Caja de Muertos

Another week at GPS, another weekend of fun in Puerto Rico! We had an interesting week at school (always do!) and Katie's friend Jodi arrived on Thursday. We went out for drinks on Thursday when they got back from the airport. On Friday Courtney & I went shopping for our trip on Saturday. The place we went to has no restaurants, stores, etc. so we had to take everything we could think of. You leave Ponce on a boat at 8:30 am and stay on the island of Caja de Muertos until 3:30 when the boat takes you home. It's about a 45 minute trip by boat and is worth the $17 a person it costs to get there! Caja de Muertos or "Coffin Island" has 2 different stories about why it is named that. The first being that it looks like a coffin when you see it from the main island or by boat...I couldn't see enough of it from the boat to tell you if that's true. The second being that Jose Almeida fell in love with a married woman and was reunited with her after he was done being a pirate and her husband died. She died some time later and he buried her in a cave at Caja de Muertos in a cedar coffin with a glass top so he could see her when he visited. He was later captured and killed and her body was taken to St. Thomas for a proper burial. Either way it's a nice place to visit and spend the day! There's a nice beach on one side, a protected beach on the other, and you can hike to the lighthouse at the top. We got there and spent the first half of the day swimming and hanging out. We then decided to take the hike. Here are some pictures..

Here's the beach we were at and a view of the boat we took to the island through the rocks. We put our things in a spot back in the rocks so it would be like having our own private beach.

Here's a picture of the lighthouse we were getting ready to hike to. You can barely see it on top of the mountain. The other picture is the trail we took. Once we started going up it was all rocks.

Here's the lighthouse at the top and the view of where we were before our hike. The beach we were at is all the way at the end where it looks like another mountain is. It was a long hike! The water and beach on the right of the picture are open, the area on the left is protected because it's too dangerous and that is where the sea turtles are when they come to shore. There is supposedly a wonderful coral reef you can snorkel at but the trail to that beach was closed yesterday. The water must have been pretty choppy there yesterday.

We went to this beach on the hike down from the lighthouse. They were calling it the Coast Guard beach. The water was so much more clear. We spent about an hour or more snorkeling. There were so many neat fish, shells, rocks, etc. to look at in the water. It was clear enough water that Courtney even went swimming & snorkeling! After this beach we had to finish our hike back to our things and got there just in time to haul our things back to the boat. The ride home was interesting. On the way there we sat on the lower level and it was a bumpy ride. On the way back we rode on the upper level. Everything was going great, lots of sun, talking, blah, blah, blah. Then Courtney says, "When we get up, don't look in the front row." There was a man in the front row throwing up on the floor! He never once got up and went to the trash, or hung his head over the side, or even got up to go to the bathroom on the lower level. He just sat there in his seat throwing up! How disgusting!! When we were getting close to Ponce we decided to get up and go down to the lower level so we could get off quickly. Who knows what might have happened if he were walking down the stairs behind us! His wife was rubbing his back and everything. I told Courtney if that had been him I would not have been so nice! Be looking for some good posts next weekend. Sharon, Wilbur, Nicole, and one of her friends get here on Thursday. I am so excited about our day we have planned for Saturday...you'll just have to wait to see what we do!

