Puerto Rico and British Virgin Islands

For our vacation this year we decided to try a couple new locations in the Caribbean. After spending a lot of time reading about all the different islands, and trying to find a good place for kids, adults, diving, dining, and beauty, I settled on the BVI’s. The plan was to meet up with Silvio and Louise (our friends from Brasil), and have a fun/relaxing vacation and hopefully different from our trip together 3 years ago to Aruba (also really fun, but just wanted to experience different new things instead of repeating the same trips again). In order to get to Tortola (BVI) though we had to fly through Puerto Rico and the way the flights worked out spend a night, so we deiced to spend 3 and have the opportunity to explore a little, and have a mini family only vacation, before our vacation with friends.

We arrived in San Juan (Puerto Rico) on October 26th in the evening and went straight to our hotel. We normally rent a house or condo on a trip like this as we like to have more freedom, but decided to do San Juan in a hotel without a car (more or less) because we had rented a house for Tortola. I was able to get an unbelievably low rate on a 1 bedroom suite at the Embassy Suites in Isle Verde, which turned out to be a great location. Anyway we dropped off our bags and ate at one of the restaurants in the hotel that first night.

Our first full day in Puerto Rico we spend between the pool at the hotel and the Isla Verde beach.

The beach was really nice, but the kids liked the pool better. It was a great pool for Jack and Jonah as the shallow end had a really shallow in spots and they could feel safe and still have fun splashing around. Jonah was starting to swim more, which was cool to watch. As it was the end of the hurricane season, the weather was crazy, we had a large midday storm that came through while we were at the beach, and it really let go on us. It was funny to watch how quickly the beach cleared out. We hid under a large tree, but still managed to get pretty wet and walked back the hotel after it ended. We ate dinner that night at a small Puerto Rican restaurant and we had the opportunity to try Mofongo, a staple dish.

The next day we took a city bus into old San Juan city and spent the entire day exploring.

The main points of interest in the city are the two forts, Fort San Felipe del Morro (El Morro) built in the 1500’s and Castillo de San Cristóbal built in the 1700’s. The kids (and Julie and I) has a lot of fun exploring/running around these forts.

We also found some huge Iguana’s (we later learned they are not native to Puerto Rico and the locals hate them) that the kids loved to look at.

Other than the forts San Juan was a nice city, fun to explore but nothing super special. We went into an old cathedral (Cathedral of San Juan Bautista) built in the 1500’s which was cool.

We found a Ben and Jerry’s and had lunch and ice cream there!!! We try to hit a Ben and Jerry’s anytime we are on vacation somewhere where they have one.

We also found a Starbucks which we have to have in every country/city we visit. I used to do this with McDonalds trying to prove the theory that the McDonalds french fry is the same everywhere in the world (which it isn’t, China was different), but Julie and I have grown against McDonalds and won’t eat there or let the kids, so we don’t go there anymore.

On our final day we rented a car for the day and took a hour and half or so drive to the El Yunque rainforest. El Yunque receives over 200 inches of rain a year!!!

We did a small hike (about ¾ mile each way) to La Minha Falls. It was a beautiful hike, and a lot of fun to get poured on while hiking in nice warm weather. A lot different than hiking in the cold rain in Washington state.

We spent our final night swimming in the pool again at our hotel and I ordered a pizza for dinner that we had delivered to our room. A nice relaxing way to end this portion of our trip.

When we arrived in Tortola, we quickly got 3 surprises. First, our driver to take us to our rental car left without us and the rental car pick up was on the other side of the island (about 1 hour drive, and a $50 cab bill). Second, the roads in Tortola were horrible; very windy, steep, narrow, few signs, and lot of damage, plus you drive on the opposite side of the road but in a American (left side driver) car. After the first day or so I really started to enjoy driving on them, but they were still bad and Julie was constantly nervous in the car and refused to drive at all which made it difficult when I went diving. Third, the restaurants and stores were almost more poorly marked than the roads. We spent over an hour trying to find somewhere to eat lunch and we were not being picky. Places either weren’t marked, weren’t open, or didn’t exist, but it was crazy. We learned the roads, but struggled the entire trip trying to find places to eat. I was really happy we rented a house and had the ability to eat a lot of our meals there.

Tortola was extremely beautiful though! It was very green, very natural, and hilly which I really loved. The beaches were great too.

On our second day we went to Brewer’s Bay. It was a really nice beach, a lot of fun for the kids. Paige and I enjoyed the waves, she would body board on the waves using me as her board. Jack played in the sand a lot and in the water with Louise and Julie and then took a long nap on Julies lap. Jonah basically played with his Spiderman in the sand and at the water’s edge the entire time; quite a imagination she continues to have.

