Old San Juan, Puerto Rico

We spent our third day in Puerto Rico exploring Old San Juan. It is apparently the oldest inhabited city in the US – it was built in 1521. It’s an interesting mix of old stone streets and new asphalt construction.

We started at the old fort, San Cristobal Castle. The views were stunning.

It was cool to look out and imagine a pirate ship landing or soldiers attacking.

The kids climbed on everything.

We ran through tunnels and put Bill and Liam in the dungeon. We learned that they would put mines in the tunnels and blow them up if enemies were invading to collapse the tunnel.

The kids were excited to earn their junior rangers badges.

After the fort, we went to lunch at a place serving local Puerto Rican food, then walked along the streets of old San Juan. We came to a square with lots of pigeons, and a man gave the kids seed so the birds would land on them. They thought this was really fun.

We met a man who let the kids hold his sombrero-wearing lizard.

We finished the visit with gelato. Always a winner!

Driving in Puerto Rico has been a real adventure. Most of the streets don’t have signs at all. Those that do have signs don’t seem to match google maps, and google does not quite sync up with the actual streets. We think that they have renamed all the streets recently. For example our Airbnb is on Calle 3, but the street sign says Calle mar Bering. Bill has been a trooper.

After a trip to the mall to replace Bill’s mysteriously vanishing sandals, we went to dinner at Cafe Tresbé. The food was amazing and the ambience was great with all outdoor tables. We played Heeey potter uno while waiting for our food. We hope to come back.


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