We packed light - only one backpack for each of us, and took the subway to the airport. We took the midnight flight to Texas, and spent the morning sleeping in the airport, waiting for our afternoon flight to Puerto Rico. From the San Juan airport we went by shuttle to the car rental location, and the second we got there it started raining very heavily.
We drove in the rain and it was late evening when we got to the Dreams Hotel. It’s small and shitty, and the doors to the rooms are practically pieces of sheet metal, but it’s cute and it was all we needed.
For local food, the receptionist sent us to El Hipopotamo. The waiters did not really understand any English, so we ended up pointing semi-randomly at dishes in the menu. We did good: our food was excellent, and the atmosphere was exactly what we wanted. Most of the patrons were middle aged local folks, who just finished their dinner and were singing along with the man on the tiny stage. He was playing the backing tracks from his computer and every now and again brought somebody to the stage to sing with him. At some point, a bald man with a mustache and a trumpet walked into the restaurant, went on stage, joined in for one song, and left.
After dinner we went for a walk. It turned out our hotel was right next to Universidad, the campus of the University of Puerto Rico. We walked between the clubs packed with partying students and landed in the Mona Lisa, a bar that was already winding down. Facing the absence of a bartender, I managed to get some drinks out of an incompetent waiter. We drank slowly as we watched the traffic of drunk students staggering to their dorms, and then we called it a day.
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