San Juan, Puerto Rico

Hey Everybody,
I spent last weekend in San Juan, Puerto Rico and now I am on my way to Salvador, Brazil. Puerto Rico was a very beautiful place. The weather was great, always above 80 degrees (even at night) and the landscape was a collection of various shades of green. I spent most of my short time there in Old San Juan, which is the historic district of town. The buildings in the city are beautiful, they are a variety of pastel colors and every building looks different because it is unlawful to color one building the same shade as the one next to it. The streets are paved with cobblestone brought over by ships from Spain, giving the city a European feel. I started the weekend off with a guided walking tour learning about the vast history of Puerto Rico. My favorite part of the tour was the fort at the end of the peninsula called El Morro. It was built when Puerto Rico was under Spanish rule and the way it was structured was brilliant because they could shoot at enemy ships from any angle with the walls and cannons that they had. It was also surrounded by a fifteen-foot moat so enemies on land could not climb the walls. The only reason that the U.S. was eventually able to take over was because the Spanish cannons couldn’t fire as far as the American ships could. That night I went kayaking with a group of students in the dark through a mangrove swamp and then into a lagoon that contained bioluminescence. Bioluminescence is a hard phenomenon to describe, but essentially it is the activation of millions or organisms in the water that light up like fireflies when you put your hand or your paddle in the water. The best description I can come up with is that they look a lot like the glowing seeds that create the giant fruit from James and the Giant Peach. I know it’s a bit obscure, but considering the fact that I couldn’t get any good pictures to come out it is the best that I can do to describe it. During our return to the beach where we had started, a fish jumped in the front seat of the kayak and scared my kayak-mate half to death so she jumped backwards and wouldn’t move until someone else took the fish out of the boat. I thought it must have been a good-sized fish to scare her that badly but it wasn’t much more than a guppy. I suppose things get a little scarier when you are paddling through the pitch-blackness of a mangrove swamp. The second day some friends and I tried to go and see a cockfight, which was a popular attraction for many of the students, but when we got there it was closed so we settled for dinner at a local Puerto Rican restaurant. I ate some local fare called a Mofongo, which is meat mixed with fried plantains and covered in hot sauce. It was a good start to my worldwide food experimentation. That night we went searching for a salsa club, and on the way into town we found a group of at least a hundred people circled around a small band and some salsa dancers. It was one of the first things that I encountered and thought to myself that there was no way I would see something quite like this in America. We found a good place for salsa dancing but it is a lot harder than it looks and all of us were put to shame by the locals. On my final day in port I went into town to try and upload some of my pictures on the blog page, but I still couldn’t get them to work and I settled with putting some of them on facebook. After that I spent a little over an hour talking to Luis, a manager at an art shop, about the politics of Puerto Rico. I had no idea that the people were so passionate about the issue of statehood. It was nice to talk for a while with a local person and hear about something like local politics from their perspective. Before the trip I was overlooking Puerto Rico because of the other countries we will visit, but it was a great place with friendly people and overall a very worthwhile experience for me and the other students on the ship. I am sure it is just a tiny bit colder at home than it is here, but I hope this finds everyone happy and healthy nonetheless. I miss everyone at home and I will write again after my travels in Brazil.

Conor

On the Ship at Last

Hey Everyone,


After a very long two days of travel from Denver to Atlanta and then to the Bahamas, and losing my bags along the way, I have settled in to my cabin on the second deck of the MV Explorer. Nassau was a very beautiful place, but it was a true tourist trap and most of the taxi drivers took advantage of the fact that you had no way else to get around. Our first night was a lot of fun; my hotel roommate James and I went with some fellow students to a local bar and met at least a hundred people from the ship. Meeting this many new people at the same time is crazy, especially trying to remember names. About 25 names in, I accepted the fact that I wouldn’t remember most of them so I just try to find a distinguishing characteristic about them and just go with that. When I see the guy I met who goes to Columbia, I just point and say, “Columbia!?” and he seems to be ok with this.
Getting on the ship took a long time as you can see by the lines in the picture, but I just tried to walk around and help people with their gigantic bags because I didn’t have to carry any myself. My bags did finally show up about an hour before the ship took off, which was nice because if it hadn’t I would have had to live the life of a vagabond for 3 more days, and I assume it is harder to meet new people when you smell like a garbage can.
The cabins are small but they are nice and have plenty of space for all the stuff I am sure I will accumulate over the course of the trip. Living here seems a lot like living in a hotel, because we never have to clean our own room or bathroom, or even do our own laundry. I had never been on a ship this large before so I didn’t know what to expect, but I haven’t had any seasickness problems yet. My roommate is George, and he is from Sao Paulo, Brazil and studies at Boston University. His girlfriend Daniela is on our floor as well and she is also from Sao Paulo. My roommate being from Brazil was actually a great stroke of luck because I had no idea what I was going to do the entire time in Brazil, but George has offered to show my around and take me to some of his favorite spots in Salvador. Today is just a lot of orientation meetings and another day to relax, and tomorrow we will have our first day of class. Saturday morning we will arrive in San Juan, Puerto Rico for the weekend and I am sure that I will have many more pictures and I will post another entry after my time there. Well I am off to do some yoga, but I hope everyone is doing well and I hope to hear from some of you soon.

Conor

P.S. I couldn't get my pictures to upload but I will add them when I get into port.
P.P.S. Tabby Rules!

My First Entry: Leaving Home

The entire process of getting ready for this trip was long and difficult, from the endless amounts of paperwork to buying all of my necessities for the next three and a half months. I consider myself to be top five in the list of the World's Greatest Packers, but this was a true test of my body and spirit. The time has finally come for me to say goodbye to Broomfield and take off to Nassau, Bahamas to meet up with my classmates and the ship which I have preemtively named Bertha: Legend of the Deep. It was very hard to say goodbye to everyone I know for such a long time but I am going to try and make the best of my opportunity and make The Eagle Trace Men's Club and the rest of Broomfield proud. I am truly blessed to be able to travel to the places I am going to and I appreciate all of the support I have recieved from my family, friends, and my girlfriend. I will leave it at that for now, I am sure I will have much more to say when the trip really begins. Please feel free to leave comments or even send emails as I would love to hear from all of you.

Conor