Dr. Seuss' birthday...and not much else

Not much to tell about this weekend either. I had already finished this post when I read Katie's blog and remembered Thursday! I had to come back and share. On Thursday we got to school and there were no lights. This isn't usually a big deal, happens occassionally. Well, the only problem is we have no windows in the entire school...no joke people. This made for some very dark classrooms. Most of the rooms had no air conditioning either with the power out. I luckily had air but no lights, Courtney on the other hand had both. Lucky! We spent the first 3 HOURS of school with no lights! It was insane! It was hot, the kids thought it was recess all day, it was a mess! My class and Katie's class are reading buddies on Friday afternoons. This last Friday was Dr. Seuss' birthday so we decided to celebrate together. On Thursday night we made Cat in the Hat cupcakes. They turned out so cute. They're a plain cupcake frosted, then you cut a wafer cookie into 2 pieces, frost them, put them on the cupcake in the shape of a hat, add red stripes, and there you have it. On Friday our classes made their own hats and we ate the cupcakes. Courtney had his students write their own Dr. Seuss stories after reading a bunch of them in class. We all had a pretty good week. Friday night was very interesting, to say the least. For more on that I'll let you ask Courtney. All I can say about it is: it was a LONG night and Saturday was spent making sure my hubby was okay. I did alot of running around for him on Saturday while, of course, doing laundry. Don't worry, he's fine now. Today's been much of the same. We did our weekly shopping, finished grades for report cards to go out this week, and watched a movie. I promise you all that next weeks post will be MUCH more exciting with pictures. Katie's friend Jodi is coming on Thursday and on Saturday we're going to a little island off of PR called Caja de Muertos. You take a boat to get there and you spend the entire day. There will be lots of hiking, snorkeling, sun bathing, swimming, etc. I'll be sure to take lots of pictures to show you our fun. Then the next week, on the 15th, Sharon & Wilbur, Nicole and one of her friends will be here. We're looking forward to it and already have plans made for what to do. I won't know what to do with myself when I have 2 weeks in a row of fun posts! This picture will have to tide you over until next week. Courtney took it on Thursday after Katie and I made our Dr. Seuss cupcakes. Yep, they were yummy!

I had to steal the next picture from Katie's site...as you can see, the teachers made their own Dr. Seuss hats also! Please excuse the blurry picture, a 3rd grader took it...pretty good job I think!

Another week gone by...

I don't really have much to share this week. In fact I think this is the first time I haven't even had pictures to put up! It was just another week at Guamani Private School. We did not have school on Monday for President's Day and I must say I enjoyed spending my day at the beach rather than at school! Courtney took Curtis to the airport on Tuesday and the dogs took out their frustrations of his leaving on our house. They tore open our wooden shishkabob (don't know if that's even spelled right!) package and shredded them and they somehow opened our salt shaker and poured the salt all over our couch. They're very frisky little dogs lately! They spent all day Wednesday in their kennels under lock down. For those of you who know my behavior system at school, the dogs had a red week. I had a field trip on Friday with 13 of my 19 students as well as the other first grades. Very interesting... We went to Guaynabo which is in the northern part of the island near San Juan. We went to a petting zoo/amusement park called Villa Campestre. Everyone was supposed to meet in the classrooms at 7:30 so we could leave early. No one showed up in my room because they all decided to meet outside. Did you READ the note I sent home?!?! We finally left around 8:00, only 1/2 an hour late. The strangest part of the bus ride was the fact that a man stood on the steps of the bus with the door wide open for half of the trip. When we got to Caguas he finally shut the door. I felt very comfortable driving up the mountains on a bus full of kids with the door open, wouldn't you? We got to the park and we were the first school there but for some reason we were the last school to get inside and start our tour. We rode on some rides, went on a little train, fed goats, milked a cow, rode ponies, etc. When the kids finally got to eat lunch at 12:30 they were starving...could this be because we are used to eating at 10:40? We ate and then finished up. We needed to leave Guaynabo at 1:30 to make it back to Guayama by 3:00 when school is out. Well, we ended up leaving at about 2:45. Needless to say Courtney was calling me by 4:00 asking where I was. I finally got home around 4:45 because I had to wait for parents to pick up their children. Friday night we didn't do much. It didn't help the I fell Friday morning while we were walking the dogs and twisted my ankle then had to walk on it all day. When I got home Friday night it was bruised and swollen and just felt great! Saturday morning we got up, did laundry, cleaned the house, and went to the beach. It was a beautiful day for the beach in Puerto Rico. The water was warm and calm and shallow. We had to walk so far out just to get our bodies in the water. It was shallow and calm enough that my husband even got in...for a little bit. Today's been spent doing our weekly grocery shopping and basically being bums. I know, I know, we have rough lives! Brent and Katie have a friend coming for a visit in 2 weeks which means we have visitors coming in 3 weeks. We're excited to have more company! Hope you all have a great week and are able to stay warm! I know, I'm a smartass!

