November 10 Humacao to Cruise Ship

November 10

First a word about last night...
We went for a night ride in our golf cart and it turned out to be quite an adventure.  It started off great, with trails going everywhere, off the main streets.  We wandered a long way from our rooms, meandering at will.  We found ourselves on windy trails through one of the golf courses and scared many birds, a big bull frog, and even a crab...right on the fairway!  When we tried to get back, we found ourselves going in circles, ending up on the same wrong stretch of road 4-5 times.  Finally, we asked for directions and made it back.  We had been gone for two full hours, when our intention had been 45-60 minutes.

What a stressful day!

After returning the golf cart and checking out, we decided to go to the UPS store, have them wrap some packages for us and mail them to us.  This would mean avoiding the hassle and extra luggage both on the ship and the plane.

We had an address in Humacao and put it into both my map program on the iPad and on Jim's GPS.  It was through town on the other side.  When we got there no one knew anything about it.  A policeman looked at our address and directed us back through town, practically where we started.  We still couldn't Find it, so we asked directions again, only to find the store had closed.  The phone number didn't work, but we were directed to another store in a different town, Caguays.

I called and the store did exist, but the gentleman couldn't speak English well, and he couldn't really give any directions.  Again, we put  in the  street address we found on the internet, and it took us across town.  We couldn't find it and residents in the area had never heard of it.  Finally a guy in a gas station gave directions...turn left at the next signal, go five ssignals about and turn left after the auto parts store.  After two more calls to the UPS store, we were directed to an Industrial Park where the attendant told us UPS was closed, and we could see that it was.  I called the store again and gave the phone to the attendant so he could get directions for us.  His were no better than before.  I called the store again in deep frustration and found that the girl had misinderstood.  They were a small packing shop, Pack and Ship, and worked with UPS.  She thought I wanted the main store.  To mak a much longer story short, after another phone call and much frustration, we found the store.

The clerk there was apologetic about our 2.5 hour drive about town in all the traffic.  She was much easier to understand in person and we got to talking about Puerto Rican politics.  Jim told her about WA's gay marriage and marijuana ballot measures passing.  She said that with all the very aggressive drivers in Puerto Rico, perhaps a marijuana law would help.

She, too, commiserated about our being there on Election Day.  She said Puerto Ricans wildly celebrate all holidays...Mexican Independence, Halloween, Jewish holidays, everything.  They just like to celebrate.

We were two hours late returning the rental car, so we had to pay another day.

THEN, we made it to the ship, and are relaxing for the first time all day.

Adios.