Day 5 - Exploring the Beaches

We spent the morning doing minor chores and going for walks. The tide was in at the nearby beach and had covered the entire sandy area. After discussing what to do, we headed out around noon to see a sample of the northwest beaches. Drove to Isabela and found Jobos Beach west of town. A nice beach with a wicked current and signs warning about it. Supposed to be a surfing spot but we didn’t see anyone trying it out. Being close to town, it has several bar/restaurants along it. At the one end, the surf crashes over a low point in the rocks to spume, explode, and rain onto the inner rocks. We walked and looked then returned to the car.

After some searching further to the west, we found the Borinquen Beach down a switchback road below the US Army Reserve facility and opposite the airport. This is a small, somewhat sheltered beach. The winter surf made it too rough to swim but, in summer, it is supposed to be a great swimming spot. We picked our way along the coastal road around the NE corner of the island to find Crashboat Beach. It gets its name from the now-defunct launching site for rescue boats from when there was an airbase nearby. This is a very popular location and the wide, long beach was crowded with tourists and locals. We set up our chairs and umbrella and watched the sun getting lower. Did some swimming in the mild surf. The place has several food trucks and vendors, so we sampled some of the beverages on offer – “virgin” (and not-so-virgin) pina coladas and daquiris, smoothies. Since it was getting on toward evening, we packed up and headed south toward Rincon, looking for a place to eat. We learned that most places are closed on Mondays so we were in Rincon with no luck finding a place. Some searching online led us to The Shipwreck where we had a great meal. It was dark as we found our way back to the condo to shower and relax.

I mentioned that traffic is chaotic. Although speeds are not high, the roads – even secondary ones – are crowded. The main highways are mostly up to US standards but the secondary roads are narrow with little or no shoulders. On some, the width isn’t sufficient to allow two cars to pass without crowding onto the grassy verge. Add to that the fact that people don’t use turn signals and tend to nose their way out into the road because visibility at corners is often obscured by high vegetation. Also, lanes tends to disappear without warning and drivers aren't good at staying in their lanes. In addition, the lines stripping has mostly worn off (or was never there in the first place). Drivers are pretty tolerant and courteous and often allow entering drivers to join the traffic stream. In town, drivers will yield to pedestrians almost anywhere and stop in the middle of traffic to do so. The road authority is conflicted in their markings. The speed limit is listed in miles per hour but the distance posts (mileposts) and distance to towns are in kilometers. It makes for a nerve-wracking drive.

More exploring tomorrow.Leggi altro