Welcome to Puerto Rico, Curtis!

Where to begin?! We had such a full weekend. Thank goodness it was a 3 day weekend or we could have never fit it all in! After our rough start on Thursday things got better. Curt stayed at our house and hung out on Friday while we worked then we drove to Guavate for lechon, roasted pig, with our friends from Chicago. Remember my shoes and fishing post? It was nice to meet up with them again before they left today. Curtis and Al kept teasing each other about how young Curt is and how old Al is. Curtis even called the man he had just met "grandpa" so Al started calling Courtney Curt's uncle and on and on. It was fun! Here's a picture of the girls and the guys.

Courtney, Curtis, and I got up early Saturday morningto head to Parguera to try to see some manatees. No such luck! We didn't see any but we did take a Johnny's Boats tour back to the mangroves, iguanna island, and Mata la Gata. I didn't take pictures of the iguannas this time but I did videotape them. We got even closer on this trip and they iguannas were snapping at our tour guide Miguel (same one from last time). After "kill the cat" island (remember?!?!) we went back to land and ate at the sangria place that Courtney loves so much. Then we drove to Rincon. We stopped at the Mayaguez Zoo (the only zoo on the island!) with a hour left before they closed. Don't worry folks, we made it through the zoo! It wasn't a bad zoo, we've seen worse in Clay Center, but there were some definite changes that should have been made. The animals that needed companions didn't have them but the ones that didn't need them had them. Go figure! I was busy with the video camera so Courtney was in charge of the digital. He did a pretty good job! We did have some interesting experiences at the zoo like...watching an ostrich go to the bathroom, missing the chimpanzee exhibit because they close early, oh, and setting an emu free. Here are some of our favorite pictures my hubby took.

There are so many more pictures of the zoo but not enough time or space here! After the zoo we went to our hotel to relax, had dinner, and went to bed pretty early. We got up early Sunday morning to go to the lighthouse to try to see some whales. We had barely been there, maybe 10 minutes, when we saw them! We saw probably 5 total but we think they were all in the same pod. It was so beautiful and amazing! We had been standing for just a while thinking it probably wouldn't happen when I saw some white stuff in the water. I said it looked a little weird, not quite like breaking waves. Curt got out his binoculars and saw the body! Good eye, Kelly, if I do say so myself! Especially coming from the girl with horrible (used to be horrible!) eyesight. I didn't get them on still camera because they were so far away and you wouldn't have been able to see them but I again had my trusty video camera on hand and was able to see a few glances. Amazing!! We were so excited! After the excitement died down we headed for San Juan but decided to stop at the blowhole again. We yelled for the cow again but the waves weren't too great this time. We didn't even get wet! We kept heading to San Juan to go to the Bacardi distillery. If you're ever here I highly recomend going there. The tour is free and you get 2 free drinks. We sat enjoying our drinks when we met a group of people from Kansas. One was originally from KC and his friend from Wichita who just moved to Kingman. Then we went on the tour to learn the history of the rum, how it's made, etc. Here we are in front of the Bacardi bat (during our tour we learned the secret on the bat) and here's Curt in front of a large amount of rum.

Here's the actual distillery.

Last night when we got home we went to look for manatees again at dusk. We were trying to find a place where people said you can see them. We couldn't find it so we decided to stop and ask directions. We ended up asking this stoned homeless man and he was very confused and all he could tell us was to go straight. Needless to say we never found any manatees. Oh well! This morning we got up and did laundry. Then it was off to the beach. We spent a few hours there with the Dills and all dogs. Benny and Winston went swimming and then Lola decided to try it. Curtis carried Miller to the water and put him in. He would not move! He wouldn't swim, he wouldn't walk, nothing! Curt had to pick him up again and carry him out. But, oh well, at least he tried! I was out in the water with the Dills looking for sand dollars (they are pros and I suck at finding them!) when I heard Courtney yelling at the boys. I turned around and saw a huge iguanna sitting on a stump that had smacked Miller across the face with his tail. Curt got one of our towells and picked him up. Here he is with his catch. Notice in the background of the one with Curt poking him with a stick...there's a boy from the apartment complex our beach is at hiding and watching! Courtney is still the Lizard King but Curt is now the Iguanna King.

