swingchickie | puerto rico

here are a few more shots of the hotel lobby, pool area and our room...

the lobby is designed to basically turn into a bar/nightclub at night, there's actually a dress code after 7pm.

the center of the lobby... hard to see, but under the chandelier is a sunken bar

staircase to the main ballroom

funky seating area off to the side... each cluster of lounge chairs has curtains that you can draw for privacy, it was really sexy.

the canopy beds by the pool at night

jack looking for tree frogs during one of our evening walks around the property... there were dozens of them singing in the trees, and jack was really bummed that he couldn't see one.

our awesome funky hotel room... what you can't see in the photo is the 2 guys in the room next door, who for some ungodly reason brought an electric guitar and amp with them. grrrrr.

and, totally incongruent with the rest of the property... the country-western bar on the roof.

anyway, day 3:

once again, we spent the day vegging by the pool, people-watching and drinking frozen fruity rum things. we finally ventured off-property in the evening, cabbing it into old san juan for dinner and some live music.

dinner was off the courtyard of el gran convento hotel, a former convent where widowed women would rent rooms to live in. it was a gorgeous place, and *gasp* we weren't the first ones there!!! why? 3 cruise ships were docked nearby, and everyone was having dinner before heading back to their ships.

view of the courtyard from our table

after dinner, we headed a few blocks away to the nuyorican cafe, a live music venue that was advertising a jazz night. i'd read about this place in one of my travel mags, and it sounded really cool and bohemian. when we walked in, it was exactly what i'd expected -- a small, no-frills, grafitti-artist paintings on the walls, wooden tables kind of place with a teeny stage up front. AND... once again, we were the first ones there. we sat there in the middle of the room, drinking our rum and cokes, watching the various band members walk by us every once in a while as they set up, probably thinking, "do we really have to start playing just for these two tourists in an empty room?" the band did start on time (one other guy came in and sat down, woo-hoo!), and they were a blast... they were like a smaller version of alo brasil (philly reference), with brazilian music featuring lots of percussion and a dancer in a white bodysuit who got people out on the dance floor. we had a great time shaking our booties for a while, and i was really bummed that the place didn't fill up -- tourists would come in, look around, and leave, i'm assuming because they wanted to be somewhere packed with other drunken doofuses. well fine, more rum and music for us then. we actually made it until *gasp!* midnight before we turned into pumpkins and headed back to the hotel.

the band on stage

the best thing EVER in the ladies room -- a machine on the wall that lets you flat-iron your hair ($2 for 2 minutes of straightening goodness)!

day 4

we decided to spend wednesday on the beach. every day so far had been by the pool, and while we loved it, it would be foolish for us to be at a seaside resort and not spend time in the actual ocean. we rented an umbrella from the beach butler, grabbed some lounge chairs, and hunkered down facing the water to bask. but by 10am, the sun was scorching down on us, and we were jostling to try to stay in the little bit of shade our umbrella provided. by 11, the Giant Ball of Anger in the Sky had won, and we dragged our sunburned selves back to the shadier pool area.

woo-hoo! all covered up under my umbrella, trying to avoid any semblance of sunlight. the angry sunburn i was starting to develop, plus the gassiness i was getting from the rich hotel food, earned me the lovely nickname "Tooty McSizzleTits" from jack. lovely.