Here's a history lesson for you. Mitch and I grew up less than 3 miles apart. We attended Jr High and High School together. Our Senior year in High School, Mitch and I both served as Student Body Officers with the group of yahoos below:
I love this group of people. You see Mitch and I up there at the top. Not sure what Mitch is up to in that picture, but look below him at the fellow with the white arrow pointing to his head. That's Brandon.
Over the years, I have done a lot of odd little jobs for Brandon. I will get phone calls and emails asking me to make it look like his friend is at a strip club having his identity stolen or put a girl next to him in a photo kissing his cheek etc etc. One particular piece of work caught the eye of a strapping JetBlue professional. Somehow he was able to incorporated my masterpiece into a JetBlue presentation of sorts. I'll spare you all of the little details, (mostly because I don't know them) but the important part is that this exceptional young man was able to reward my talent with some free JetBlue buddy passes.
Who is this wonderful man? Allow me to introduce Rhett.
He does bear a striking resemblance to Brandon, doesn't he? It's almost as though they are related :)
Anyway, when Brandon called and told me that Rhett was able to give us these passes, he also informed me we only had about 3 weeks to use them. I was elated, but extremely doubtful we would be able to go on a trip with such little time to plan for it. Mitch was working long hours and it just seemed unlikely he would be able to break away any time soon. Then there was the matter of my children. Who could I ask to care for them while I soak up the sun on white sandy beaches?
Grandma, of course.
Bless my mother's heart, with only a week's notice, she was willing to drop everything and fly out to spend 4 nights with my little crazies in the big bad city. And you want to know the really sad part? My kids didn't shed a tear when I walked out the door for my vacation, but when we dropped Grandma off at the airport, you would have thought they were at her funeral. They screamed and cried the entire ride home...
So the stars aligned and we were able to use those wonderful buddy passes to go to The Island of Enchantment, Puerto Rico. Free of responsibilities for a few days.
You know what they say, size matters. When deciding where to go, we kept that in mind and picked the absolute largest resort we could find on that small island. El Conquistador Golf Resort (all of the large buildings are all part of the resort. We even had to ride a gondola to get to our room.
The truth is, we actually took the last room available on the island, as it would seem.
As you enter the lobby, you are greeted by a few exotic birds. This is Chuckles... or Giggles - I can't remember which. Either way, we looked like idiots trying to get that bird to giggle and the only chuckles I heard were from people walking by us.
I could get used to waking up every morning to this view.
The first day we spent on the resorts private island where we baked like lobsters. We laid on the beach, swam, played beach games and even rented wave runners. It was as fantastic as it sounds.
After a wonderful nights sleep, we woke up the next morning a little hesitant to spend as much time in the sun
We decided the spa was the destination for the day. We enjoyed the steam rooms and the hot tubs and even had a couples massage. After that we hung out at the pool side and read our books for the remainder of the afternoon. That night we went on Bio Bay Kayaking tour. I felt like I was in the movie Avatar. In certain areas of the ocean, you can find these molecules that actually glow when they react with oxygen. So when you stick your hand in the water, the water around it glows.
(we couldn't take our camera, but if we were to jump in the water, this is what it would look like.)
This is the only picture we have and it is kind of telling, actually. See how determined Mitch is? Well, apparently this Kayaking tour was a kayaking competition. Nobody else knew it, but it was a race to the finish line and Mitch was determined to win. We had to pass everyone in our group at all costs!
The only problem with our great and spacious resort was that they trap you in. It is right on the coast and the golf course is between you and the rest of the island. To get to the nearest restaurant is like a 2 mile walk and even then, you'd probably get lost because the streets don't have any signs! That just means that you have to eat at their restaurants and if you want to buy anything, it has to be from the resort. For my foodie siblings, the food was not that great at this place. Their rice and beans were amazing, but that was about it. Everything was average, at best and was even more overpriced than Disney Land.
We decided on our final day on the island to rent a car and drive up to Old San Juan.
We toured the old forts and dined at one of the local restaurants (which was really amazing and MUCH cheaper than the food we had been eating).
On our way back to the resort, we stopped by a local grocery store. It was an unusual one, pretty unique to the island, I'm sure. They called it Walmart. There, we picked up a gallon of milk and some cereal. It was a royal feast!
And when we returned, we were delighted to find the Tulip Festival in our home.
The trip was delightful and I cannot thank Rhett, Brandon and especially my mom for making it possible.
