CARIBBEAN CRUISE: OLD SAN JUAN

Well, we are back to the real world, for us anyway. Ariving in Calgary at night when it was 12 below zero with a little wind was a real wake up call as to what we had missed for 2 weeks. Waiting outside for a taxi did little to increase our enthusiasm for the Calgary winter, after being papmered by temperatures no lower than 78 during the day and 77 at night. Even the water temperature was well over 80!
We had a great time with a few exceptions which I will go into at later dates. The cruise itself was very nice with weather generally in the 79 to 84 degree area. Nights were as low as 77, imagine that! It was not without some rain, we had showers at times on various islands, but no real rains. Our first stop was at San Juan Puerto Rico. We got to San Juan late the night before we sailed and this tour was taken midway during our cruise.
San Juan is one of the oldst settlements in the Caribbean founded by Ponce de Leon in 1508 and was later changed in 1521 to San Juan. This is Old San Juan. There are old forts that are still in existence, along with old churches in the Old Town area. The whole thing is virtually a Unesco World Heritage site. It has been beautifully maintained today by the National Parks System. The main wall goes for miles and it is very thick and high. It's function ws to defend the harbour from invading navies. From where it is situated it looks very easy to defend any attack from the sea.
The views from the fort are spectacular. The harbour and the surrounding area scenes are hard to beat when viewed from the walls of the fort. Some of the buildings were used during WW2 as housing and offices for the US military. It is a protected tarritory of he United States. Spanish is the national language, but English is used as well by many of the residents. "Spanglish" is heard at times when an resident is speaking with a tourist.
It is warm, about 78 degrees when we are taken by our tour guide around the site. There are guard towers and gun emplacements that guard every angle of the fort and the town. The walls around the fort are 18 feet thick and 140 feet high; it took almost 200 years to complete what was started in 1540.
Today it is a tourist attraction that should not be missed if going to San Juan.