West for the Weekend

Thanks to Puerto Rico technically being part of the United States, we were lucky enough to have a four day weekend. Naturally, this meant it was time for an adventure. Our destination was the West coast of the island-- more specifically, San Sebastián.

Friday night was pretty relaxed and we headed to the movie theater. The movie we saw (We're the Millers) was in English, but had Spanish subtitles at the bottom of the screen. Apparently this is typical, though I did notice a few Spanish titles also playing at the theater.

Saturday afternoon we packed up the car and drove a little over two hours to San Sebastián. The road went up through the mountains, which were partially covered by fog, and then gave way to tons of bamboo trees before taking us to the residential area.

As soon as we arrived in San Sebastián I thought, "THIS was the Puerto Rico I was expecting." Everything was tightly packed together; brightly colored houses, small businesses, lots of trees, some lizards, a mountain view a short distance away from the houses, and the ocean not far off. To give you a comparison, in my city, Guayama, things are much more spread out. My neighborhood is colorful houses quite close together as well, but you need to walk or drive a ways to get to any of the small businesses and large/chain businesses are quite prevalent. As far as foliage is concerned, it's mostly planned (like palm trees next to the sidewalk) and there aren't many natural patches of trees. You can see the mountains from most places in my city, however, the ocean requires some driving to reach.

That evening we went to a town called Moca because there was a festival. Immediately it was like being back home at a county fair. There was a massive amount of cars trying to park in various places in the grass, people milling about the various fried food stands, a stage area designated for live music, and some rides that have definitely been around since at least the 80's. There was even a Tilt-a-Whirl! We listened to some live merengue music for a while, then made our way to a bar to play pool, talk, and dance.

The bar--I'm not sure what it was called--was partially outdoors. The main section with the actual bar, juke box, and pool tables was indoors, but suddenly there ceased to be a roof and more tables and trees made up the other half of the bar. While here, I got the chance to do a little salsa dancing and had quick lessons in how to dance both merengue and bachata. I love dancing, so this was the perfect end to our first evening.

The pier I jumped off of, into the ocean!

Sunday was for the beach. We drove about 45 minutes to Crash Boat Beach, which is a pretty touristy beach with boat and scuba rentals, jet skis, bright umbrellas, and various food vendors. There is a long pier that stretches into the water which I made sure to jump off of, even though it was kind of scary. We hit a few patches of clouds, but otherwise it was a perfect beach day of sunshine and salt water.

Another shot of Crash Boat Beach.

Our last evening in the West lead us back to the festival in Moca because El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico was the musical entertainment. Apparently this group is the most popular Salsa group in Puerto Rico. The ensemble was quite large with trumpets, an upright bass, multiple drummers, a pianist, and three old, but energetic singers who salsa stepped their way through the entire concert. For reference, when I say "old" I mean this group is celebrating 50 years together this year. Several couples took this opportunity to show off their salsa dancing skills, which was amazing to watch. I wasn't able to take a video of the performance, but I did find the following one on YouTube, so take a minute to experience El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico:

El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico 

Today we slept in a little, stopped at the bakery, and then meandered our way back to Guayama. It was a great four-day weekend and I think I'm ready for another school week.