We've had a great visit with Curtis. It's been nice having family around and I think he's enjoyed it too. Our next visitors come in a month and they just happen to be Curtis' parents! We're excited for more visitors...hint, hint!!

In Loving Memory of Chilee

It is with a sad heart that I write this blog entry. Our beloved Chilee passed away last night. For those of you who don't know the story, Courtney bought her for me when I turned 21 to replace our hamster, Spike. That means we've had her for 7 years now. When we moved to Puerto Rico Courtney's cousin, Curtis, took her to take care of her. He did a fabulous job...better than we could have imagined. Curtis actually flew here to PR yesterday and was with us when his brother, Travis, called to give him the news. It was so strange because Courtney's cousin, Trish, had just e-mailed me that her iguanna of 14 years had passed away. We were talking about how strange that was and about how hard it would be if Curt had to call us with that kind of news. We saw Chilee at Christmas and boy was she mad at us for leaving! She bit me, wouldn't let me pet her, etc. By the time we left she had come around and was snuggly to us. She even barked for us a few times which made our trip for us! Whoever said dog was man's best friend never had a Prairie Dog - they are man's best friend! We'll miss you Chilee Dog and we love you!

Shopping, fishing, and puppies

I love all of the fun things there are to do here in Puerto Rico but I also love having a weekend to just take it easy. On Friday Katie and I went shopping for shoes because Benny and Lola really enjoy eating her shoes. We went to every store in the mall and couldn't find just the right pair for Katie. We did, however, find a store that had all shoes for $5.00! We couldn't resist...they had some very sexy shoes! I bought 2 pair that are out of my normal shoe comfort zone but hey, might as well! So, we shopped while the boys played video games on Friday. For Valentine's Day coming up I bought Courtney a heavy duty fishing pole. He and Brent had been talking about wanting to fish so I thought he'd really enjoy having a pole of his own. I ended up giving it to him on Friday so they could fish on Saturday. Saturday afternoon the boys had their day out while Katie and I watched Pretty Woman and gave ourselves pedicures. While they were out fishing they met some dogs. One they named Carla and/or Casey although Katie and I said those weren't dog names. They also saw a mama dog with 5 tiny puppies and a group of people visiting PR. They came home, we ate dinner, and then went back to our hangout spot (Brandemar...it's a hotel/restaurant/bar and if you recall, it's the first beach we went to when we got here!). When we got to Brandemar we went to find the puppies to give them some food. I agree with Kate, that's the worst part of living here is the sick puppies and dogs everywhere. We found one of the puppies that Courtney and I fell in love with. We named him Pete! Don't worry Dad, we didn't bring him home! We saw the group they met and had a great time getting to know them until 1:00 this morning! We had such a great time we're getting together with them in Guavate on Friday night. Most of them were born here in PR but have moved to the states. Today's been spent relaxing, we took a nap and watched Little Miss Sunshine. This week will be jampacked also. Our cousin, Curtis, gets in on Thursday afternoon to spend President's Day weekend with us. We'll be taking him to Guavate on Friday to meet our new friends. It should be another great week and weekend!

Here we are in our $5.00 shoes! Big heels are huge down here with every kind of outfit. Might as well dress like everyone else (within limits!) while we're here. The shoes were actually quite comfortable and I can't wait to wear them to school!

Here's Courtney with Pete...isn't he adorable?! Then there's Brent feeding Carla/Carly/Casey/Sally. I think Sally's the best name because she looked like part weiner dog so her name could be Salchicha which is Spanish for sausage...Sally for short. Feel free to leave a comment on our BLOG to let us know which name you think she should have!

Here's our group picture that Kate took with her timer on her camera. We had a blast with these people! We'll see them again in a week before they go back to Chicago.

