Part 2 Vacation: Puerto Rico

Oh, no, it's more of those trip photos! Look away, bad movie night...where is the slide projector...just kidding; I hope you like these.

The skylines were just amazing at all the ports of call we went to. Here is the one coming into the port at Puerto Rico.

This is from the ship looking over the port to the old Fort in Old San Juan.

We kept hearing we had the biggest liner on the seas, but until we got off of the ship and looked back at it with another ship next to it, we didn't realize how big it was. All we could say was, "Yep, that is a big ship!" and that sort of sums it up. Ours (meaning the one we got to ride on) is the one on the left.

The first place we went was the Capital Building in Old San Juan. This is a very beautiful building with lots of marble from Europe. It looked like it was being renovated when we had our visit there. Even with that, the parts I could see where absolutely stunning to behold.

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This is the statue that stands facing the capital building; it is St. Christopher (if I remember correctly). He has his finger up in judgment to make sure the work inside is kept in check and that they are doing God's will and not man's. Just so we all know it is his index finger that is pointing not his middle or pointer finger that is pointer, in other words he isn't flipping a bird as it would be called in slang terms in the USA.

Interesting to note: if this was in the continental USA instead of one of it commonwealths, it would be torn down -- how sad is that. This would have happened because it is in a public place mixing God and state. Are people crazy? I am glad it is there; I like the sentiment that God is watching over all.

The second place we went to was the Old Fort in Old San Juan. I loved this place; it had such character in the stone work and the sheer scale of things. You are able to see just the top of it from old capital building looking towards the old fort. If you look closely at the below photo, it is in the back of the photo on the left hand side.

My favorite part of the fort is the in the bottom center picture. I just love the shape of these look-out spots. In the bottom left photo, you can see the capital building from the view of the old fort.

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This set of sketches was on one of the walls in a very damp and hot room, the humidity in this room made it hard to breath. I am surprised these images have survived. The caption below reads

"GALLEONS

The ships drawn on the wall may be the work of a Spanish caption held here to await execution for mutiny. "

Personally, I thought this a funny statement as they may be which, to me, means they don't have a clue how the pictures got there and are just giving you an idea of what may or may not have happened and want it to sound good. I actually liked the pictures before I read the caption. I liked them better without the caption. I think it pulls away from the drawings and degrades them, somehow. Either way, it is a type of graffiti.

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The above cannon balls are on the top of the fort. The interesting part, to me, is that the first row was sunk in cement as if it wasn't enough that they had been welded together, they thought it necessary to bury them in cement. Just how strong to they think the average person is? I mean, oh my, there are 188 cannon balls welded together in this stack; the fact that they are hollow still doesn't make them light enough for the stack to be picked up all together and that we must cement it down. I actually thought this was a real neat display; just a little overboard on making it stable and ridged.

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Actually what is left of some old bricks at the fort in Old San Juan Puerto Rico. I was so impressed with the way they looked that I just had to take a few photos of them. Something about the way nature was tearing them down looked so peaceful and beautiful to me. You can see through some of them where the hole goes all the way through the bricks.

After the fort, we went shopping for a little bit and met back at the statue of Christopher Columbus before returning to the ship. Not sure why this picture came out so bad; it was the best out of three I took of the statue. It was interesting to see how many of the islands have a statue of Columbus. We did not take a picture of each one of them, but this was the neatest one, to me.

Back on ship dinner with friends the Rollos. (photo taken by Vicki)