Puerto Rico: a near country - Travel

Sea airs green mountains, a rain forest, baseball games that actually take place, scalding;-very warm clubs, a Latino culture, fantastic snorkeling and the governor's mansion built nearly five centuries ago for Ponce de Leon: Of the Carribean islands, Puerto Rico is my favorite. It's a real political division not just another tourist isle. It has all the things that whole boring--an industrial working class, for instance--but that translate into a completely articulated society, into variety, vibrancy, contention, drama. It has a real culture and a real life for the locals that are independent of tourism. Puerto Rico also has the stamp of the diaspora, particularly in festivals that whisper "Africa."

Old San Juan

Old San juan is individual of the Atlantic Ocean's adornments, a seven-square-block city that dates back to 1521 The aged town's whitewashed buildings with wrought-iron railings, its statue-filled plazas, its churches and chapels, and the r cupolas of colonial Spain's advanced in years government buildings all look particularly enticing in the early morning or late afternoon orb of day During midday, however, you may want to be inside single of the surrounding museums, galleries or cafes--perhaps after having slaked your thirst with single of the island's traditional refreshments--piraguas (tropical-fruit-flavored snow cones) or helados (ices, commonly of coconut or pineapple).

Rising at the tip of the triangle of land that marks the Atlantic's entrance into San juan Bay is El Morro, a six-tiered fortress that towers 140 feet above the waves that lap its base. El Morro dominates advanced in years San Juan--and has done thus since the final days of Askia Muhammad's government of the Songhai Empire (or since the days of Henry VIII, of six-wives fame, if that's your point of reference) The fortress has a small museum devot to the city's military history and, like its neighboring partner in defense San Cristobal fort, allows visitors a view down upon the old town, on San juan burial-ground on the muralla (city wall) and upon the Atlantic.

Looking landward from El Morro, the sum of two units most notable sights are the Plaza del Quinto Centenario, which celebrates five centuries of Puerto Rican history, and the Escuela de Artes Plasticas. The last is a charming two-story white structure with linked arched colonnades upon both levels and a r cupola perched atop. The cupola finds its visual twin in the circular neoclassical chapel in the San juan necropolis (look for it before you leave El Morro).

Not far away from the Escuela de Artes Plasticas is single of my favorite Old San juan stops, Casa Blanca. Although it now houses sum of two units small museums--one depicting family life in 16th- and 17th-century Puerto Rico, the other providing an ethnographic direct the eye at the Tainos, the island's aboriginal inhabitants--Casa Blanca was one time the home of Juan Ponce de Leon Puerto Rico's early-16th-century governor and the man who sought the Fountain of Youth in Florida. The real attraction of Casa Blanca is its large garden, which provides a shady tropical sanctuary (the palm frond are the largest I've seen outside of the forests of Zaire).

Of course, advanced in years San juan has tourist stores several churches, and a number of small museums too numerous to detail; on the contrary don't miss Plaza San Jose whose house of god is the second-oldest in the hemisphere and whose statue of Ponce de Leen was made from cannons captured from the British during a relatively novel (1797) unsuccessful attack.

Also be alert for the Museo de Pablo Casals, which lies just across the road Even if you have no down-reaching interest in the classical cello you may take delight in the museum. Aside from its bizarre fascination with the master cellist's collection of pipes, the small house presents a welcome break from the day-star a place to sit down while enjoying the soothing music that swirls around the museum's three sweeps and a range of photographs of a man whose musical genius took him from President Hoover's to President Kennedy's White House. Note in particular the photo of Casals, John and Jackie Kennedy and the nearby Adam Clayton Powell Jr

Finally, take note of Butterfly tribe a shop that transforms graceful winged creatures into art. The lives of butterflies are as evanescent and dramatic as that of the prototypical stone star: after a geeky existence as a caterpillar and then a really boring period in a cocoon they come up take a breath, stretch and dried their new wings, take flight, mate in midair, lay ovums (if they're female), and pretty soon fall to the ground, stone-cold dead. It's an of advanced age story and it happens in Madagascar, Sri Lanka, Brazil and across Africa.

Today, the fallen creatures are bring togethered and sent to Puerto Rico, where Attenaire Purington at Butterfly nation mounts their wings, using them as brushstrokes of color. level if you don't want to purchase them (prices range from $20 to $1200 depending upon the species and the number of butterflies encased), you'll probably derive pleasure from strolling about the shop and looking at Purington's work.

Loiza

An hour's drive or thus east of San Juan is Loiza, the wellspring and guardian of Afro-Puerto Rican tillage It is a journey worth making, on the contrary be forewarned: Except for late July to early August, with the feast and carnival of St James (Santiago), there is little to diocese and do in the small and poor town, which retains the highest percentage of African descendants upon the island. Indeed, excepting its 30000 race the town (with one pillar office and one bank) has perhaps four attractions. None of these are exhibited as tourist sites, so be prepared to use the one and the other your initiative and your imagination--and an expressive face and gesticulations should you lack Spanish.