The next day we planned to do basically the same thing but go to a different beach; Smuggler’s Cove. On the way there though we passed by the one touristy place on the island, The Dolphin Discovery, and stopped so Julie and Louise could swim with the dolphins, something they both really wanted to do. Louise opted out though at the last minute and I felt generous with our money and signed the kids up. Jack refused to get in the water at the last minute, but Julie, Paige and Jonah were in the water for close to an hour playing with the dolphins!!! They were able to pet them, the dolphins gave them a kiss, and Julie was able to get a ride holding on to their fins and actually be pushed up on top of two and kind of skied with the dolphins pushing her. It was a lot of fun for them; I think the highlight of the entire vacation for Julie.

Smuggler’s Cove was a great beach also. We rented a boogie board with a viewing port on it, so I was able to take the kids out “snorkeling” one at a time. That was really cool for them, and me.

The next day Silvio, Louise, and I went diving in the morning/afternoon. We dove two dives off Great Thatch Island, a nature reserve.

They were nice dives. The visibility was not super, especially for the Caribbean, but it added a lot of nutrients to the water, which attracted some bigger life. We saw some sea turtles, some larger fish, a barracuda, and a couple of sharks.

Julie and the kids spent the morning at a pool at the country club next to our house. Our house had a pool also that they played in, but the country club pool was better and had a small bridge you could jump off into the water.

When we got back Silvio and Louise took a nap and Julie and the kids and I drove down to Josiah’s bay (the beach 5 minutes from our house) to see how it was and if Julie would feel comfortable bringing the kids here the next day when we were diving. The access to the beach though was washed out, and from what we could see it was a pretty rough water surfing beach and it wasn’t going to be fun for Julie. I did let all the kids drive the car though on our way back to the house. One at a time I let them sit on my lap and steer the car. Jack especially loved it and kept telling me to take my hands off the wheel while he tried to steer us into the ditch.


Jack Driving in the BVI's from Julie Tull on Vimeo.

The following day we went diving again in the morning. This time we went to the wreck of the RMS Rhone a ship that sunk in 1867 but is still pretty intact. They were two great dives, I think in the top 5 ever for me, if not my favorite. We were able to swim through the boat a couple of times and through/around the propeller which was about 20 feet in diameter. We saw more turtles, and lots of fish, but the ship itself really was the exciting part of the dive.

Julie and the kids hung out at the pool again. I really hoped they could have gotten out, but Julie was so scared of driving on the roads that they couldn’t really go anywhere.

That afternoon Silvio and Louise took a nap again and Julie and the kids and I went to Cane Garden Bay. This was our favorite beach. It was very calm and protected and the water got deeper very slowly so even Jack was able to play and had a lot of fun there.

That night we went out for a nice dinner at a place call The Last Resort. It was a restaurant on a tiny island about a 3 minute boat ride from Tortola. It was a fun evening, but was stupid expensive!!! We bought a shrimp appetizer for $18 and it was only 2 shrimp and really nothing else.

On our final day we took a ferry to Virgin Gorda. Once there we rented a truck with benches installed in the back and drove to The Baths.

The Baths were really cool. Basically they are formed by a lot of giant granite boulders that are believed to have moved here during the thawing of the last ice age. It is the only place in the Caribbean that has any granite.

We had a good time playing there and then had lunch at a restaurant just above that had a fresh water pool that the kids played at while we were eating. After lunch we did a short hike to another beach nearby to find a Geocache and then drove to another beach called Savannah Bay.

Savannah Bay was our favorite beach of the entire trip. It was just really nice and beautiful and clean and we were basically the only ones there. Unfortunitely we didn’t leave much time for staying there as The Baths were supposed to be the best spot on the island (they were great also), so we only stay for about one and a half hours before heading back to return the truck and catch our ferry back to Tortola.

That night we went for dinner a place that felt like a more local’s restaurant. It was a good meal and not crazily priced. After dinner with went back to our house, put the kids to sleep, all had a drink together and said our goodbyes. Our flight left at 7 in the morning the next day. We had a long day flying home back through San Juan, then Dallas and finally home. The kids were great on the plane, as they always have been, and we had Ben and Jerry’s again, this time in the Dallas airport. It was a long trip 3 days in Puerto Rico and 6 in the BVI’s with a travel day on either side, but we had a great time and it was really nice to spend time with Silvio and Louise again.