Sunshine in San Juan | WEARABLES
Y'all, I am beat. I just spent four days and four nights in a gorgeous little place called Puerto Rico, and the girls I went with are no joke. They know how to live it up! If you've followed my blog for more than a minute you know my idea of a big night out is drinks, dinner, and maybe a 9pm showing of a movie. These girls turned my homebody status on its head, and for good reason - we didn't want to waste a minute of our trip when we could be taking in the local culture, eating regional delicacies, and drinking our faces off with spring breakers (note to self: the month of March is off limits to anywhere tropical from now on.)
Most of the time, my blogger tendencies were capped at snapshots of buildings as we walked by, without stopping the entire troupe to take more extensive photos. But when you visit the historic Old San Juan area and get a glimpse of these magnificently colorful houses, you try and resist the urge to photobomb every building you see.
Nope, it's impossible.
Though this outfit definitely isn't the most flattering on me, it made me feel very tropical and less gringa-like (though, to be fair, I don't know if my wide-eyed-at-every-beautiful-sight appearance helped my anti-tourist cause.)
These outfit photos were snapped by Dhruvi from Stilettos & Sequins (the birthday girl, and the reason we all ventured across land and sea to the isle of PR) on our last full day in San Juan, after we all downed some carbs and coconut water at a small spot on the edge of Old San Juan. Did you know that if you order a coco in Puerto Rico, they bring you a real coconut with a straw in it? A whole coconut! Island life is the best.
We had a jam-packed itinerary, and we were on a mission to see some of Old San Juan during the daylight hours while en route to pick up a rental car for our trip to Culebra the next day, so after D and I took photos of each other's vacation style we wandered through the streets of San Juan to meet up with our friends and pick up the car. Our friends had tired of our photo antics and moseyed on to our final location ahead of us. Sí claro.
I, obviously, had to paparazzi everything in sight:
We made a small pit stop at Cafeteria Mallorca for some cafés con leche after one of Dhruvi's readers had told her it was the place to go. The diner-feel of the cafe was the perfect vibe to end our little tourist walk - it felt authentic and welcoming, rather than glitzy and hokey.
D was really proud of herself for conducting the entire affair en Español - and I was super impressed too! All four of the ladies I traveled with were basically fluent in Spanish, and I can only speak about eight words of it. One of those words being taco, this wasn't incredibly helpful to them. Hopefully I contributed some slight comic relief?
We eventually met up with our group and, after some frantic in-hotel-lobby planning, departed for our next adventure. And I vowed to learn Spanish.
What are your thoughts on visiting the historic, but usually more touristy, areas of different cities? Sí o no?
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hibiscus top | Therapy on Valencia (similar) jeans | Gap 1969 Denim Always Skinny sandals | Madewell, old (similar) bag | Cruciani from Poshmark (similar) gold cuff bracelet | Gorjana Aldridge cuff from Rocksbox earrings | Old Navy (similar) sunglasses | Carrera (similar)