Super Bowl Weekend

Another weekend was completed here on our little island. Did we do something fun you ask? Of course! Friday night we went to Santa Isabel to do a little shopping for the Super Bowl festivities, ate at a bar & grill, and then went to another teacher's house for a "business meeting". Don't ask! But, if you do ask Courtney will be glad to fill you in. Saturday we got up and did the usual laundry, cleaning, etc. Saturday night we headed over to Coamo for a festival. Every city has a Patron Saint that they celebrate. This weekend was the celebration for Coamo's Saint. We got there and Katie and I were like little kids! We saw carnival rides and cotton candy and we were excited! We went on one ride, the Twilt A Whirl, because the boys didn't trust the rides that went off the ground. They did sound a little funny...don't worry, we haven't heard of any accidents...yet. They were setting up for a concert when we got there so we stuck around and watched a little. They also had vendors around with food and beverages (alcohol city!) and a few shops. Katie and I went shopping for earrings...$1.00 per pair! How could we not?!

Here we are on the Tilt A Whirl.

The boys looked so pretty holding our purses while we were on our ride!

If you want to see how seriously they take drinking and driving down here, look no farther than these pictures. I kid you not - for 25 cents you can give yourself your very own breathalyzer (no clue on the spelling!). It's attached to a wall, you stick in a quarter, take out a straw, blow, and within seconds you have your reading. My husband did it after 4 (or 5, can't remember) beers and he blew...are you ready for this?...a 0.25! Ha! Ha! Don't think it's very accurate, do you? I blew after 3 beers and had a 0.00. I was in the "good" category complete with a smiley face, Brent was in the "warning" category with a goofy face, and Courtney was in the "danger" category with a face that I have no idea what it was. Katie was also "good" blowing a 0.00 after a pina colada. I think I should buy a machine for my house so I can monitor my husband's condition, don't you?

Let's Go Camping!!

We had our first full week of school in a while this last week and needed to do something to "relax" at the end of the week. If you've kept up with this little BLOG of ours you've seen pictures of Mendez and read stories about him. Well, he owns some land in the mountains North of our town. He invited everyone out to his place to camp out on Friday night and the 4 of us (Dills and Marshes) took him up on it. Mind you, I've never been camping before in my life. We did a little bit of everything on this camping trip of ours. At Christmas Courtney and I brought back our tent...that we've had for 5 years now and never used. Right after school on Friday Courtney and Brent drove to his house and set up our tents. Katie and I went shopping for the night. I couldn't believe all the stuff you need to camp out for 1 night!

I know it's kind of dark but that's Winston by our tent. All 4 dogs got to participate in our night out. They were really well behaved.

The boys were so excited to use their machetes and hatchets to cut wood. The ground was a little wet and so were the wood and leaves around so the fire took some time to build....

...but they did it!!

We roasted hot dogs and made smores...which Mendez had never experienced before. We sang karaoke minus the microphone and words. We sang ALOT of 80s love songs...not quite sure why but that's what was playing.

Here are beach dogs Lola (left) and Benny (right) transformed into camping dogs. Miller and Winston were on the opposite side of the "campgrounds" by our tents.

Towards the end of our night the secretary for our school, Damaris, showed up. She doesn't usually come to our parties so we were excited to see her and we had a blast with her. The picture on the right is Damaris and her cousin Angel, Mendez, Brent, Courtney, me, and Kate. As you can see we were drinking...just a little...

This was the last picture of the night. Our husbands and dogs were already in bed and we finally decided it was time for us to go to bed. As you can see we had lots to fun!

Baseball, pinchos, and more...

We've already had an exciting and fun start to our week. Last night we went to watch the son of one of our friends play coach pitch. Mind you, Justin is 3 years old and playing coach pitch with the 5 & 6 year old! He's so tiny compaired to everyone else...but there were actually a few smaller than him! Here he is up to bat. He batted first in the 1st and 2nd innings. Here they let every child bat for the first 2 innings, then it's 3 outs OR 7 runs...which ever comes first. They only made it 3 innings last night because they can't play past 8:00 for the little ones. Justin did pretty well. He didn't get a hit in the 1st but did in the 2nd although it got out at 1st base. I also experienced a new food last night at the game, I ate a bacalaito. It's fried batter that has codfish in it. It was actually pretty good! Here's a few more cute pictures of our little baller.

