January 10-12, 2025
Friday-Saturday – 1/10 and 1/11
Friday was a travel day with an early start to catch the 8am Jet Blue flight to San Juan. To avoid too early a start we stayed at a Marriot a short shuttle ride from National airport. Got up at 5:40 and caught the 6:05 shuttle. The airport was pretty busy even that early!
Uneventful flight, though Jet Blue’s entertainment system wasn’t working so no movies, and connection via Cape Air to Vieques. Cape Air was a 15 minute flight from wheels up to wheels down. We also left 20 minutes ahead of schedule as all booked passengers were ready to go!
The single runway in Vieques had a good amount of cross wind as we approached so the pilot looked to aiming way left of the landing zone. We “crabbed” in and landed in the right spot.
Our taxi was waiting and we headed in to town, the main town of Isabel Segunda, to stock up at the store. You have to be very careful what you buy and there don’t seem to be prices on most items. The store had some Costco stuff – butter, yogurt, soy milk, etc. The 48oz container of yogurt was $12 though and it seems that’s more than what it would be on the mainland. Cereal was a bit pricey too but the produce wasn’t too bad.
https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/19875109?source_impression_id=p3_1737043294_P3mIIqMMXwskoYfk
The flat we have is great – great views of the pool and the waves/Atlantic beyond. There are mini splits in each bedroom and one in the kitchen/living/dining area. We mostly have them set on “dry” as opposed to cool. We’ll turn to cool if we heat the kitchen up while cooking, or if the bedroom needs to get cooler at the end of the day.
Saturday
Today we got sorted in the lovely 3BR flat with just about everything we could need. The coffee pot doesn’t like the finely ground coffee found here so we have to adjust to allow the slower drip so it doesn’t spit grounds here and there. The frig has an ice maker which helps when you hydrate with lots of glasses of water.
Day temps seem to be high 70s to mid 80s. We walked into town, about 10 minutes and 2 hills to find the fish market. We picked up several yellowtail snapper, weighing in at a total of about 3 pounds. $18, cleaned. We’ll go there a lot while we’re here! Nice to have easy access to fresh fish. It’s probably the best fish market access we’ve had in our travels.
We found another market to get some more supplies at. It has different items and is also much easier to get around. The aisles are organized and not full of stuff as the other one was!
We walked around a bit more and got back to the flat mid-afternoon. Rather than nap I went to the pool thinking of napping there in an inviting lounger. I stepped into the water but realized if I got wet, I’d get chilled. So I found a lounger and talked to the compound’s friendly old cat. He enjoyed the conversation and when I put the towel over me (the breeze was cool) he decided to join me!! He’s very nice. After a while, and without a snooze, it was time to get cleaned up.
We’re going to have a great month here!!!
Sunday-1/12
Our walk today was along the beach. We are hemmed in by large rocks against the cliffs 5-8 minutes on either side of us. There seem to be some spots where there is good sand and not too many rocks and might prove acceptable to the grand kids for playing. We’ll see. The pool is so wonderful we may never get them out to the beach!!!In
Looking out to the north from here we can see the island of Culebra to the NE and surfable waves out in front of us. Turns out this beach is THE surf spot for Vieques. In mid afternoon we saw some terrific waves and 5 or 6 surfers on their boards. I saw one get up and ride in but he was too far left for me to see how he navigated the rocks/reefs that seem to be everywhere.
I tried for the second time to bake some bread. I used a more reliable recipe and had better success. I want to locate the health food store and see if they have some whole wheat or other flour to improve the loaf on my next attempt. The down side of bread baking is getting the oven to 450 degrees when it’s 80 degrees. The kitchen gets pretty hot!
January 13-15, 2025
Monday-1/13
Today we dealt with picking up the golf cart to use to explore for a few days. Apparently when they say there’s a free shuttle from the ferry dock they expect you to be on the ferry. We wanted a rental start at 4pm with a ferry dock pickup. We got to the ferry dock a little before 4 only to get a phone call asking if we were coming to pickup the golf cart. We said we were waiting for the shuttle and learned that the shuttle left after the passengers from the ferry disembarked. We needed to take a $10 taxi to get to the site to pickup the golf cart.
