San Juan, Puerto Rico

So this is a little late, as I was in Puerto Rico two weeks ago, but I've been hustling around the yacht club trying to get things arranged for our next regatta and haven't found the time to put a new post up. I know it only takes two seconds but the team and myself are travelling to St. Croix this weekend and it is a logistical nightmare trying to get 6 kids, and 6 boats with all the rigging, and myself over from Tortola, via private yachts. On top of that, I have 7 buddies from Canada meeting me in St. Croix and travelling back to Tortola for a week of cruising, and more than likely some boozing.

Anyway, Puerto Rico was quite the trip. It was my first regatta coaching the BVI Sailing team and we were in full attendance as it was a qualifier for the upcoming OPTINAM (Optimist North Americans). Puerto Rico is the smallest of the Greater Antilles islands, but compared to Tortola, it's enormous. The population is around 4 million, and it has a huge American influence as it is an unincorporated territory. By large influence, I really mean it was like landing in Florida, except everyone is speaking Spanish. There were highways, and high rises, and mansions, and ghettos, and McDonald's and Starbucks, Wendy's and Dunkin Donuts, and everyone drives nice cars. Needless to say, I was re-culture-shocked from being in Tortola for the past several months.

The yacht club hosting the regatta was at was actually the Puerto Rican Navy docks. Puerto Ricans are known around the BVI for showing up in a navy-like fashion, meaning they show up with a flotilla of 5 or 6 huge luxury fishing yachts with outriggers and towers that are the height of a sail boat mast. The usually roll into the North Sound of Virgin Gorda, raft up, and party all weekend long. They travel with their entire family from the dog and the cat to the nannies and the maids. Anyway, the yacht club had dozens and dozens of these boats fishing yachts and maybe 4 sailing yachts in their docks.

The regatta itself was rather poorly run and there was a lot of trouble with the scoring of my team which resulted in me filling out a lot of inquiry forms. The race course was way out in San Juan harbour and we had a great view of Fort San Felipe del Morro. My team sailed well and overall we finished with a 2nd in Laser 4.7 fleet, a 2nd in Optimist Green fleet, and a 1st in Optimist White fleet.

Puerto Rico was a lot of fun! It would have been nice to actually get to see more of San Juan, maybe to do some shopping at the Mall of America, and eat some more rice and beans, but by the end of each day I was way to tired to bother going out exploring.

These are a few photos I snapped with my iphone while on the water.