Puerto Rico!

Very early Thursday:
After a midnight flight to New York, Jenny's birthday celebration in the airport with Dunkin Donuts, another flight to Puerto Rico two hours later, getting on the wrong bus, an hour wait for the right bus, 75 cents later and no sleep.. we finally arrived at the Sandy Beach Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico!  Funny side note: I just found out that Sami and Reagan were staying at a hotel just down the street from us.  And we were even on the same beach but never saw each other!  So funny!
The first day of adventure included snorkeling and boogie boarding.  Although Andrew's board aka wave shield bust in half we had a great time! It was kind of a restful day as we were all suffering from crazy jet lag.  But I will never complain to napping on an amazingly beautiful beach.

 

Friday:
We took a bus to Old San Juan and spent the day walking through the old city and the huge fort that is there.  We somehow all forgot to put on sunscreen and didn't bring any along with us that day so that would definitely explain why we all started looking like lobsters and felt as though all of our skin was frying off.  Anyhow the city was fun to look at.  All of the houses and buildings are yellow, orange, blue, pink and green.  I absolutely loved it!  They have a ridiculous amount of parks everywhere.  And we even found an abandoned/broken kite and repaired it and got it flying.  We also happened to see Santa walking around.  He said he was on vacation, but he still gave us candy canes!

Saturday:
The boys (Andrew and Shaun) got up early to go rent a car for the day while Jenny and I soaked up some sun on the beach.  As if we didn't get enough the day before. The next thing we know Andrew calls and says there has been a change of plans and to grab all of our water toys and meet them at this hotel five minutes down the road.  So we spent the day swimming in their awesome pool complete with a water slide and dominated in water volleyball against some rich folks who actually were guests. Then we snorkeled some more on the beach.  On the way home the boys discovered a casino and it was nearly impossible to drag them away from the roulette table.  Although it was kind of fun to sit there and watch people drop $600 and lose it all, then head to the atm for more.  While here we are playing $20 and feeling rather guilty and knowing we probably won't be eating for the next two days.  

Sunday:
We were able to rent a car and go to a rainforest.  It was beautiful!  We did a 40 min. hike to this big waterfall.  Andrew and I didn't get in because it was freezing.  I love to look at water but not so much play in it.  It turned out to be a nice romantic relaxing spot anyway.  Afterwards we went to a nearby beach.  We walked around that area for probably 45 min. trying to find a place to eat that was a) open and b) not some nasty overpriced sea food.  Luckily we found a pizza shop.  Granted it was sunday, but its not utah and almost everything there was either closed or shut down.  And honestly you couldn't really tell the difference between a place that was shut down and a place that was open.. it was all kind of ghetto.  And you can probably guess that we headed to the casino that night as well.  If any of you know my husband you know that gambling is one of his favorite past times.  And since we had to leave for the aiport at 4:30 am the boys stayed up all night, while Jenny and I packed the bags and slept for maybe an hour.

Monday:
It was time to head home from the amazingly warm, beautiful island. We got back to New York pretty early so we spent the day walking around and ate an amazing much needed meal in Little Italy.  The funniest part about this day is that our flight left at 8:30 pm and we almost missed it! It was the only flight that day from NYC to SLC. So Andrew noticed that the screen said New Orleans.  He asked the lady at the desk where this flight was going.  She responded New Orleans, and the pilot standing there said Houston, and our boarding pass said this gate was going to Salt Lake.  After a few moments of confusion we literally took off running down a few gates and onto the plane.  It was a close call!! And now we're back home feeling rather cold, hoping our burns which have finally stopped peeling and are somewhat tan don't fade, missing the very blue ocean and nice beach, Mike's Pizza, roulette tables two minutes away, a whole lot of spanish I never understood, and crazy bus rides.