Student Travel to San Juan, Puerto Rico

■15 Guests
■Air and Ground Transportation; Hotel, Meals
■Private Tour
■Professional Tour Guide

Available Year Round
Handicap Accessible

Things to Do
Escape the high-rises and highways of central San Juan for the cobbled streets in the walled city of Old San Juan, lined with Spanish townhouses decorated with wrought-iron balconies. Castillo de San Felipe del Morro, perched on a rocky promontory, provides a view of the entire city. San Juaneros head to the golden sands of Isla Verde Beach to swim and snorkel in the calm, clear waters. Hop on a ferry and tour the nearby Bacardi Distillery. At nearby Luquillo Beach, families swim in the calm waters.

Shopping
Expect to find bargains galore in Puerto Rico, from luxury goods to local crafts. Browse the couture emporiums on Avenida Ashford in Condado, or look for trendy clothes and electronics at Plaza Las Americas, the biggest mall in the Caribbean. A stroll down the narrow side streets of Old San Juan reveals shops filled with vejigantes (painted Carnival masks), unique souvenirs, books and jewelry.

Restaurants and Dining
San Juan holds many global culinary surprises including splash-worthy steakhouses and sushi emporiums in Isla Verde, or casual Italian and Mexican eateries in Condado. Sample the island's rustic criolla cuisine, a blend of Spanish and African influences, in rustic spots in Old San Juan. Fresh catches of red snapper (chillo) and dolphinfish (dorado) are two widely available local favorites. Street-food aficionados will delight in codfish fritters or deep-fried cheese. 

 

It’s hard to believe that San Juan was once a deserted spit of land dominated only by dramatic headlands and strong trade winds, but such was the picture when the Spaniards first arrived with their colonization plans in the early 1500s.

 

Unable to stave off constant Indian attacks or mosquito-borne malaria in the lower lands, they retreated to the rocky outcrop in 1521 and christened it Puerto Rico (‘Rich Port’). (A Spanish cartographer accidentally transposed San Juan Bautista – what Spaniards called the island – with ‘Puerto Rico’ on some maps a few years later, and the name change stuck permanently.)

 

The gigantic fortress of El Morro, with its 140ft-high ramparts, quickly rose above the ocean cliffs.

The Catholic Church arrived en masse to build a church, a convent and a cathedral. For the next three centuries, San Juan was the primary military and legislative outpost of the Spanish empire in the Caribbean and Central America. But economically it stagnated, unable to prosper from the smuggling that was pervasive elsewhere on the island.

 

That all changed after the Spanish-American War of 1898. The US annexed the island as a ‘territory’ and designated San Juan as the primary port. Agricultural goods such as sugar, tobacco and coffee flowed into the city. Jíbaros (country people) flocked to the shipping terminals for work and old villages like Río Piedras were swallowed up.

 

The unchecked growth surge was a nightmare for city planners, who struggled to provide services, roads and housing. By the 1980s, franchises of US fast-food restaurants were everywhere, but there were few places to get a gourmet meal featuring the island’s comida criolla (traditional Puerto Rican cuisine). Housing developments blighted much of the area.

 

Unemployment was rampant, and crime was high. Ironically, Old San Juan was considered the epicenter of all that was wrong with the city. Tourists kept to the overdeveloped beaches of Condado, Isla Verde and Miramar.

 

In 1992, the world marked the 500-year anniversary of Columbus’ ‘discovery’ of the Americas. That celebration gave city leaders the impetus needed to focus on the historic restoration of Old San Juan. The energy and finesse that characterized that effort waned slightly as the decade ended. However, the new century has brought several successful urban regeneration projects such as the super-efficient Tren Urbano (metro) that opened in 2005, a space-age convention center situated in the neighborhood of Miramar and a clutch of redeveloped hotels in revitalized Condado.

OPTIONAL ADD-ON: CULEBRA - A tranquil, inviting little island, Culebra lies in a mini-archipelago of 24 chunks of land, rocks, and cays, 18 miles east of Puerto Rico's main island and halfway to St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands. It's just 7 miles long and 3 miles wide and has only 2,000 residents. The landscape is dotted with everything from scrub and cacti to poincianas, frangipanis, and coconut palms.

Today vacationers and boaters can explore the island's beauties, both on land and underwater. Culebra's white-sand beaches (especially Flamenco Beach), its clear waters, and its long coral reefs invite swimmers, snorkelers, and scuba divers.

 

OPTIONAL ADD-ON: ST. LUCIA - Rising like an emerald tooth from the flat Caribbean Sea, St Lucia definitely grabs your attention. Glossed over as some sort of glam honeymoon spot, this mountainous island has much more to offer then just posh digs.

 

Who says the Caribbean is all about lying on the beach? If that’s all you do in St Lucia you’re missing out. The rainforest-choked interior is made for hiking; a canopy of green covers the island like a haze. Rolling hills grow to form volcanic mountains and reach to the sky. The iconic Pitons rise from the waves to the clouds like pyramids of volcanic stone. This isn’t some glammed-up, theme-park holiday spot – St Lucia has a pulse. Your senses are bombarded with the sights, smells and sounds of an island that’s truly alive. In Northern St Lucia, Pigeon Island National Park has a history of hostility, but these days, is known for walks and its small sandy beach. Towns like Castries move and shake to the sound of car horns, the smell of rotis fresh from the oven and reggae blaring on the speaker.

 

Sure you can find a beach to sit on and a nice hotel right beside it. There is great scuba diving to be found under the waves and the sailing is top notch. But it’s much more than that. If you’re looking for a Caribbean destination that will let you get under the skin of West Indian life – St Lucia is the one.