The Story Of Us

On this day we woke up early.. very early. It was still dark out when we got into our rental car. We had an almost two hour drive ahead of us, into the central mountainous region for PR to a town called Utuado.  But first sustenance and giant cups of coffee. Trying a panaderia (bakery) was something I had wanted to do, especially to try their famous guava pastries.. So we went to Panaderia Espana. There was so much powdered sugar on everything.. H got a croissant with custard, D got a sugar donut and M and I shared a pastelillos de guayaba (guava pastry) and then we were off.  The road was mostly okay but the last 30 minutes or so became harrowing. We were driving on a winding uphill type road that should have been one way but was not.. way too many close calls on hairpin turns.. any residual sleep we had in our eyes was gone. Turned out we had missed a turn somewhere along the way and GPS decided to take us through some back roads.   We rea...

El Yunque is a rainforest in Puerto Rico. Did you know that it is the only tropical rainforest in the U.S. National Forest System, with over 240 species of trees and thousands of native plants? It's a vital habitat for the critically endangered Puerto Rican Parrot and provides water for 20% of the island's population.       El Yunque is very easy to reach. It was just a 40 minute drive from our hotel. We picked up a car from the local rental place and were on our way. We drove the first 30 minutes and stopped at Ekelekua for some breakfast.  Entry to the rainforest was free. Our first stop was La Coca Falls - the falls were right across the street from a parking lot.  Our second stop was Yokahu Tower.  This 65ft, Moorish-looking stone tower was built as a lookout in 1962. It's an easy 98 steps to the top where you get a 360-degree views of the lush rainforest. The tower is named after Yokahú, a Taíno spirit associated with the protection of the mount...