Trip Report - Eastern Caribbean - March 2015 - From Seti to Ceti

The next day, it being close to my husband's birthday, I had arranged for a driver to take us to the Arecibo observatory and to anywhere else where there might be good opportunities to take photos.

Arecibo radio telescope

After a tour of the grounds, the driver took us around to different scenic locations. I had told him that I liked to see graffiti, so he took us to two different sites with impressive graffiti installations, including two by Zaya.

One of the sites was in the Santurce neighborhood of San Juan, where every year they have an annual graffiti festival and invite new artists.

Street art by Zaya in Arecibo (the town)

Street art by Zaya in Santurce

We also stopped by a small outdoor stand that was selling ceti empanadillos. Ceti are tiny fish that are mixed with other ingredients and then roasted in banana leaves. I found out later that Andrew Zimmern had talked about them

on his show. "Weird Food".

Ceti fish mixed with squash and seasonings,
and roasted in banana leaves.

Inside El Morro

The driver let us off in Old San Juan near El Morro. The grassy area outside the fort is a popular place to walk or to
fly a kite.

Locals flying a kite near El Morro

One of the places I had on my "must see" list was a gift shop/coffee house called "Poet's Alley". It has a nice ambiance, and there are even pads of paper available by the tables so that you can write a poem while you wait. Unfortunately in this instance it appears that the long list of interesting-sounding coffee drinks on the wall menu was almost totally mythical. They listed 'Song', 'Fable', 'Limerick', and 'Fairy Tale' cofee blends, but when I asked for them, they didn't have them. "What do you have?" I finally asked. "Mango." was the reply. It turned out to be a delicious smoothy with whipped cream on top, not the fruit tea I had been expecting. We will draw a veil over the quiche - just don't order it. The fact that the young man who served us looked as if he could have been the model for the rough hero of a romance novel made up for just about everything, though.

The lyrical coffee and tea list - almost totally
mythical.

We did some more walking and then took a cab from an area near the port. Back to the hotel for 'Happy Hour'.