Visiting Friends in Puerto Rico

Grabbing lunch at the beach bar.

We planned an impromptu trip to Puerto Rico to spend some time together before Jade graduated high school, I started working like crazy, and Jason left for a bunch of business trips.

I love renting an apartment (like we did in Paris) so we could cook some meals ourselves and live like a local... boy did we!







While there we visited Ivonne and Eric, who live in paradise.  They took us to a very local night out, with live music, people dancing in the streets, bar hopping, and FUN.  That's them waving in the video.  It was one of the coolest nights out ever.  There was live music everywhere, cheap rum punches, and tons of people just chatting, dancing, and laughing in the streets.  The video doesn't capture it, but it's the best we could do.

Jade and I shopped in Old San Juan while Ivonne worked and Jason and Eric golfed one day.

I bought the most beautiful handmade earrings and Jade and I stopped for some lunch and cocktails (hers was a virgin margarita).







The real adventure of the trip was a zip-line and waterfall rappelling tour in the rainforest.  What a rush!

That's Jade rappelling down a 90 foot waterfall!!!

Zip-lining, can't capture the fun in pictures!

Thanks for having us, guys!  Can't wait until next time!

Sailing the Caribbean

Days 3-5 : St Thomas - Culebra - Culebrita

Our first three days on the sailboat were so cool, and each day got better than the next. Wait until you read about Monday! 

 We woke up on Saturday morning to a beautiful view of St Thomas. 

Then left to drop our bags off on our boat, ate breakfast at a little place in the marina, and went grocery shopping. Meanwhile Leah and Ian arrived and we boarded our boat. It took almost all day to go through the process of getting the boat, so by the time we were done, we just sailed to the other side of St Thomas to anchor for the night. 

Our home for the next 10 days 

We jumped into the water to cool off

then grilled burgers on the boat and settled in for our first night of sleep aboard the Azzurra (what a name for a boat). 

 The next morning, on Sunday, we got up and got moving to the island of Culebra. We found a remote little beach where no one was around and did a little snorkeling off the boat and ate lunch. 

 We heard about a great beach on this island, so we moved our boat a little closer and walked across the island to it. We had to pass a garbage dump on the way, though (yuk!). 

See the trash behind us?

 Flamenco Beach was definitely pretty, though. We even went for a little run along the beach and I got a quick running lesson from Ian. 

 Playing in the water 

 Sunday night we decided to head onto the island for dinner, so we took the dingy in and found this little restaurant by the water, then hit the sack. 

 On Monday morning we stopped in town again to get a few more groceries, then set off to Culebrita. Jason got his first sailing lesson on the way. 

 Our boat in full sail. 

 Before we got to Culebrita, though, on the other side of Culebra, we found this little cove that we couldn't resist. 

It was this beautiful bay where there was no one but us and the few beautiful homes on the coast. We swam around, explored the little remote islands, ate lunch, and then reluctantly said goodby to our beautiful little spot. As we left saying how special that anchorage spot was, the one we came upon in Culebrita was even prettier! 

 After lunch and a swim, we decided to hike to the lighthouse we saw at the top of the island. 

 The view from the top was ridiculous! From every spot all you saw was beautiful beaches with all sorts of shades of blue waters. 

 After hiking down, we decided to run the trail that lead to one of the beaches we saw and there were all of these butterflies as we ran by! 

 And then we saw a rainbow. 

 For real, butterflies and rainbows and secluded beaches. Amazing. It even rained to give a cooling off after our run. 

 We headed back to the boat for a refreshing evening swim and jumping off the top deck of the boat. 

Then - to top off this day - we got to see the most glorious sunset. 

 What a day! We grilled up some chicken for dinner and realized that there was no moon, so we took our wine (and beer) and all of us laid on the boat and watched shooting stars and laughed and talked until we had to call it a night. What a perfect day. I was told there would be more perfect days, but I can't believe we'll top this one.