The morning of disembarkation is usually very sad. Everyone plans their flights so they can leave the ship and head directly to the airport, giving themselves an hour or so of cushion to make their flights. We planned our flights so we had as much time in San Juan today as possible. We got up at 7 am to finish packing the stateroom and then we took our bags with us to Tiana’s for breakfast.
As we were finishing breakfast, I received a text from Harold, who was to be our tour guide from Puerto Rico Green Transportation. He let me know that he was outside and waiting for us whenever we were ready. We said our goodbyes to Shane and Manuel and headed off the ship.
Since we didn’t have to wait for our bags, we were off the ship and through customs in about five minutes. We looked for Harold, but ended up finding another guide from Puerto Rico Green Transportation first (they had on bright green logo polo shirts). He took us over to where Harold was waiting in our Mercedes Benz Metris Minivan. It had space for 7 people and 8 pieces of luggage. He offered us cold water and snacks, in addition to going over our preferences for the day. We were going to do a four hour tour of San Juan before heading to one of our favorite restaurants, then off to the airport to catch our flights home.
Once we were comfortable and buckled up, Harold took us out of the parking lot. We headed to the nearby convention center to get a look at it, then we were off to old San Juan.
Harold gave running commentary as we drove around, pulling into various driveways to explain the history of different buildings and hotels. Our first real stop was the Capitol building of Puerto Rico. We stopped the van so we could get out to look at the building. After having the purpose and history of the building explained to us, we headed across the street.
Waiting for us across the street was Plaza San Juan Bautista. The plaza had a statute of Juan Bautista, in addition to a wall of glass mosaics that have all the townships and provinces of Puerto Rico.
Beyond the Plaza was the ocean, with great views up and down the coast.
After spending a few minutes admiring the view, we were back in the van and heading for Castillo de San Cristóbal, which is the largest Spanish fort that was built in the new world. Our friends had visited the fort prior to the cruise and we had never been, so Harold said we might as well do a drive through. We didn’t have a ton of time or we would have definitely done a tour.
After our drive through of the fort, Harold took us towards Castillo San Felipe del Morro. We had visited this fort before on a prior trip to San Juan, but Harold wanted to make sure we got to see the cemetery next to it, Capilla del Cementerio Santa María. This is the resting place for many famous people from Puerto Rico’s past.
What followed next was super exciting, but also nerve wracking. Harold took us through the famous La Perla area of San Juan. La Perla is a historic shanty town, adjacent to the Capilla del Cementerio, comprised of hundreds of houses stacked between the outside of the walls of Old San Juan and the ocean. The neighborhoods contains artistic enclaves as well as hot nightspots with various clubs. The nerve wracking portion was the fact that the roads were super narrow and Harold was driving a large van. The road was barely capable of holding the minivan, let alone the various oncoming cars we encountered on these “roads”. Harold did a masterful job though and got us through.
After leaving the neighborhood, Harold took us to the San Juan Bautista Cathedral. We’ve been to the Cathedral before, but Harold told us he had something different there to show us. He parked the van and we got out. We briefly entered the Catherdral to look around, then turned east and headed down the hill.
Our destination was the Puerta de San Juan, was the main gate for the walled city of Old San Juan. This was the primary gate used to access the old city. I was really excited because we didn’t see this the last time we came to the San Juan. Harold explained the history of the gate and then took us through the wall to the outside.
We walked around outside the game for a little bit, reading the signs and looking at the walls and sentry boxes.
Once we were done looking around at the fortifications, Harold offered to take us to some local shops. We headed back up the hill towards the Cathedral and then took a right. We walked past several of the traditional buildings. Harold said a lot of them had similar entryways to help with air circulation.
We headed farther down the street and went into a local art shop. The ladies did some shopping and found lots of items to purchase. Harold said there were some additional shops around the corner he recommended, so we headed in that direction.
We did get to see the street in front of the La Fortaleza, which is the governor’s mansion. This had been the scene of several protests the week before. It was also the location of the famous hanging umbrellas, which had since come down to be replaced with the Flag of Puerto Rico. I actually really liked it with the flag. After snapping some quick pictures, we headed down to a shop that Harold recommended. As we shopped in the store, Harold ran back to grab the van and said he would meet us out front in a few minutes so we would have more time before heading to the restaurant. He arrived in ten minutes and we were off for lunch.
Harold drove us to Casita Miramar, which is a restaurant we found when we last visited. We loved the service and the food and basically planned this day around going here for lunch. We wanted to get here before the cruise but between the school schedule and the flight schedule, we couldn’t make it work.
The dining room wasn’t crowded at all since we arrived relatively early. We were quickly seated and ready for lunch.
The menus are shown on various blackboards and they are always changing. We got several appetizers to share and then we all ordered entrees.
We finished eating, paid our bill, and then texted Harold to let him know we were almost done. As we walked out, Harold pulled up with the van so we could head off to the airport. We were at the airport within a few minutes. Harold helped take all the bags out of the van and after giving him an additional gratuity, we were inside the airport. We were with Harold for a total of about six hours, which costs about $300 plus gratuity. It was well worth it as we got a private tour of San Juan and storage for our bags while we took the tour and enjoyed lunch.
In order to check your bags at the Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport, you have to put your bags through an agricultural inspection station and get an inspection sticker. Once we got our stickers, we decided to go ahead and change into some warmer clothes since it was still winter at home. After changing, we checked into our flight and headed through the TSA Pre-check line. We headed to the gate to waiting for boarding.
Our flight to Charlotte boarded quickly and the flight was fine. It took us about three hours to make it to Charlotte.
We landed in Charlotte and headed to the American Airlines Club that was closest to our gate to wait since we had four hours before our next flight home to Dulles. Nancy and I both had the Citibank American Airlines Executive World Elite Mastercard which gave us access to the lounge (we’ve since closed this card since it has a large fee and we aren’t flying these days). The lounge was busy, but we managed to grab some food for dinner while everyone tried to keep up on the progress of the Super Bowl. We left the lounge about 30 minutes before the flight and headed to the gate. Just before we boarded, we caught the last few minutes of the game before getting on board.
We landed at Dulles around 11:30 pm, so we were all exhausted. We grabbed our bags and found a taxi home. We had been gone for eight days and had a fantastic time on our cruise. I’m really thankful we were able to safely get in this cruise before the Covid pandemic put a pause on cruising, especially since our Spring Break and Summer cruises were canceled. We got to visit lots of new ports of call and return to San Juan, which we love. Hopefully we will be able to get on board another Disney cruise soon!
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