Salinas, PR -- Rainforest Road Trip

While we're in Salinas we have rented a car to do some inland exploring around the island. Today's stop was El Yunque, the Caribbean Rain Forest in the north part of the island. (It is practically across the street from the Westin Rio Mar, so while I'm thinking about it: hello to everyone at Starwood!) El Yunque is overseen by the US Forest Service, and it's the only tropical rainforest in US jurisdiction. The Forest Service has done a lot of work putting in nice trails to all the waterfalls and interesting areas of the park. We did one of the more challenging hikes down to Mina Falls and we were rewarded with a spectacular waterfall cascading down the rock face. There was a swimming area at the base of the falls, but we had absentmindedly left our swimsuits back at the car. That was okay though, because there's a reason it's so green and called a "rainforest": it rains every day. Hard. We got doused while we were on the trail and it actually cooled us off pretty well. We hiked back up to the car and got to hear the native Coqui (ko-KEE) frogs chirp; we didn't actually see any of them though. However, we did see some other wildlife: massive iguanas. And not in the rainforest, either -- these were huge lizards hanging out by the roadside in town, walking down the sidewalks, everywhere. The first time I saw one it was starting to cross the road right in front of our car but luckily Kevin avoided it. There must be plenty more of them because there were tons of carcasses on the road that hadn't been so lucky. We even saw a schoolkid pick a live iguana up and literally throw it at a girl he was walking home with. Boys, especially at that age, are so stupid sometimes.

On the way home we hit rush hour traffic in San Juan. We were starving and the car was low on gas so we got off the freeway to look for a gas station and maybe some cheap food. As I was paying the cashier at the Shell station, I glanced out the window and saw a mall with all the typical American chain restaurants -- Chili's, Johnny Rockets, and most importantly Macaroni Grill. See, we received a generous gift certificate as a wedding gift and yet every time we've been back in the states we forget about it until we get back to the boat (neither the Bahamas nor the Dominican Republic had a Macaroni Grill, go figure). So I've been carrying this card around for a year and finally we found our chance to use it. Much better fare than McDonald's, that's for sure. Plus, while we were eating one of the other tables had a birthday and all the waiters gathered around to obnoxiously sing the chain's signature birthday chant. Judging from the birthday guy's reaction, it's just as embarrassing when they sing to you in Spanish.