DAY 4 PUERTO RICO

TUESDAY=SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO

We were in port in San Juan from 1pm-8pm. I was super excited about coming here because I have a 96 year old patient who is from here and just to experience this place, knowing that this is where she grew up, was going to be a treat.

(**I will add this right now, so that I don't forget** I got word the day we came home that my patient had passed away the day we were actually here in San Juan. What are the chances that she would pass while I was visiting her home town for the first time. We have been expecting this, actually since last year, and she has been hanging on forever now and gradually declining in health. She was the sweetest little lady who helped me with my Spanish. I have been seeing her daily for almost a year and my "route" since returning just hasn't been the same. I feel honored to know her and have her a part of my life and some day I will return to San Juan and visit all the places she told me about.)

However, I had the hardest time figuring out just what to do here. Especially with us being beach bums, made it very difficult. I didn't completely decide until the week of the cruise and it was spur of the moment based off of people here on these great boards.

I have always wanted to sail out of San Juan and it's on my "bucket list" and here's why...the bio-luminescent bay!! I just HAVE to experience this! Some day I will I promise.

Since we weren't going to be in port until late, I seen this as an opportunity to sleep in. The thought just excited me too much. BUT.... bang, clang, can't hear yourself talk in your own dream noises were going on...once again...outside on my balcony? I think this morning they would be taking their boiler pots, drawing a line, then seeing who could push theirs the fastest across the line. The winner was in charge of gathering all the pots and hurling them at their respective losing owners while they darted the pots and they went crashing to the floor. Yep, that about explains the sound pretty accurate.

So, I was up at 8:30am on my "sleeping-in" day. I decided to head out to the balcony to check out the weather and catch a glimpse of...the water of course. Man did it smell like rotten somethingorother out there, coming from these "vents" somewhere around this area. Phew! Back in I went to wake the rest of the family up. If I'm not sleeping in, neither are they. Wipe the drool off your faces and let's go eat!

As they were getting up, I was checking in with my daughter back home and seeing how her "healing" from surgery was coming along. Then my son's finance text me to let me know she passed one of her "important" exams for a nursing class and all was good in the world.

We headed up to the buffet for breakfast at 9:30. It was super crowded this time and I couldn't help think "why are these people even awake on a day they could be sleeping in?" I mean I'm sure they are not all located on the 2nd floor under the galley right?

Hey at least Carnival's eggs are COOKED...unlike the scrambled eggs I got on the Jade last month.

We headed up to Pixels to see if we could find our pictures from Grand Turk (we had 2 taken) and couldn't find either. This picture hunt game is not my cup of tea. Did every female HAVE to have on a blue and white sailor looking cover up just like me on this cruise? Seriously?

We gave up and headed back to the room. I sat out on my smelly balcony and heard a noise.

This means we are getting close to shore. woo hoo

I believe this means we are really SUPER close.

Yep, I'm seeing land now. It was cloudy and I felt a few sprinkles. Ugh

Then within a few minutes...the sun was out again.

Now THIS place looks like where I want to go! Anyone know where this is?

We were able to get off the ship at 1pm and I like to be prompt, so when they said go...I go.

Hmm, ok, not your typical "tourist" type port I see. We are parked in downtown maybe?

I had no idea where to go or where you catch the cabs at. After walking down the pier, you come to the street. Um ok. Now what? There wasn't anyone around directing you where to go and asking what you'd like to do or if you need a cab or anything. Strange and something I don't think I have experienced in any port to date.

So, I just followed everyone else and hoped they knew where they were going. They stop to take a picture, I stop to take a picture.

Well, that wasn't working out for me too well so I decided to stop and ask someone where you go to get a taxi. They pointed in the opposite way of the way I was going of course. You head to the left and walk down the street.

We told a guy standing there where we were going. "Where?" He acted as if he had never heard of the place. The name of the place is Numero Uno. He was unsure and ask someone else. I told them is was a resort type place on the beach. Then I told him Pamela's and he said "OH!!!! Pam-mel-o's" Um ok. I was pronouncing it just like a girls name. Oops. (But in my defense it's spelled Pamela's and Pamela's is the restaurant to the hotel).

