Fiesta Puerto Rico

Hola! I escaped to the island of Puerto Rico for the weekend. This is my first time here, and as soon as I got off the plane I felt it: summer!

I have pictures, but won't be able to post them until I get home, but I wanted to talk about my trip so far.

I arrived in San Juan around 7:30 on Tuesday night. I had been traveling all day, so didn't have much energy. My husband and I stayed in Old San Juan and went out to dinner at a restaurant about two doors down from our hotel. Although it was Valentine's Day, the restaurant wasn't very crowded. The food was good, nothing extra, but the service was very warm.

The next morning, we drove to Carolina, about 20 minutes from San Juan, and I went running along a bike path called Paseo Piñones. Although the trail followed the coast, most of the route was through a mangrove forest. It was so nice to be running in shorts and singlet, and the trail was beautiful. There was a mix of asphalt, and wood, like a boardwalk. I love running on wood; it's soft, especially when there are pine needles to cushion your footfall.

I ran six miles out and back. Along the way I spotted creatures dashing off the road in front of me. Mostly they were shadows, but eventually I spied one darting away from me, its tail extended straight up. It was either a small lizard or a scorpion. They never bothered me and neither did the few people I encountered along the way. No runners, but there was a man and woman strolling and another man on a bicycle.

I was a little jumpy being alone in a tropical forest. At one time some big flying thing buzzed my left ear and I nearly had a heart attack. I chastised myself for that, reminding myself that Naomi was in Africa and dealing with worse things than dragonfly's. I thought, "What would Naomi Do?" You may quote me. :)

Near the end, the trail left the jungle and hugged the beach. It was nice to look out on the Atlantic Ocean, but there was no shade and the sun was hot! Up ahead I noticed a dog that appeared to be running loose. I like dogs, but not when I'm running and they're not confined. I thought about Stefano's encounter with the evil dogs and didn't want to be in that predictament. I considered turning around, but I wanted to get to the end, to the tres piños, so I looked around and picked up a big stick. That raised my confidence and I ran ahead. But the dog was nowhere in sight. Whew!

I held on to that stick for the rest of the run. Even though I didn't need it, you never know. As I ran on the trail along the highway towards my waiting husband, a truck driver honked at me. I waved as we passed, and thought, how in the old days I would have flipped him off. But I figured at age 52, nobody was honking because I was a babe, so he must be a runner too!

Afterwards I had a fresh pinapple-coconut smoothie at a roadside shack. And something they called a taco, filled with something they called chicken, but it wasn't like any chicken taco I ever had. I was hoping it wouldn't come back to haunt me, and fortunately, it didn't.