Driving a golf cart on a golf course is very different from a road. Particularly one with potholes and hard-to-see speed bumps.
After the pickup we went to the store again for a few more items. Seems groceries here are exceedingly expensive for some items and only a bit expensive on other stuff. Wine prices seem to be fairly decent.
Tuesday–1/14
Today we explored a bit more with the golf cart. We went to another rental car vendor, recently recommended by one of the guests here. We found we could get a bronco next week for less than the one we rented at the place we got the golf cart. It’s also in town so we can walk to it and not deal with the shuttle hassle. Oh, BTW, the shuttle to/from town will only accommodate the primary driver of the rented vehicle. If you have family, or arrive with family and luggage, they have to wait until you return to the dock with the rental to pick them up. Seems they’d rather have you and whomever is with you to take a taxi!
Wednesday-1/15
Today we went farther afield in the golf cart. Many of the roads outside of town are quite decent. We drove past the airport to the mile long pier that apparently was built by the Navy before it left Vieques, and is reported to have been the start of a bridge to Puerto Rico. That never happened!
We then went to the south side of the island, to the other town, Esperanza. This side doesn’t get hammered with the north wind so the beaches are much more serene. It’s about a 25 minute “drive” at 18mph.
We found a terrific restaurant for a late lunch. Bananas. We had great views, a nice rum punch, and delicious sliders. We each had the 3 fish slider meal of tuna, yellow tail snapper, and mahi mahi. Thom ordered fires for his side and I ordered lentil salad. It was all terrific!!!
We are dealing with a near coffee crisis. 95% of the coffee sold in the markets here are the vacuum bags of finely ground, espresso style, coffee. Our coffee maker is a basic drip and the fine coffee binds up the filter and the coffee and grounds then erupt into the carafe and over the coffee maker. The coffee is also somewhat expensive.
I contacted the number off the sign of a local roaster who sells coffee here and by mail order. His 5.5 oz bag of ground coffee costs $14 but it is the right grind for drip. I bought some to experiment with a mix of the coarser grind, on the bottom, and then the fine grind. That seems to work. At least for 6 cups there were no more eruptions. I’ll try with the 7 cup volume tomorrow.
The coffee roaster said the best solution is to grind your own. Easy for him to say!!! However our son in law, arriving Friday, has a small grinder he can pack along. Problem solved. Phew!
January 16-18, 2025
Thursday -1/16
Today was a quiet day, enjoying the view and doing some laundry. The golf cart was due back mid afternoon. We went to the gas station to get 3 gallons of gas!! And then I walked around the little town of Isabelle while Thom took the cart back. I met him at the ferry dock where he came on the rental place shuttle.
Friday – 1/17
The family are due in around 3. On arrival there are smiles as they see the view and the pool and we all head to the pool where the kids have a great time. Dinner is a simple large pile of nachos!!!
Saturday – 1/18
After some pool time and enjoying the place, we await the car rental pickup and head off to a beach that is only reachable by car. It’s a bit of a ride and then a bumpy, pothole filled final mile or so. The beach is beautiful and very sparsely populated. It’s windy and there are some waves but they don’t seem to bother anybody. The water isn’t actually warm but it’s not bad once you’re in the water for a bit. The kids played and frolicked in the waves for a long time!!!
We had hoped to go to the Crab Island Rum Distillery for dinner and live music but it got late enough that it made no sense as the kids would crash early. Hopefully next week. We picked up some pizza on the way home. Mamma Mia’s pizza was surprisingly good!
We sat by the pool as it got dark and had the pizza. Due to a non working blender we had shaken pina colada’s on the rocks!!! I reported the non functioning blender to our wonderful hosts and within half and hour another one showed up! It’s used and only 350watts so we’ll have to see how it goes…..