This is the area the cabs come to pick you up.

He put us in a van and off we went. 

Look at the neat median in the middle of the road.

One thing that stood out about this place is all the graffiti. It is EVERYWHERE. I must have taken about 25+ pictures of it along the way. I couldn't believe the entire place (well, at least where we were driving) is nothing but graffiti on everything from buildings, bridges, houses, stores, shops, walls...everywhere.

After awhile, it seemed like our driver was lost. He would go down a street and then sigh and you could tell he was getting frustrated. The road would end and he would have to cross over to another road to continue going in the same direction. He finally admitted that he was a little unfamiliar with the names of the streets and wasn't sure which one of them went straight through to the end. He finally found the right street.

To read our day at NUMERO UNO and PAMELA'S, click the following tab:

It only took us around 15 minutes to get back to the ship.

We headed to the room for showers and then took the munchkin to the kids club for what little time she had left before it would be time to pick her up again.

We headed to the casino, only to remember that we were still in port and they were not on. There were plenty of people waiting at their favorite slot machine and guarding it as if their lives depended on it.

We headed up to the pool deck to take some pictures of San Juan at night before we headed out.

The Silhouette was docked beside us.

It looked interesting...but where are the slides? Where is the putt putt? Where is the sports deck with the ropes course?

Then we started pulling out. Good bye San Juan. Thanks for a good day and no rain.

Airport

We headed to the casino and played a quick $20 each and decided there just wasn't enough time to really get into playing so we headed to Pixels again to see if we could find any of our pictures from yesterday or today. We were in luck and managed to find them all with the help from the staff.

We picked up Sakari from the kids club and tried to convince her that it would be so much fun if she was to stay longer and play with her friends. She wasn't having it and wanted to leave. Sigh. It's really weird getting back on the ship late from a port and not having much time to do anything without the little one in tow.

{She wasn't happy going to the kids club on the Jade the month prior and said she was just tired of the same old things and party's they did. I knew that Carnival would not be having the same things that she was use to and figured she'd have a lot more fun this time. However, even when not at the kids club, she really wasn't into doing much. This morning they had the Seuss-A-Palooza Parade & story time. She loved that on the Pride and got all dressed up in her Dr Seuss Thing 1 outfit and hair and participated in the parade and loved the story time. Not this time...she refused. I don't know how many times I threatened her on this cruise to not take her on another cruise after this one. Seriously. She was a party pooper and only wanted to hang out with us.}

I guess it was time to eat dinner then. We hadn't ate since our lunch at Pamela's and we were getting pretty hungry and cranky. But wait...nothing was open again. I was starting to get frustrated at this point. We settled on hot dogs, tuna fish and ham and cheese sandwiches from the deli. Not really my kind of dinner and more like a snack.

We went out to the lido and everything was lit up red. It was the Red Frog Caribbean beach party I guess and we watched for awhile, but not many people were on the dance floor dancing. Sakari started getting whiny and wanted to go back to the room. We kept telling her she could have stayed with her friends and had a fun time, but she decided she wanted to hang out with us and this is what we were doing so she'd have to deal with it. She pouted, she whimpered, she was unbearable at this point and we gave in and went back to the room since not much was going on anyhow. (I would later see videos of the huge crowd that must have showed up after we left).

She got a little happy when we announced we were going to the room.

This was the towel animal of the night.

Sakari immediately went to drawing and I immediately headed for the bathroom x3 today. I was a little nervous about this new development since the month before consisted of noro and not being able to get off the potty for a week. I was holding my breath with this one and trying to convince myself that it was just all the food I was eating...even though I felt like I wasn't eating as much as I normally do on a cruise, especially with no formal "dinner".

We headed to bed without setting the alarm because we knew that we didn't have to be up too early the following day (St Kitts) and I knew my automatic alarm clock from upstairs would have me up anyhow.