed us to a lot of the tropical plants. Hoping to go back with some swimsuits next time, the trail ended up at a really nice swimming hole and parking wasn't a major issue.

During our hike we met a local who had been 'coasting'. Which was essentially traveling along the coastline, she'd just come from the Maunabo Lighthouse. So we ended up taking a page out of her book and headed down the mountains where we ended up at a restaurant called El Tenedore de Mario which had a variety of Puerto Rican food as well as fruit smoothies. Clover and I got some because a friend of mine recommended trying fruit juices while we were here. 

9/10, really good, hadn't had Mofongo (2+ starches mashed together, usually unripe and ripe plantains) before and the skirt steak was super tender!

We'd been driving a bunch up til this point in the day and would continue to drive a bunch afterwards. If I thought the highways were bad yesterday...the mountain roads were really something else, think West Virginia mountain roads but a lot more potholes and steep angles. Also a lot more houses and restaurants right on the road. 

Another thing about Puerto Rico is animals are EVERYWHERE, free range on a whole other level. You'll be driving and it'll just be 'oh look a dog', and it's just lying down watching the road. Cats too, and chickens if you'll believe that, chickens are absolutely everywhere. Cows aren't right beside the roads but they're set loose in these giant fields filled with tall grass or in random areas. They're skinny cows too, I wonder if people actually kill and eat them or if they just let them roam.

On the same topic, Clover pointed out "The only things in cages here are the people", which honestly isn't far off. Lots of windows are barred and there are often gates around the houses because people like to leave their windows open since the weather is amazing. It feels like the animals have more freedom of movement than the humans.

We visited the Maunabo lighthouse. It said the National Lighthouse Association preserved it but that didn't reach much further than the outside.

We found a way around the fence surrounding the place and ended up on the beach under the cliff! A sign mentioned 'tortugas' so I think it was a turtle hatching beach but people were allowed to walk on it so we got some great pictures of the cliff and lighthouse from below!

Also as we were walking to get down to the beach we saw these massive clumps of what looked like mud in trees. At first they seemed like they were paper wasp nests but then we realized they were made of mud, we didn't see any but we think they have to be termite mounds. I didn't think they could build in trees but I guess they know it's much less likely to be destroyed if they build them up there.

Next we attempted to get to a place Google called Secret Beach and failed, it was in a gated community so I guess instead of Secret Beach it should've been called Private Beach. Then we drove to Humacao Nature Preserve, which was closed, Google is really letting us down on open times. However we did see our first living Iguana through the gates.

After this we drove a bit more to a spot called Piedra Blanca which was essentially a giant rock sticking out of the peak of a mountain. The scariest part of the drive was the concrete driveway that was the final stretch to the parking area, I swear it felt like it was straight up. The tires skid for a second but they got traction and hauled us right up. And it was seriously a treat, we were able to climb up on a rock closer to the top of the mountain and see all the way down the valley to the ocean. 

Also Clover found a giant snail shell, apparently giant snails are local to Puerto Rico. They got bit by a few fire ants for picking up their food but managed to get away with one shell.

Despite knowing how crazy drivers here and there not being a crosswalk we decided to park across the street from where dinner was, Lechonera Los Amigos. 4 lanes, 3 people. In other words we nearly died twice but it was all good. We'd been seeing Lechonera(roasted pig) places all day, there's literally a route nicknamed the Lechonera Highway that we were on; so we were ready to try some by dinnertime. 

It was served cafeteria style so once again, I had to face the horrors of not being able to speak Spanish in a dominantly Spanish speaking country, but we got through with the great powers of pointing. I ended up getting some of the lechonera, rice with chickpeas, and blood sausage (I just wanted to try it). Tried the blood sausage and, well, it wasn't exactly my favorite thing, I'll try it again some other time. The rice and pork were totally amazing though, they also put some pork skin on my place which was insanely crunchy but really flavorful. It was cheap and ended up being more than I could eat in one sitting.

Anika Rating: 9.5/10 (I'm really digging myself a hole with how high these ratings are)

Overall a super busy day, feels like we drove everywhere. Here's the Google Maps timeline and it's insane we covered so much of Puerto Rico in one day, but by no means have we exhausted all the things to do in this part of the island.

Tomorrow we're hoping to go to the rainforest since it won't be crowded on Easter.

Thank you for reading!