Tonight we decided to have a "bring your own meat" combo meal with the Dills. I've officially had a night of taking nothing but "cheese" pictures. We made our own pinchos which are huge down here. We used pepper steak, peppers and onions, and Courtney mixed some sauces together. We also had corn on the cob and roasted onion potatoes. Here's the play-by-play photo montage...Step one: putting the fixins on the stick; step two: take a picture cuz they look so pretty; step three: put them on the grill; step four: let them grill; step five: eat (no pictures of that...I was busy!); and step six: be miserable from eating too much.

Happy Birthday, Clate!

It was another fun weekend for the Casa Benny 5. On Friday night we had birthday party for Clate. His real birthday is this coming Thursday but we know lots of the teachers have plans for next weekend so we went for it early. Katie made a fabulous cake...I did, however, put the sprinkles on top! We, for some reason or another, decided to cut the cake together so Courtney got a picture of that. Katie and I have had our picture taken together at every party we've had so we had to have some Friday. I didn't bring my camera out so I had to steal these photos from Katie's BLOG. Brent took what I thought was a great picture of us but Kate thought her chest showed too much. That would be the reason for the picture that I have up here now. I'm a good friend so I was trying to hide her...are you singing "That's What Friends Are For" now? It was the least I could do! Kate and Brent met a guy at the mall several weeks ago named Hans. He saw them and just ran up to them so he could talk. I guess that's what you do when you see other Americans down here! He and his girlfriend, Kristy, came by. They seem like nice people. They're from California but Kristy's job transfered her here. Hans is working but is looking for a more stable job because they bought a house. It sounds like if he doesn't find something better they're going to head back to CA. I can definitely understand how living here would be (is) hard. Saturday Clate went to Old San Juan for the San Sebastian festival but we didn't want to mess with the crowds. Good thing we didn't go with Clate...he just got home at 7:00 am this morning! Instead the 4 of us went to see "Blood Diamond" and today's being spent watching football.

Well folks, it's officially happened...Kelly's going through some cultural difficulties. Since we've been back from Christmas break things have been a little strange here. I never really felt weird or uncomfortable here but I do now. I am now noticing the stares from people, the looking at you then talking about you then looking at you again. They aren't shy and won't hide when they're talking about you because they don't think you can understand them. It also seems like people think we're pretty stupid. Last night we had that issue twice at the movies. The worst one was when we ordered at Burger King. Courtney ordered a large combo so we could share the fries and drink. The lady then had to "explain" to Courtney that just because he ordered a large didn't mean his sandwich would be any bigger...just the fries and the drink would be. REALLY?!?! We had no idea! Then, I wanted a whopper jr. with cheese, sandwich only. They refused to give me cheese because I wasn't getting a combo. You can only have cheese with a combo meal. WHAT?!?! I thought it was funny because on the 99 cent menu you can get a cheeseburger but they can't add cheese to a whopper jr. It made no sense to any of us and we stood there talking about it...which made the people behind the counter mad so they were rude to us for the rest of the time we were there. I also had an issue with a parent this week at school that was/is (I think) absolutely ridiculous and I don't feel I got the backing from my boss that I think I should have received. But, you'll be happy to know, for once in my life I stood up for myself. Courtney was pretty proud of me. When I told him what I said he asked, "Did you really say that to her?" Sure did! Maybe things were the same when we first got here but I was so excited to be here that I didn't pay any attention to it. Hopefully that's the case and things will get back to "normal" soon. We're still happy down here. We love the climate, our friends, the beaches, even the heat but I'm finding it hard right now to love the people. Anyway...I'm venting... We might be going to a surfing competition this weekend which would make for some awesome pictures. No, neither one of us surf but it would be fun to watch! We're still waiting to see some whales and manatees. Who knows maybe that will happen this weekend. Have a great week!