Day 2 San Juan

Today was a walking day. According to Sylvia’s pedometer we managed to walk almost ten miles even though it really seemed more like fifteen since we ended up walking for a fairly steady six hours. We started by walking around the bottom of the walls around Morro Castle (old fort), then entered the San Juan Gate and spent the next couple of hours touring the fort and surrounding grounds. The picture on the right shows Morro Castle at the top of the hill. There's a walkway along the water between the water and the wall. It’s truly a pleasant way to spend a few hours (If you double click on the picture you can see people walking next to the wall). There’s a constant warm yet cooling breeze that was very refreshing. I never felt hot. We then walked next to the San Juan wall over to the San Cristobal Castle (another old fort) and wandered around that until lunch time. Both were worth visiting. The history and scenery are equally beautiful. We lunched at St. Germain Bistro, a small place that specialized in fresh fruits, vegetables and breads. We met the owner, a very beautiful young woman, who could not have been more pleasant. The women over here all look like Maria from the movie West Side Story…Sylvia’s about to kill me. By-the-way, the food was pretty good. I had Ceviche again and I forget what what’s-her-name had. After more walking, we stopped for something to quench our parched throats at a tapas place called Toro Salao. We also arranged to pickup a rental car on Saturday to use for the rest of our trip. Prior to dinner we strolled the Princesa Promenade which is a great little tree lined park next to the water that featured large fascinating aerial photographs of the earth. For dinner we chose Sofia, an Italian restaurant that was pretty good. Why anyone surrounded by first-class local food would pick Italian is beyond me, but we did…must be the rum.