One thing about cruise ships is that you always arrive for disembarkation quite early in the morning. It can take a little while to get off the ship and through customs, but you end up with pretty much a full day. By 10 am we were back at Da House stowing our bags and heading out into Old San Juan again.

Door to our room from the patio

Now THAT’S a hat!

Cool mural

We found a good lunch, which is never a challenge in San Juan, wrapped up a little Christmas shopping, and headed over to El Morro.

El Moro

El Morro is the other old fort that guards San Juan and is also now a National Park site. It is perched on the edge of the island overlooking the very narrow channel that leads into the harbor. The earliest bit was built in 1539 by the Spanish,and it was added onto over the centuries. Another cool old fort, this one with six levels and either long stone staircases or stone ramps (for dragging cannon up and down) to get to each level. At the second level, there is even part of a shell that was fired by the Americans during the Spanish American War stuck in the wall.

El Moro battlements

El Moro lookout

We were fascinated by the iguanas hanging out on the walls at El Morro. Their colors did seem to match the walls- pretty cool! There is also a very picturesque old cemetery just outside El Morro that overlooks the sea. What a beautiful place for one’s final resting place.

El Moro iguana

Cemetery near El Moro

A local Christmas tradition was also taking place in the courtyard of one of the large art galleries. There were a few food stalls but mostly there were rows and rows of tables with many artists selling their Three Kings statues. You see a lot of religious art around San Juan to start with, but the most prevalent image is the three kings. This was apparently an annual tradition for all these artists to sell their versions, and it was quite the showing.

At the organic market – appears to be squeezing cane juice for drinks

LOTS of hand carved religious figures, mostly the three kings, for sale at the market

After so much expended energy, we just had dinner at a tavern and grill next to our hotel that turned out to be a real gem. The atmosphere was great and the food even better. Following our starter of garlic shrimp, Mike had a seafood mofungo, and Tami had a grilled flank steak with mushroom risotto that was so good she couldn’t stop talking about it.

Our final full day in San Juan was to be a good lazy day of strolling the city one more time. We checked out the exhibits at the Museum of the Americas. It was interesting to see the history from the perspective of Puerto Rico and to see what they focused on. It included artwork by a local artist, which we really didn’t get. We think there was a lot of political and social statements in the work that just went over our heads.

Museum is on the second floor

Death at the museum

Illustration of the letter M – of course Tami picked out the one with soccer players

One interesting thing about the streets of the old town is the blue cobblestones. When the Spanish ships came over to bring home oodles of gold and silver, they needed ballast for the ride to the Americas, so they loaded up with slag from iron production, each one weighing around seventeen pounds. They have a lot of cobalt in them so they appear very blue. Many of the streets in Old Town are paved with these and they are quite beautiful.

Streets are paved with blue bricks

Since this was actually our anniversary (35 looong years!) we had reservations for dinner at Marmalade, supposed to be the best restaurant in San Juan. We actually both put on long pants and wore nice shirts (!!!). The restaurant was beautifully simple and elegant inside, so good thing we did!

Marmalade specializes in a tasting menu where you pick how many courses you want, and then choose the items from different categories. We went for six since that was the most, of course. We each chose something different and shared everything, so we essentially had twelve different dishes. Let the feasting begin!

And what a feast it was! We won’t bore with all the details, but every plate was absolutely delicious, and we also had the wine pairings that were the perfect complement to each dish. Standouts were the white bean with truffle soup that is their signature dish, truffle ice cream, and the pork cheeks. Service was incredibly attentive, and our waiter took the time to describe each dish and wine in detail.

It was a truly amazing meal, and we apologize for the lack of descriptors. All we can say is that it was a three hour meal and every single dish was a delight. We highly recommend it to anyone who visits here. What a wonderful finish to a fantastic trip.

Alley back to our hotel